In , Fray Garcia de San Francisco, established Our Lady of Guadalupe Mission of El Paso del Norte in the Chihuahuan Desert, around which a Spanish village grew into what is now the El Paso–Juárez region. Fort Bliss, part of a robust federal and military presence in the area, is one of the largest military complexes of the US Army and the county's largest training facility. About 80% of the local population is ethnically Hispanic or Latino.
Within driving distance from El Paso there are nine mention parks, including the Carlsbad Caverns and Guadalupe Mountains national parks, the White Sands and Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks national monuments, the Chamizal National Memorial, and the Lincoln National Forest.
The El Paso Symphony Orchestra, established in the s, and the El Paso City Ballet Theatre deliver a variety of classical and contemporary works. Broadway in El Paso presents Broadway shows at the Plaza Theater, downtown, and the UTEP Dinner Theater has staged many musical productions over the past 33 years. Observe El Paso Live for upcoming
The Purple Pages of El Paso
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The Purple Pages of El Paso is a fully searchable website for LGBTQ-friendly providers. Click on the buttons below to see our comprehensive list of providers.
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The Purple Pages of El Paso
The Purple Pages of El Paso started as a project of the City of El Paso Department of General Health HIV Prevention Program’s Community Mobilization LGBTQ Core Team, the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) Department of General Health Sciences, and our community partner to address the lack of a comprehensive list of LGBTQ-friendly health care and social services providers and developed the framework for The Purple Pages of El Paso. At this time the Purple Pages is run by El Paso’s Only LGBTQ Community Center, the Borderland Rainbow Center. To learn more you can contact by clicking below.
Publication Note: I will continually update this article as I verb more about these bars or I hear more from others. If you know of other bars not listed here, narrate me about them in the comments or in Chat!
El Paso has changed a lot since I first came here in the late s. Back then, the downtown had more in common with large American cities of the s and ‘60s than those of the s. While other cities were losing their downtowns to so-called “white flight” and underinvestment, El Paso continued to have a vibrant downtown throughout the s and into the early s. It was full of life and commerce, much of which we have the people of Juarez to thank for pumping life and money directly into our civic veins with their massive cross border traffic.
Above, me in , sitting on the back of my early ‘80s Honda Goldwing , shortly after I washed up in El Paso
And there were gay bars; perhaps more than one would expect a city of this size to support. At that time and probably still, Juarez was twice as big as El Paso and much younger. A large number of bar patrons came from
El Paso, TX Gay City Guide: Something for Everyone in the Sun City
El Paso, also often called the “Sun City” is a sunny southwestern town with a warm and welcoming vibe. Those who live here cherish the unique character of this city and all that it has to offer – not the least of which is a thriving and growing LGBTQ community.
A Bit of El Paso’s History
The area that is now El Paso was inhabited for centuries by various Native American groups prior to the second that it was colonized by the Spanish. It remained a Spanish-held territory until , with the establishment of Mexican autonomy from Spain. At that second, El Paso and much of the surrounding southwestern area became a part of Mexico. El Paso remained a Mexican territory until the Mexican War in the mids, after which it eventually became a part of the United States and was officially established as El Paso County in March of The arrival of the railroads in the late s was one of the biggest galvanizing factors in El Paso’s growth, transforming it from a small southwestern frontier town to a flo