The United States – Mexico War (1846–1848) and the division of the two countries by both land and water boundaries changed the border landscape. One change was the establishment of International Boundary Monuments. These extend from the Rio Grande river in El Paso, Texas to the Pacific Ocean, marked first with rock piles, but later replaced with permanent obelisks. Today many original monuments are mistaken for rocks or graves and not the history they truly convey. The old Spanish trade route of the Camino Real from Mexico City to Santa Fe, later developed at El Paso into a smelter when the railroad arrived. With the railroad and the smelter came people who settled into what was called Smeltertown. This paper examines the forgotten boundary monuments and Smeltertown artifacts of the El Paso – Ciudad Juarez nexus and the focus of historic archeology along the border and what is still here.

中文翻译：

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美国和墨西哥的西部边境地区-历史不被遗忘

美国–墨西哥战争（1846–1848）和两国的水陆边界划分改变了边界景观。一种变化是建立国际边界纪念碑。它们从得克萨斯州埃尔帕索的里奥格兰德河一直延伸到太平洋，首先标有岩堆，但后来被永久性方尖碑取代。今天，许多原始的纪念碑被误认为是岩石或坟墓，而不是它们真正传达的历史。从墨西哥城到圣达菲的Camino Real西班牙古老贸易路线，后来在铁路到达时在埃尔帕索（El Paso）发展成为冶炼厂。随着铁路和冶炼厂的到来，人们定居在所谓的冶炼厂镇。