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Sonora

From the oldest Clovis camp and the terraces of Trincheras to Kino's missions, Álamos silver, the Yaqui wars, the Sonoran presidents and the irrigated wheat of the Yaqui Valley.

Capital: Hermosillo · Became a state: 1831 · Checked 3 Nov 2026

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AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora
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Álamos, the old silver town
Álamos, the old silver town Photo: WendyAvilesR, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Then and now

Sonora in figures from its history

People, 1900 census221,682Against 2,944,840 in 2020 15
People, 2020 census2,944,840About 13 times the 1900 count 16
Became a state1831Part of the Estado de Occidente with Sinaloa from 1824; on its own from 1831 1
Capital founded1700Pitic founded 18 May 1700; presidio 1741; renamed Hermosillo 1828 3
Indigenous-language speakers, 202062,808Aged 3 and over; 2.23% of that population 16
Clovis site, El Fin del Mundoc. 13,390 yearsEl Fin del Mundo, believed the oldest Clovis site in North America; found 2007 1
Presidents from Sonora4De la Huerta, Obregón, Calles and Rodríguez, 1920 to the early 1930s 1
Álamos silver1683Mines at Los Frailes founded; the northernmost of Mexico's colonial silver cities 4
The first peoples

Clovis hunters, the Trincheras hill and the river peoples

Sonora holds some of the oldest human traces in North America. El Fin del Mundo, in the northwest, is believed to be the oldest Clovis site on the continent, dated to about 13,390 years ago. Farming appeared in the river valleys between about 400 BCE and 200 CE, and pottery by 750 CE. From 750 to 1450 the Trincheras tradition flourished in the Altar, Magdalena and Concepción valleys. At Cerro de Trincheras its people built more than 900 stone-walled terraces on a hillside, and between 1300 and 1450 the town held more than 1,000 people and governed the farming villages around it.

Indigenous languages spoken today

Speakers aged 3 and over, census of 2020 17

Mayo (Yoreme)27,070
Yaqui (Yoeme)18,591

INEGI's 2020 census counted 62,808 speakers aged 3 and over. INEGI's state panorama gives the two largest languages as shares of that total (Mayo 43.1%, Yaqui 29.6%); the counts above apply those shares to the total and are rounded. Guarijío, Seri, Pima, Pápago and Cucapá are also spoken.

Hermosillo, the state capital
Hermosillo, the state capital Photo: Wilber magdiel jimenez, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

When the Spanish came, the Seri (Comcaac) lived on the coast and the islands, the Pima and Tohono O'odham in the north, the Opata in the mountain valleys, and the Yaqui and Mayo along the great rivers of the south, where they farmed the floodplains. Guarijío communities held the sierra on the Chihuahua border. In 2020 the census counted 62,808 speakers of Indigenous languages aged 3 and over. Mayo and Yaqui together accounted for about 73% of them, and the state's own count adds Guarijío, Seri, Pima, Pápago and Cucapá among the languages still spoken.

Sources: 126161718

The colonial centuries

Missions, presidios and the silver of Álamos

Diego de Guzmán's men reached the Yaqui River on 7 Oct 1533, and in 1540 Francisco Vázquez de Coronado passed through and recorded the name Sonora. Lasting Spanish presence began with the Jesuits around 1614. The province was called Nueva Navarra in 1637 and Sonora from 1648. In 1687 Eusebio Francisco Kino arrived and founded a chain of missions in the Pimería Alta, the Pima country of the north. In 1691 Sonora and Sinaloa were joined as the Provincias de Sonora, Ostimuri y Sinaloa, an arrangement that lasted until 1823.

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AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonoraBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurChihuahuaCiudad Obregón6Cananea5Guaymas4Álamos3Cerro de Trincheras2Hermosillo1
Archaeological siteCityMinePortnumbers match the cards
Click a neighbour to open its history.Tap a neighbour to open its history.

Silver drew settlers to the frontier. Mines at Los Frailes were founded in 1683, and Álamos, founded on 8 Dec 1685, became the northernmost silver city of New Spain, with mansions that still stand. Pitic, the future Hermosillo, began as a village in 1700 and received a presidio, a frontier fort, in 1741. The pressure on land and labour brought revolts: the Seri rose in 1725 and again from 1748, and the Yaqui and Mayo took up arms in 1740 to drive the Spanish out. In 1767 the crown expelled the Jesuits, and the mission system that had organised much of the province came to an end.

Sources: 12453

Places in its history

1

Hermosillo

City · 1700

State capital, founded as Pitic in 1700; home of the Ford plant from 1986. 3

2

Cerro de Trincheras

Archaeological site · c. 1300-1450

Hill of more than 900 stone terraces, centre of the Trincheras tradition. 6

3

Álamos

Mine · 1685

The northernmost silver city of New Spain; capital of the Estado de Occidente 1827-30. 5

4

Guaymas

Port · 1769

Gulf port blockaded in 1847, attacked by filibusters in 1854 and occupied by the French in 1865. 10

5

Cananea

Mine · 1906

Copper town where the miners' strike of 1906 foreshadowed the Revolution. 8

6

Ciudad Obregón

City · 1928

Hub of the irrigated Yaqui Valley, where Borlaug's wheat research took root. 11

Independence to the Revolution

A frontier lost, the Yaqui wars and the Sonoran presidents

After Independence, Sonora and Sinaloa formed the Estado de Occidente, a joint Western State, from 1824, with its capital at Álamos from 1827 to 1830; Sonora became a state of its own in 1831. In the war with the USA, warships blockaded Guaymas in Oct 1847 and held the coast until 1848. The 1848 treaty took Sonoran land, and the Gadsden Purchase, the sale of land to the USA signed on 30 Dec 1853, took far more, most of today's southern Arizona. Filibusters, private adventurers who tried to seize land by force, followed: Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon attacked Guaymas on 13 Jul 1854 and was defeated. French troops occupied Guaymas in 1865, and republicans beat the imperialists, the backers of Maximilian's French-supported empire, near Ures in 1866.

1810 to 1920 in Sonora

From the timeline below, coloured by era

  1. 1831Sonora separates from Sinaloa and becomes a state with Hermosillo as capital. 1
  2. 1853The Gadsden Purchase, signed 30 Dec, takes most of today's southern Arizona. 13
  3. 1854Raousset-Boulbon's filibusters attack Guaymas on 13 Jul and are defeated. 10
  4. 1904-08Deportations of the Yaqui reach their peak. 1
  5. 1906Copper miners strike at Cananea on 1 Jun. 9
  6. 1920The Plan of Agua Prieta opens the era of the Sonoran presidents. 1

The people, then and now

Census counts, from the figures above

People, 1900 census221,682
People, 2020 census2,944,840

Sources: 1516

Under the Porfiriato, Porfirio Díaz's rule of 1876-1911, railways tied Sonora to the national and USA economies, and huge land grants went to foreign companies. The Yaqui fought to keep their river lands; deportations peaked from 1904 to 1908, when about a quarter of the Yaqui people were sent away. At Cananea, about 2,000 copper miners struck on 1 Jun 1906 against unequal pay, and the strike was crushed with help from Arizona volunteers. In the Revolution, Sonorans rose to the top: after the Plan of Agua Prieta in 1920, the revolt that overthrew Carranza, De la Huerta, Obregón, Calles and Rodríguez held the presidency into the early 1930s.

Sources: 12513109

How its economy turned

Dams, wheat and the Hermosillo plant

Water remade southern Sonora. Canals dug around 1910 opened the Yaqui Valley to settlers, and the railway stop of Cajeme grew into Ciudad Obregón, renamed in 1928. In the 1940s the Mayo delta was cleared for farming and the Mocúzari Dam was finished in 1951. The Álvaro Obregón Dam, built from 1947 to 1952, feeds canals that water about 450,000 hectares in the Yaqui and Mayo valleys. In the 1950s the agronomist Norman Borlaug worked in the valley, helping found a wheat research centre whose seeds later spread the Green Revolution, the high-yield crops that raised grain harvests around the world; he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970.

The region, c. 1600 and today

What each state turned on, by the era table below; Sonora outlined in gold.

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c. 1600

AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora

Sonora: Frontier: missions, presidios, independent peoples

  • Silver mining districts
  • Frontier: missions, presidios, independent peoples

Today

AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora

Sonora: Mining

  • Export manufacturing
  • Tourism
  • Farming and agro-exports
  • Mining

Its places in the modern era

Numbered as on the map above

  • 5Cananea · 1906
    Copper town where the miners' strike of 1906 foreshadowed the Revolution. 8
  • 6Ciudad Obregón · 1928
    Hub of the irrigated Yaqui Valley, where Borlaug's wheat research took root. 11

Industry followed. In 1964 a bridge over the Colorado River tied Sonora by road to Baja California, and from 1965 maquiladoras, export assembly plants, spread along the border. In 1986 Ford and Mazda opened a stamping and assembly plant in Hermosillo, first building the 323 and the Tracer. After NAFTA took effect in 1994, maquila employment across the country rose 86% in 5 years. Copper kept its place too: Anaconda began open-pit mining at Cananea in the early 1940s, and the mine changed hands in 1990. By 2000 the state rested on irrigated fields, mines and factories.

From 2003 Ford rebuilt and enlarged it, with a park for its suppliers beside it; it built the Fusion and Lincoln sedans from 2006 to 2020, then switched to the Bronco Sport in 2020 and the Maverick pickup in 2021. Its vehicles cross the line drawn in 1848 and 1853 on their way to the USA market. Sonora's long history as a borderland, from Kino's missions and the presidios to the Cananea copper and the irrigated wheat of the Yaqui Valley, now runs through an assembly line tied to North America.

Sources: 11112148

Timeline

Sonora, date by date

Before the Spanish before 1519

  1. c. 13,390 years ago

    Clovis hunters camp at El Fin del Mundo, believed the oldest Clovis site in North America. 1

  2. c. 400 BCE

    Farming appears in the river valleys. 1

  3. c. 750-1450

    The Trincheras tradition flourishes; Cerro de Trincheras peaks with over 1,000 people from 1300. 6

The colonial centuries 1519 to 1809

  1. 1533

    Diego de Guzmán's expedition reaches the Yaqui River on 7 Oct. 2

  2. 1540

    Francisco Vázquez de Coronado passes through and records the name Sonora. 1

  3. 1685

    Álamos is founded on 8 Dec, two years after its silver mines. 4

  4. 1687

    Eusebio Francisco Kino arrives and begins the missions of the Pimería Alta. 1

  5. 1700

    Pitic, the future Hermosillo, is founded on 18 May. 3

  6. 1740-42

    Yaqui and Mayo rise together to drive out the Spanish. 1

  7. 1767

    The crown expels the Jesuits, ending the mission system. 1

Independence and the Reform 1810 to 1875

  1. 1831

    Sonora separates from Sinaloa and becomes a state with Hermosillo as capital. 1

  2. 1853

    The Gadsden Purchase, signed 30 Dec, takes most of today's southern Arizona. 13

  3. 1854

    Raousset-Boulbon's filibusters attack Guaymas on 13 Jul and are defeated. 10

The Porfiriato 1876 to 1910

  1. 1904-08

    Deportations of the Yaqui reach their peak. 1

  2. 1906

    Copper miners strike at Cananea on 1 Jun. 9

The Revolution 1910 to 1920

  1. 1920

    The Plan of Agua Prieta opens the era of the Sonoran presidents. 1

Modern Mexico after 1920

  1. 1952

    The Álvaro Obregón Dam first fills, watering the Yaqui and Mayo valleys. 11

  2. 1986

    Ford and Mazda open the Hermosillo assembly plant. 12

  3. 2006

    The rebuilt Ford plant in Hermosillo begins building the Fusion sedan. 12

  4. 2020

    The Hermosillo plant ends sedan production and switches to the Bronco Sport. 12

The country in three moments

Where Sonora stood: c. 1600, 1910 and today

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c. 1600

Silver, the heartland and the frontier

AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora

Sonora: Frontier: missions, presidios, independent peoples

  • Silver mining districts
  • Towns, farms and workshops of the old heartland
  • Ports, sugar and cacao
  • Indigenous south: cochineal, maize, tribute
  • Maya lands under encomienda or beyond Spanish rule
  • Frontier: missions, presidios, independent peoples

1910

The Porfiriato at its height

AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora

Sonora: Mining

  • Mining
  • Oil
  • Henequén
  • Sugar and textile mills
  • Haciendas: grain, pulque, cattle
  • Export crops: coffee, tobacco, cacao, chicle, timber
  • Steel, cotton and the railway north
  • Ranching frontier
  • The national capital

Today

What each state turns on now

AguascalientesBaja CaliforniaBaja California SurCampecheChiapasChihuahuaCoahuilaColimaDurangoGuanajuatoGuerreroHidalgoJaliscoMexico CityMichoacánMorelosNayaritNuevo LeónOaxacaPueblaQuerétaroQuintana RooSan Luis PotosíSinaloaState of MexicoTabascoTamaulipasTlaxcalaVeracruzYucatánZacatecasSonora

Sonora: Mining

  • Export manufacturing
  • Oil and gas
  • Tourism
  • Farming and agro-exports
  • Mining
  • Ports and logistics
  • Services and government

Why Mexico's own reading of what each state's economy turned on in that period, drawn from the sources listed in each state's room; a classification, not a measurement.

Keep going
Rutanamex

Today's numbers for Sonora

Output, exports, jobs, wages and investment now, each with its source and date.

The book

Book 6, Where to Go in Mexico, chapter 14

Where to Go in Mexico: The Pacific Border, the corridor this state belongs to.

Why Mexico

The national timeline

The turning points of the whole country, each dated, each with its source.

Sources, each with its date

  1. Wikipedia (English), Sonora, History section, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  2. Wikipedia (Spanish), Sonora, Historia and Demografía sections, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  3. Wikipedia (English), Hermosillo, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  4. Wikipedia (English), Álamos, Sonora, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  5. Wikipedia (Spanish), Álamos (Sonora), 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  6. INAH, Lugares INAH, Cerro de Trincheras, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  7. Wikipedia (English), Trincheras (town and municipality), 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  8. Wikipedia (English), Cananea, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  9. Wikipedia (English), Cananea strike, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  10. Wikipedia (English), Guaymas, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  11. Wikipedia (English), Ciudad Obregón, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  12. Wikipedia (English), Hermosillo Stamping and Assembly, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  13. Wikipedia (English), Gadsden Purchase, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  14. Wikipedia (English), Maquiladora, 3 Nov 2026 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  15. Tercer Censo de Población de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos 1910, Table VI, population by entity at the 1895, 1900 and 1910 censuses (digitised by Universidad Veracruzana), 1910 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  16. INEGI, Censo de Población y Vivienda 2020, results for Sonora (press release 33/21), 26 Jan 2021 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  17. INEGI, Panorama sociodemográfico de Sonora, Censo de Población y Vivienda 2020, 2021 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link
  18. Consejo Estatal de Población de Sonora, Data Demográfica No. 2, Población indígena en Sonora, 2024 · read 3 Nov 2026 · link

Pictures

Where the sources disagree

  • Mayo and Yaqui shares of Indigenous-language speakers: INEGI's 2020 state profile gives 43.1% and 29.6%; Wikipedia (Spanish) gives 46.4% and 26.6% with no census year. This page uses INEGI.
  • Battle of 1866: Wikipedia (English) names it Llanos de Ures; Wikipedia (Spanish) names it Guadalupe de Ures. This page says "near Ures".
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Sinaloa

River peoples on the edge of Mesoamerica, Jesuit missions and mountain silver, a Pacific port at Mazatlán, then dams that made the coastal valleys a granary.

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Tabasco

From Olmec La Venta and the Chontal Maya cacao lands to pirates, a wandering capital, Garrido's red years and the oil boom of the 1970s.