A paved road, New Mexico Highway 134, crosses the range through Narbona Pass, connecting Sheep Springs to Crystal.

Known in the Navajo Language as So Sila (Twin Stars), the pass was lately named in English for Colonel John M. Washington in 1859.

The erg is thought to have covered about 125,000 square kilometres (48,000 sq mi) in the southeast Colorado Plateau, and was surrounded by volcanic fields of the same era.

[5] On 3 September 1849 the diarist of the Washington expedition said of the western entrance to the park, "I noticed towering pines and firs, also the oak, the aspen, and the willow; and bordering the stream there was a great variety of shrubbery, the hop vine, loaded with its fruit, being intertwined among them.

Flowers of rich profusion and of every hue and delicacy, were also constantly before the eye–upwards of ninety varieties having been picked up since we entered the gorge [Narbona Pass] yesterday.

Indeed, we are all in hopes that, yesterday and today, we have been having an earnest of what we may yet behold in this part of the world–a rich, well-timbered and sufficiently well-watered country.

[9] Writing in 1884 about a proposed sheep ranch, Thomas Keam said, "The mountain plain was very pleasant in summer, but entirely impracticable in winter, as it is one of the coldest places on the reservation.

Exotic materials like Narbona Pass Chert are found much more often in the Chaco Canyon assemblages of stone tools than in those of the other great houses.

[13] Narbona Pass chert is also present in Bluff Great House, Navajo Springs and Lake Valley from the Chaco period, but accounts for less than one part in a thousand of the total chipped stone.

However, it is common in the assemblages of Crumbled House, on the lower slopes of the Chuska Mountains, which was occupied after the Chaco Canyon period.

The material was identified as Narbona Pass Chert, a rare find for archaeological sites anywhere in the Mesa Verde region to the north of the San Juan River.

[11] The Navajo people, Southern Athabaskan nomadic hunter-gatherers, arrived in the southwest around 1400 AD and settled in the mountains between the valleys occupied by the Pueblos.

The stronghold of the Canyon de Chelly, to the west of the Narbona Pass, became the sacred center of the Navajo people.

Chuska peak is its head, Narbona Pass the neck, the Tunicha and Lukachukai ranges are the body and the Carrizo Mountains are the legs and feet.

[19] The Navajo headman Narbona had heard of Hinojos's advance, knew he had to come through the pass to reach the Canyon de Chelly, and had carefully prepared an ambush by about 250 warriors.

[20] When the owl hoot signal was given, the Navajos poured arrows into the column, those who had guns fired, and some threw stones or rolled rocks into the gorge.

It is said that the bones of some of those killed in the battle may still be found in the pass, as can some of the wooden ladders that the Navajos used to climb up the Standing Rocks where they hid before the ambush.

[21] In 1849, shortly after the United States had taken control of New Mexico from the Mexicans, Colonel John M. Washington led a strong force of soldiers and volunteers west into Navajo country.

[22] In 1864 Colonel Kit Carson began a scorched earth policy with his 1st Regiment New Mexico Volunteer Cavalry, destroying the Navajo herds and crops, followed by an invasion of Canyon de Chelly.

[25] Moore understood what the market in the eastern United States would value, and in his catalog stressed the use of natural materials and primitive technology.

"[28] Moore was succeeded by A. J. Molohon, who continued to introduce complex non-Navajo styles that probably drew on Oriental rug designs.

After this, the style changed to banded rugs with distinctive "wavy" lines made by alternating weft strands in two or three different colors.

A typical new-style Crystal rug will alternate groups of two or three wavy or solid lines with broader bands decorated with patterns representing squash blossoms or geometrical motifs.

In the 1950s development of coal, oil and uranium brought money into the Navajo community along with social problems and pollution.

In 2000, almost all of the 400 or more competitors in the very demanding race were local, supported by their family and friends with a relaxed outdoor barbecue environment around the finish line.