Hidalgo County

Hidalgo County, in South Texas, is bordered by Cameron County on the east, Brooks County on the north, Starr County on the west, and Mexico on the south. The county seat, Edinburg, is at the junction of U.S. highways 107 and 281. The center point of the county is at 26°23' north latitude and 98°10' west longitude. Other communities of note in Hidalgo County are McAllen, Weslaco, Mission, Peñitas, and San Juan. Hidalgo County comprises 1,596 square miles of the Rio Grande delta. Its elevations range from forty to 200 feet. The northern part of the county has sandy and light loamy soils over deep reddish or mottled, clayey subsoils. In some areas limestone lies within forty inches of the surface. The southern part of the county has moderately deep to deep loamy surfaces over clayey subsoils. Along the Rio Grande brown to red clays occur. Hidalgo County is in the South Texas Plains vegetation area, which features grasses, mesquite, live oaks, and chaparral. Native plants, reduced in recent years by extensive farming, include chapote, guayacan, ebony, huisache, Brazilwood, and yucca. Natural resources include caliche, sand, gravel, oil, and gas. The climate is subtropical and subhumid. Temperatures range from an average low of 47° F in January to an average high to 96° in July; the average annual temperature is 73°. Rainfall averages twenty-three inches a year, and the growing season lasts for 320 days of the year.

Indians have called the area home for 11,000 years. Artifacts dating to the Archaic Period indicate that inhabitants of the region were hunters and gatherers who practised no agriculture and kept no domestic animals except a few dogs. Subsequently, some forms of agriculture, such as raising maize, were introduced. Several major linguistic groups called the lower Rio Grande valley home, including Coahuilteco and Karankawa. The Coahuiltecans in the future county hunted a wide variety of animals, fished, gathered berries, fruits, and roots, and used mountain laurel for its narcotic effects. The Lipan Apaches, having been forced out of Colorado and New Mexico by the Comanches, entered Texas in the 1700s and gained control of South Texas by 1775. The Comanches followed them and arrived in South Texas in the early nineteenth century.