Poteet, Atascosa County
Rancho del Atascoso was the second working ranch established to serve five missions constructed near present-day San Antonio, namely Misión San José y San Miguel de Aguayo. This mission was erected in 1720 to Christianize and colonize the local Native Americans and as a safe refuge for those abandoning east Texas missions after French conflict. The first rancho for Misión San José was Rancho San Miguel, which operated until the 1750s. However, travel from the mission to Rancho San Miguel proved too inconvenient and too dangerous. The friars built Rancho del Atascoso to be closer to Misión San José. The rancho stretched north of present-day Poteet, and the southern boundary reached just north of the present town of Pleasanton. Ranchos were typically very large with loosely defined borders. In 1767 or 1768, Fray Gaspar José de Solís described the rancho having “10 droves of mares, 4 droves of mules, 30 harnesses, 1500 yoke of oxen, 5000 head of sheep and goats, and all necessary farming implement, such as plowshares, plows, hoes, axes, bars, etc.” Rancho del Atascoso was abandoned between 1768-1777 in favor of its successor, Rancho San Lucas. Daily, the rancho served as a laboratory where Native American converts would be instructed in the fundamentals of European-style agriculture and stock raising, tending to cows, horses, goats and sheep. Friars, soldiers and civilians also worked to sustain the ranchos. Private ranching models followed in the footsteps of these early efforts. When Misión San José y San Miguel de Aguayo became secularized in the 1790s, descendants of the native converts and early settlers stayed in the area for generations. (2017)