Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In this episode we conclude the story of the Coronado Entrada into the American Southwest. By the spring of 1540, a few hundred Spaniards, a few free and enslaved Blacks, perhaps a thousand Indios Amigos – literally, friendly and free Indians – hundreds of horses, and herds of cattle, sheep, and pigs, were making their way up the west coast of Mexico aiming for supposed riches of Arizona and New Mexico, all on the basis of a massive intelligence failure. There were no Seven Cities of Gold, but Coronado and his men would be the first Europeans to see the Grand Canyon and they would name Texas, which ain’t nothing.
Selected references for this episode
George Parker Winship, The Journey of Coronado, 1540-1542
F. S. Dellenbaugh, “The True Route of Coronado’s March”
In your list of place names you need to add the historic site in New Mexico dedicated to Coronado. The following is from the Bing Map description of the site: “Coronado, New Mexico’s first state historic site to open to the public, was dedicated on May 29, 1940, as part of the Cuarto Centenario commemoration (400th Anniversary) of Francisco Vásquez de Coronado’s entry into New Mexico. It is located along New Mexico Highway 550, 1 mile west of Bernalillo and 16 miles north of Albuquerque.”
I grew up in the area and learned a lot about the Spanish in and all around New Mexico.