Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Ricraider · CC BY 3.0Most of Sierra Blanca was built recently: 3% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1977. Its Register listing is the Hudspeth County Courthouse. Below: 6 old photos and papers, maps from 1964 on, and the census since 2000.
The Sierra Blanca post office opened in 1882, the earliest record of the town by name.
From Wikipedia’s history of Sierra Blanca.
The town was founded in 1881 at the completion point of a southern transcontinental railway. Sierra Blanca has served as the junction of the Southern Pacific and Texas and Pacific railroads. Hudspeth County was formed in 1917 from El Paso County. Sierra Blanca was named the county seat, and has the only adobe courthouse in Texas.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archiveFMIB 34845 Habitat of Couch's and Hammond's Spadefoots and of Two Toads (Bufo woodhousii …
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
In the archiveApollo 11 Support Team members Jack Swigert (left) and Bill Pogue (right) discuss a sampl…2 decades in the archive, from the 1910s to the 1960s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Sierra Blanca. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Sierra Blanca.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Sierra Blanca’s page.
Retake this view · +15The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Between 315 and 553 people in every census since 2000.
3 censuses, 2000–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Sierra Blanca’s Wikipedia page.
Nobody well known was born in Sierra Blanca itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Most archives stop around 1920. The photos from after that are in family albums, not libraries.
The Sierra Blanca post office opened in 1882, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
One place: the Hudspeth County Courthouse (listed 1975).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (6), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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