Pecos River San Jose New Mexico
Channel: New Mexico Outdoor Sports Guide - NMOSG
Date: 2022-06-16

San Jose is a census-designated place in San Miguel County, New Mexico, United States. Its population was 137 as of the 2010 census. San Jose has a post office, with ZIP code 87565. Exit 319 of Interstate 25 serves the community.

San Jose was founded in 1803 when allotments of land were made to 45 men and two women by the Spanish government of New Mexico. The purpose of the settlement, and others in the Pecos River valley, was to defend the eastern flanks of the New Mexican settlements from Indian attacks, especially by the Apaches. Many of the early settlers were landless genizaros. Many of the comancheros and ciboleros who traded with the Comanche and hunted bison on the Great Plains came from San Jose and other Pecos Valley settlements.

The Pecos River (Spanish: Río Pecos) originates in north-central New Mexico near Santa Fe and flows into Texas, emptying into the Rio Grande. Its headwaters are on the eastern slope of the Sangre de Cristo mountain range in Mora County north of Pecos, NM, at an elevation of over 12,000 feet. The river flows for 926 miles before reaching the Rio Grande near Del Rio.

The name “Pecos” derives from the Keresan (Native American language) term for the Pecos Pueblo, [p’æyok’ona]. The river was also historically referred to as the Río Natagés for the Mescalero people.

The river played a large role in the exploration of Texas by the Spanish.

On June 6, 1990, 20.5 miles of the Pecos River from its headwaters to the townsite of Tererro received National Wild and Scenic River designation.

nmosg.com