The Spanish Colonization of Texas
(Hook.) Spain attempted to colonize Texas from a recommendation from Pineda, who mapped the Gulf coast in 1519. They wanted to develop Texas by building Catholic mission around natives. Afterwards, the Franciscan Friars, who ran the mission, would convert the natives. Then presidios—a military post—would be built; the area would be deemed safe and then Spanish people would begin to move in. They began in 1682, when the first mission was built, called Corpus Christi de la Isleta, near modern-day El Paso. Afterwards, many missions were established, but many factors contributed to the near-failure of Spanish Texas, for what I believe are three main reasons: the location of the missions and settlements, the natives living in the region, and the way the missions functioned. …show more content…
Mission often times did not operate around rivers (Document A). This made the missions difficult, as there had to be constant action between large rivers and the area to acquire water. No irrigation ditches, or acequias, could be built or used as a result of the distance from major rivers, which is made it an arduous task to farm. A even lower amount of missions were placed around the same river (Document A); this made trading between mission especially hard, and made it close to impossible to send messages and news through the hot Texas climate. Trading with Mexico city was extremely hard with the Sierra Madre Oriental acting as a barrier between Mexico and Texas (Document A.) This boundary lessened the amount of news that could travel between the
(Hook.) Spain attempted to colonize Texas from a recommendation from Pineda, who mapped the Gulf coast in 1519. They wanted to develop Texas by building Catholic mission around natives. Afterwards, the Franciscan Friars, who ran the mission, would convert the natives. Then presidios—a military post—would be built; the area would be deemed safe and then Spanish people would begin to move in. They began in 1682, when the first mission was built, called Corpus Christi de la Isleta, near modern-day El Paso. Afterwards, many missions were established, but many factors contributed to the near-failure of Spanish Texas, for what I believe are three main reasons: the location of the missions and settlements, the natives living in the region, and the way the missions functioned. …show more content…
Mission often times did not operate around rivers (Document A). This made the missions difficult, as there had to be constant action between large rivers and the area to acquire water. No irrigation ditches, or acequias, could be built or used as a result of the distance from major rivers, which is made it an arduous task to farm. A even lower amount of missions were placed around the same river (Document A); this made trading between mission especially hard, and made it close to impossible to send messages and news through the hot Texas climate. Trading with Mexico city was extremely hard with the Sierra Madre Oriental acting as a barrier between Mexico and Texas (Document A.) This boundary lessened the amount of news that could travel between the