Forestry Division

About forestry service, 74463, Taft, OK, US, New Mexico

Tierra Amarilla is a census-designated place in and the county seat of Rio Arriba County, New Mexico, United States. Tierra Amarilla is Spanish for "Yellow Earth". The name refers to clay deposits found in the Chama River Valley and used by Native American peoples.: 352–353  Tewa and Navajo toponyms for the area also refer to the yellow clay.: 352–353  == History == There is evidence of 5000 years of habitation in the Chama River Valley including pueblo sites south of Abiquiu. The area served as a trade route for peoples in the present-day Four Corners region and the Rio Grande Valley. Navajos later used the valley as a staging area for raids on Spanish settlements along the Rio Grande. Written accounts of the Tierra Amarilla locality by pathfinding Spanish friars in 1776 described it as suitable for pastoral and agricultural use. The route taken by the friars from Santa Fe to California became the Spanish Trail. During the Californian Gold Rush the area became a staging point for westward fortune seekers. === Tierra Amarilla Grant === The Tierra Amarilla Land Grant was created in 1832 by the Mexican government for Manuel Martinez and settlers from Abiquiu.: 352–353  The land grant encompassed a more general area than the contemporary community known as Tierra Amarilla.: 352–353  The grant holders were unable to maintain a permanent settlement due to "raids by Utes, Navajos and Jicarilla Apaches" until early in the 1860s. In 1860 the United States Congress confirmed the land grant as a private grant, rather than a community grant, due to mistranslated and concealed documents.