El Segundo Barrio has been the “starting point for thousands of families” coming from Mexico since the 1880s.[8] It is the second historic neighborhood of El Paso, the first being Barrio Chihuahuita.[9] The railroad arrived in El Paso in 1881, and afterwards, the population of El Paso grew quickly.[9]
The first resident of Segundo Barrio was a campesino, or farm worker, named Santiago Alvarado, who received a Mexican land grant to farm the area in 1834.[2]
During the Mexican Revolution, many people fled the country, immigrating into El Segundo Barrio.[2] Wealthier migrants continued north, while the poor remained in the barrio.[2] Revolutionaries, spies and journalists lived in Segundo Barrio during the revolution. Francisco Madero lived in different houses in the neighborhood while he was working on a plan to defeat Porfirio Díaz.[10] Pancho Villa also visited El Segundo Barrio, eating ice cream at the local Elite Confectionary.[10]
In the 1930s, the barrio was overcrowded, with residents living in presidios or tenements.[2] Progress on upgrading housing had still not been improved by the 1950s. In the 1950s, it was recorded that there were still “more than 12,000 substandard dwelling units in the area, an average of seven families per toilet, with an average of ten persons per family.”[11]
In the 1960s, the city finally made improvements to Segundo Barrio, paving and lighting streets.[11] The Rio Grande, which did not flow in a regular channel was eventually routed through a cement channel in the 1960s.[12] Land containing tenements on the El Paso side was given up to create the channel.[12]
July 1967 saw a tragic fire that destroyed a tenement building which had no fire escapes.[13] Three children died in the fire.[13] People were mobilized by the tragedy of the fire and began to protest, first starting at the El Sagrado Corazon Catholic Church and then moving on to City Hall.[13] The protests had the effect of scaring local officials and spurred a conference held at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), to “study the social, economic, and political conditions of south El Paso.”[13] A local activist, José Aguilar, created a program called the Mexican-American Committee on Honor, Opportunity, and Service (MACHOS), which required that members live in Segundo Barrio and which advocated on behalf of residents for improved living conditions.[13]
Photo by Danny Lyon for the National Archives, 1972.
In the 1980s, Segundo Barrio was considered a “rough neighborhood.”[14]
Flooding in 2006 affected Segundo Barrio. The area was evacuated temporarily in August 2006.[15] A historic building which dated from 1910, the Casitas del Norte Apartments were damaged by the flooding and subsequently renovated by the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG).[