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War redrew the US southern border. The culture never surrendered.
Natividad says 4 nations claimed his ancestor’s homeland as archives show how border shifts changed communities and preserved languages and traditions.
- Nicholas Natividad studies how shifting national boundaries reshaped communities in the Paso del Norte region over generations, examining history through families that remained despite changing political borders.
- For 300 years, Spain claimed the vast region now consisting of Mexico and the American Southwest until Mexico won independence in 1821 after an 11-year war, establishing the foundational territory for the modern border.
- Natividad's great-great-great grandfather Juan Velarde lived under the flags of Mexico, Texas, the Confederacy, and the United States, embodying the rapid political transformations that reshaped the desert Southwest.
- Archivist Dennis Daily preserves historical maps at New Mexico State University's Branson Library, maintaining a collection by French, Dutch, Spanish, and American cartographers that documents these territorial shifts.
- "With every shift in the border has come a shift in consciousness," Natividad said, as Mexican Americans and Indigenous communities preserved their traditions, keeping languages and ceremonies alive despite national expansion.
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30 Articles
30 Articles
The Billings Gazette+29 Reposted by 29 other sources
War redrew the US southern border. The culture never surrendered.
The border's journey to its current location is the story of a nation that swallowed up Native American tribes, Spanish descendants and Mexican citizens in its hunger to grow.
·Billings, United States
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Total News Sources30
Leaning Left2Leaning Right0Center28Last UpdatedBias Distribution93% Center
Bias Distribution
- 93% of the sources are Center
93% Center
C 93%
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