Political History of San Juan County

San Juan County, the area under consideration, occupies the extreme northwest corner of the state of New Mexico. It is bounded on the north by La Plata County, Colorado, on the west by the state of Arizona, on the south by McKinley County, and on the west by Rio Arriba and Sandoval Counties. This area is something of an empire in itself as it comprises 5,176 square miles, or 3,504,640 acres. Approximately 2,000,000 acres in the area lie within the confines of the Navajo Indian Reservation, leaving some million and a half acres in the county proper, of which about 300,000 are irrigable