In 1835, a petition for land far from Santa Fe, New Mexico was awarded to "pobladores" (settlers) willing to relocate to the eastern edge of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Founded along the Gallinas River, the settlement became the Las Vegas Land Grant. The history of this grant is the history of New Mexico. On this 496,000 acre community grant, beliefs about land and faith were intertwined within a system of shared sacredness. In the 1890s, Anglo-American merchants and cattlemen joined with Hispano elites in the first concerted effort to wrest control of this grant from its original owners...