page_title: Sandia Mountains
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Sandia Mountains / History
caption_attribution_description: Early snow on the Sandia Mountains, October 28, 2009
context_page_description: The Sandia Mountains, are a mountain range located in Bernalillo and Sandoval counties, immediately to the east of the city of Albuquerque in New Mexico in the southwestern United States. The mountains are just due south of the southern terminus of the Rocky Mountains, and are part of the Sandia–Manzano Mountains. This is largely within the Cibola National Forest and protected as the Sandia Mountain Wilderness. The highest point is Sandia Crest, 10,678 feet.
context_section_description: The Sandias contain a location notable for prehistoric archaeology: the Sandia Cave was believed by some in the 1930s to the 1950s to have been inhabited 10000 to 12000 years ago by the "Sandia Man," a cultural classification that is no longer used.  The cave can be accessed via a 1/2 mile trail in Las Huertas Canyon, on the northeast side of the range, near Placitas, New Mexico.
  Ancestral and early Pueblo peoples have lived in the Sandia Mountains area for thousands of years.  Examples of previous Pueblo settlements, now unoccupied, include Tijeras Pueblo and Pa'ako Pueblo, both founded around 700 years ago.  Sandia Pueblo is a modern pueblo, abutting the Sandia Mountains on the northwest side of the range. Some of the foothills of the range are on Sandia Pueblo land; there have been disputes in the past between the Pueblo, the Forest Service, and private landowners over rights to various parts of the range.  The people of Sandia Pueblo consider the mountains a sacred place.
caption: Early snow on the Sandias, October 28, 2009
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