Terra Patre Farm in Belen, NM, consisting of about twenty acres, is all that remains of the original two
hundred acre farm, part of the two hundred thousand acre Belen Land Grant of 1742.  Donald A. Chavez y
Gilbert is a descendent of, among others, Belen Land Grant founder, Diego de Torres. The owner of the farm
the year the Mexican American War ended (1848), and owner at the time the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
was signed soon after, was his great-great-great grandfather, Juan Nepucemo Chavez. He married Telesfora
Baca in 1848. Both their names still appear on the Middle Rio Grande Maps (102-103) for Terra Patre farm
and surrounding area. The farm has piece by piece been passed down from one family member or another to
the other through the generations.

Chavez y Gilbert runs the farm in the tradition of his ancestors and has taken special steps to make it available
to the community and local schools as a teaching farm. Like his ancestors, he has had to strive to preserve
what remains of this farm and protect it from government intrusion, and confiscatory taxes and ordinances.
The long-term plan is to place this farm in a perpetual trust as a Spanish Colonial Heritage Park to be
dedicated to teaching the children and grandchildren of New Mexico for many generations how the Old West
began and how the first cowboys and ranchers lived.
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Belen, New Mexico
& Southern Colorado
Terra Patre Farms