Paisano Pass

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out in Presidio County, there's a pass in the mountains that carries a name with a story behind it, and that story starts, as the best ones do, with a chance encounter. Legend recounts that two Spaniards, meeting right here at this gap, greeted each other with the words Mi Paisano.

My Countryman. Two men, far from home, finding a familiar face in a wild and lonesome country. That greeting, according to legend, is what gave this place its name.

Now, the first time Paisano Pass actually shows up in the written record, it's January 3, 1684, when a man named Juan Dominguez de Mendoza made camp right here. That's the first known moment history paused long enough to write this place down. And then the pass went quiet again, as far as the records are concerned, for a good long while.

But after 1850, Paisano Pass found itself a new purpose. It became a well-known point on the Chihuahua Trail, an emigrant road used by people pushing west toward California. Wagon after wagon, family after family, rolling through this same gap in the mountains, maybe not knowing about the two Spaniards, maybe not knowing about Juan Dominguez de Mendoza and his January camp.

But passing through all the same, the way people do when a place sits right where the land says: this is the way. Some spots just keep calling travelers home.

What the marker says

Legend recounts that two Spaniards meeting here greeted each other "Mi Paisano" (My Countryman). First known to history when Juan Dominguez de Mendoza camped here on January 3, 1684. Well known after 1850 as a point on the Chihuahua Trail, an emigrant road to California.