Nuevo Santander Land Grants

The mojonera shows how titles were set; the later paper trail is stranger. After 1848 Texas officials struggled to fit the porciones into a property system built on the empresario model, and by the early 1850s the state had confirmed many grants. Yet by the early 1870s the General Land Office could find no record of the original titles. On April 24, 1871, the Legislature voted $2,500 for copies. John L. Haynes then traveled to Reynosa, Camargo, Mier, Guerrero and Laredo to transcribe and translate the records each villa had kept.

What the plaque says

Nuevo Santander Land Grants One of the last northern provinces of New Spain, Nuevo Santander was established by José de Escandón, and encompassed the present Mexican state of Tamaulipas and part of trans-Nueces Texas. Escandón, known as the father of the lower Rio Grande Valley, organized an expedition and conquered the area, settling 20 towns and 18 missions between 1749 and 1755. Settlers in the colonies in South Texas requested individual land allocations as early as 1753. In 1767, a Spanish royal commission began the work of surveying and granting possession of land to individual colonists at the Rio Grande villas of Laredo, Mier, Camargo, Revilla and Reynosa. The commissioners, Juan Armando de Palacio and José de Ossorio y Llamas, were instructed to survey the various settlements and jurisdictions, to distribute the land to individual settlers, and record all transactions. The porciones, or partitions, in each of the five settlements were assigned a number and required to be delineated by recognizable markers at the corners of each lot as indicated by the surveyors. Mojoneras, or large pointed sandstones marked with the porcion number, year and surveyor initials, were commonly used as markers. The Porcion 74 Mojonera is one of the last surviving markers of its kind. In the years after the Spanish land grants, the area of Nuevo Santander that extended into Texas, north of the Rio Grande, became involved in numerous border disputes between Mexico and Texas, and Mexico and the United States. Despite these difficulties, the people of this region created a lasting cultural legacy. (2013)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Roma Historic District — 1.5 mi
  A bluff-top Rio Grande steamboat port, now a National Historic Landmark District where Heinrich Portscheller's molded brick and walled stone compounds face Ciudad Miguel Alemán across the river.
• Falcon State Park — 15 mi
  A 576-acre state park at the foot of the Falcon International Reservoir, made by the dam Presidents Eisenhower and Ruiz Cortines dedicated in 1953, known for bass fishing, camping and brush-country birds.

More markers nearby

• Heinrich Portscheller — 1.5 mi
• Mission Mier a Visita — 4.6 mi
• Farm Workers Movement in Texas — 8.5 mi
• Old Rancho Davis — 11 mi