Sabino y Lemitar

Lemitar appears on no Mexican-era list of settlements; it seems to have begun about 1831, and its church of the Sagrada Familia was finished by 1835. Its best-known resident came later. Manuel Armijo, three times governor, gave up the defense of Santa Fe in August 1846 without a fight and fled to Chihuahua, then came back to live out his life here. A missionary who dined with him in 1851 found a thriving town of about three hundred, and Armijo died in Lemitar on December 9, 1853. Sabino, across the river, was lost to the Rio Grande.

What the plaque says

Official Scenic Historic Marker Sabino y Lemitar The Camino Real passed near here below the bluffs on the east bank of the Rio Grande. Apache raids prevented permanent Spanish settlement of this area until the early 1800s, when the village of Sabino was established on the east bank of the river and Lemitar on the west side. A ford across the river linked the villages, and a west bank branch of the Camino Real soon developed.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge — 24 mi
  A Rio Grande refuge south of Socorro where cranes and geese winter by the tens of thousands on wetlands and fields kept by people, because the river no longer floods to make them.

More markers nearby

• New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources Museum — 6.3 mi
• New Mexico Tech — 6.3 mi
• Socorro — 7.0 mi
• The Garcia Opera House — 7.0 mi