[3] Its nickname of La Bella Airosa ("the airy, beautiful") comes from the strong winds that blow through the canyons to the north of the city.

[4] The area had been long-inhabited; apart from some green obsidian, the mining that Pachuca is most famous for began in the mid-16th century, during Spanish colonial rule.

Here primitive mines to extract green obsidian, arrow heads, scraping tools, and mammoth remains can be traced back as far as 12,000 BCE.

Around 2,000 BCE nomadic groups here began to be replaced by sedentary peoples who formed farming villages in an area then known as Itzcuincuitlapilco, of which the municipality of Pachuca is a part.

According to tradition, it was after this conquest that mineral exploitation began here and in neighboring Real del Monte, at a site known as Jacal or San Nicolás.

[3] Téllez was also given credit for laying out the colonial city of Pachuca on the European model but this story has been proven false, with no alternative version.

This work claims that the first mineral deposits were found by Alonso Rodríguez de Salgado on his ranch on the outskirts of Pachuca in two large hills called Magdalena and Cristóbal.

[2][8] Mining output had waned by the 18th century due to flooding, but was revived in 1741 by the first Count of Regla, Pedro Romero de Terreros, and his business partner Jose Alejandro Bustamante, who invested in new drainage works.

[8] During the Mexican War of Independence, the city was taken by Miguel Serrano and Vicente Beristain de Souza in 1812, which caused the mines here to be abandoned by owners loyal to Spain.

The old Instituto Científico Literario Autónomo de Hidalgo was converted to the Universidad Autónoma del Estado in 1961, which would become one of the impetuses to the growth of the city in the following years, turning out as it did a better-educated and more technical workforce in areas such as law, engineering, business and medicine.

Away from this centre is the more modern Pachuca, with warehouses, factories, supermarkets and a large football stadium called El Huracán (The Hurricane).

[16] The Pachuca zona metropolitana (ZM) is one of the 56 officially defined areas for the 2005 Census (2010 not released) consisting of the municipalities of Pachuca de Soto, Real del Monte, and Mineral de la Reforma making a total of 7 municipios, with a combined population of 438,692 inhabitants as of 2005[update], up from 375,022 in 2000, covering 1202 km2.

Donated by Cornishman, Francis Rule,[12] it was built to commemorate the Centennial of Mexico's Independence, and was inaugurated on 15 September 1910 (Noche de Grito).

[17] A group from the city had the idea for the clock, and they, along with Mexican ambassador Jesús Zenil arranged to have the same company that built Big Ben, construct the inner workings.

It has a notable façade of brown cantera stone, lightly sculpted, with a keystone in the form of a parchment, cornice, Ionic columns and geometric designed in the upper parts.

The façade contains two towers that flank the main entrance and the north side to serve as guard stations for the building.

[19] The Methodist Church building was built in the early 20th century, and is distinguished by its locally rare Romanesque Revival style.

[2] such as a steam shovel, a winch and a truck used for transport of ore.[19] The exhibition halls contain displays relating to how minerals are found in nature and the tools and processes used to extract them.

It was built and operated by monks until 1869, when the state converted the building into the Instituto Literario y Escuela de Artes y Oficios.

The school was based on positivist philosophy and the University motto of "Amor, orden y progreso" ("love, order and progress") remains to this day.

It was temporarily housed in the old Universidad Pedagógica Nacional buildings, but in 2004 the state of Hidalgo ceded the university the old Santa Barbara Hacienda, with 231 students studying classes in Mechatronics, Information technology and Biotechnology at the new facility.

[21] Beginning in 1824, Cornish miners and English investors came to Pachuca and the neighboring town of Real del Monte to invest and work in the mines here.

The treacherous 500-kilometre (300 mi) trek inland killed about half of the miners and their family members, many succumbing to malaria and yellow fever.

[23] Cornish/English workers and their technology revitalized the silver industry here and miners' remittances sent back home helped to build the Wesleyan Chapel in Redruth in the 1820s.

Today the Pachuca – Real del Monte District retains much from its period of association with Cornwall and home of one of Mexico's most enduring cross cultural pollinations.

Up in the hills around Pachuca, many houses feature distinctly British characteristics: thicker walls, square windows and pitched roofs.

The Pachuca club encouraged the formation of teams in Mexico City and Orizaba, the first championship of the new Liga Mexicana de Fútbol Asociación was played in 1902.

It is the most important annual event in the state of Hidalgo, taking place every October in facilities located in the south of Pachuca.

The festival began as a liturgical event sponsored by monks at the monastery of San Francisco in the 16th century, which eventually drew dignitaries from surrounding communities.

[31] All of Pachuca’s mines worked silver ore which was dressed using the patio process, similar to at Real Del Monte.