Butterfield Overland Mail

The 1857 act behind the contract called for four-horse coaches or spring wagons fit for passengers and gave each trip twenty-five days, and the mails nearly always made it. East of Franklin the first route ran thirty miles to Hueco Tanks, fifty-six more to the Pinery, twenty-four to Delaware Springs and forty to Pope's Camp on the Pecos, near the thirty-second parallel. Late in 1858, looking for better water, the stages shifted south along the El Paso-San Antonio road to Camp Stockton.

What the plaque says

Butterfield Overland Mail The Butterfield Overland Mail was a mail and passenger stagecoach service that linked the Western and Eastern states. John Butterfield, president of the Overland Mail Company, won a federal government contact in 1857 to take and deliver mail twice weekly in both directions between St. Louis, Missouri and San Francisco, California. The service ran from September 1858 until March 1861, when events leading to the Civil War ended its operations. The route had a number of stops, including a large, well-equipped one in Franklin (present El Paso). The route through West Texas, later known as the Upper Road, followed a path from Hueco Tanks into Franklin. Route changes led to the development of the Lower Road, which cut south and followed the Rio Grande through San Elizario and Ysleta. The Lower Road provided a more reliable source of water and better protection from Native American attacks than the Upper Road. Both paths converged at the Concordia settlement, where Concordia Cemetery is now located. The Butterfield Trail continued to Franklin and followed the river north to Cottonwoods (now Anthony, TX), then veered west. The route boosted commerce in El Paso and helped increase the town's population. It also strengthened the city's link to the U.S. Stage service along the Butterfield Overland Mail terminated in 1861, although a Confederate mail service used the trail until 1862. The path later became the base for other routes, including roads and highways. Today, traces of the Upper Road remain visible on Fort Bliss and El Paso International Airport property. The trail's legacy continues to live through the commerce and people which it brought to El Paso, and its bonding of the town to the rest of the United States. (2008)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Chamizal National Memorial — 7.9 mi
  A park on land the Rio Grande once put in dispute, where a century-old border quarrel between the United States and Mexico was settled by treaty and a new concrete channel.
• Ysleta Mission (Corpus Christi de la Ysleta del Sur) — 9.1 mi
  The Tigua mission church at Ysleta, rebuilt in 1908 around the walls, bell and Santo Entierro that came through fire, its interior painted with rain clouds and corn.
• Magoffin Home State Historic Site — 9.2 mi
  A U-shaped adobe of the 1870s in central El Paso that joins Mexican building to an Anglo plan, closed for restoration through 2027 while its visitor center stays open.
• Tigua Indian Cultural Center, Ysleta del Sur Pueblo — 9.8 mi
  The cultural center of Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, the Tigua nation that has lived in the Mission Valley of El Paso since 1682 and keeps its own history here.

More markers nearby

• Biggs Army Airfield — 3.0 mi
• Fort Bliss at Lanoria Mesa — 4.4 mi
• Fort Bliss, C.S.A. — 5.5 mi
• San Lorenzo — 6.3 mi