Joan and Keith's Travels: Sky Top City

SKY TOP CITY

Acoma Pueblo (/ˈækəmə/; Western Keresan: Aa'ku; Zuni: Hakukya; Navajo: Haakʼoh) is a Native American pueblo approximately sixty miles west of Albuquerque, New Mexico in the United States. Three villages make up Acoma Pueblo: Sky City (Old Acoma), Acomita, and McCartys. The Acoma Pueblo tribe is a federally recognized tribal entity. The historical land of Acoma Pueblo totaled roughly 5 million acres; now only 10% of this land is in the hands of the community within the Acoma Indian Reservation.

According to the 2010 United States Census, 4,989 people identified as Acoma. The Acoma have continuously occupied the area for more than 800 years, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United States. Acoma tribal traditions estimate that they have lived in the village for more than two thousand years.

Origins and early history

Pueblo people are believed to have descended from the Anasazi, Mogollon, and other ancient peoples. These influences are seen in the architecture, farming style, and artistry of the Acoma. In the 1200s the Anasazi abandoned their canyon homelands due to climate change and social upheaval. For upwards of two centuries migrations occurred in the area, and Acoma Pueblo would emerge by the thirteenth century. This early founding date makes Acoma Pueblo one of the earliest continuously inhabited communities in the United States.

The Pueblo lies on a 365-foot mesa, about 60 miles west of Albuquerque, New Mexico. The isolation and location of the Pueblo has sheltered the community for more than 1,200 years, which sought to avoid conflict with neighboring Navajos and Apaches.

A view of the Acoma Pueblo mesa from the northwest

19th and 20th century

During the nineteenth century, the Acoma people, while trying to uphold traditional life, also adopted aspects of the once-rejected Spanish culture and religion. By the 1880s, railroads brought the pueblos out of isolation. In the 1920s, the All Indian Pueblo Council gathered for the first time in more than 300 years. Responding to congressional interest in appropriating Pueblo lands, the U.S. Congress passed the Pueblo Lands Act in 1924. Despite successes in retaining their land, the twentieth century proved difficult for the survival of cultural traditions for the Acoma. Protestant missionaries and schools came into the area and the Bureau of Indian Affairs forced Acoma children into boarding schools. By 1922, most children from the community were in boarding schools.

Present day

Today, about 300 two- and three-story adobe buildings reside on the mesa, with exterior ladders used to access the upper levels where residents live. Access to the mesa is by a road blasted into the rock face during the 1950s. Approximately 30 or so people live permanently on the mesa, with the population increasing on the weekends as family members come to visit and tourists, some 55,000 annually, visit for the day.

Acoma Pueblo has no electricity, running water, or sewage disposal. A reservation surrounds the mesa, totaling 600 square miles (1,600 km²). Tribal members live both on the reservation and outside it. contemporary Acoma culture remains relatively closed, however. According to the 2000 United States census, 4,989 people identify themselves as Acoma.

Many Acoma people disapprove of Juan de Oñate being called New Mexico's founder. In 1998, after a statue was erected as a tribute to Oñate at the Oñate Monument Center in Alcalde, someone cut off the bronze right foot of his statue with a chainsaw.

Cameras are only allowed up to the Mesa IF you have them registered ahead of time and you must ask permission to take pictures of the people while some areas are strictly off limits for pictures! So my pictures are from down below the housing area on top of the Mesa.