Puelches is a village and rural locality (municipality) lying on the National Route 152 in

La Pampa Province La Pampa () is a sparsely populated province of Argentina, located in the Pampas in the center of the country. Neighboring provinces are from the north clockwise San Luis, Córdoba, Buenos Aires, Río Negro, Neuquén and Mendoza. History In ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. It serves as the administrative center of the Curacó Department with its rural area expanding into the Lihuel Calel Department in the south of the province. Though it was founded as a cattle town, in a traditional farming area, the main economic activities are

salt In common usage, salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl). When used in food, especially in granulated form, it is more formally called table salt. In the form of a natural crystalline mineral, salt is also known as r ...

production and mining. It is considered Argentina's geographical center by a national decree from 1978.

Etymology

The town was referred to as Los Puelches by the media in the early 20th century. In 1941, the Governor of the province, Miguel Duval, proposed to rename it Coronel Bedoya to honor one of the officers who participated in the

Conquest of the Desert The Conquest of the Desert () was an Armed Forces of the Argentine Republic, Argentine military campaign directed mainly by General Julio Argentino Roca during the 1870s and 1880s with the intention of establishing dominance over Patagonia, inh ...

. The proposal met criticism and it was decided to keep the original name which refers to the native

Puelche people The Gününa küna (Guennakin), or sometimes Puelche (Mapudungun: ''pwelche'', "people of the east") were Indigenous peoples living east of the Andes Mountains in Chile and Southwest Argentina. They were annihilated by Plague (disease), plagues ...

that inhabited the area before the arrival of the

Argentine Army The Argentine Army () is the Army, land force branch of the Armed Forces of the Argentine Republic and the senior military service of Argentina. Under the Argentine Constitution, the president of Argentina is the commander-in-chief of the Armed For ...

. The

Mapudungun Mapuche ( , ; from 'land' and 'people', meaning 'the people of the land') or Mapudungun (from 'land' and 'speak, speech', meaning 'the speech of the land'; also spelled Mapuzugun and Mapudungu) is either a language isolate or member of the s ...

word can be translated as 'people from the east'.

History

The area of Puelches has been populated by a series of natives for thousands of years, who were generally known as Puelche. The term did not refer to them as an ethnic group, but was rather a reference to the area they inhabited. In the 16th century, the

Mapuche The Mapuche ( , ) also known as Araucanians are a group of Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina, including parts of Patagonia. The collective term refers to a wide-ranging e ...

started their expansion into the area, assimilating the then-local hunting-gathering tribes, who called themselves gününa-këna, into their culture. The area was taken over and incorporated into the Argentine state, after the natives were defeated in the Conquest of the Desert in the 1870s by the national troops. The village was founded in 1900 as an agricultural colony, named Los Puelches, by a national decree. Six years later, the local school, the magistrate's court and the

civil registry Civil registration is the system by which a government records the vital events ( births, marriages, and deaths) of its citizens and residents. The resulting repository or database has different names in different countries and even in diffe ...

were opened. In the early years of the 20th century Spanish and French settlers came into the region and integrated with the remaining locals and the creole population. Into the 1940s the region flourished as the growing flow of the Salado River enabled activities such as cattle farming, fishing and mining. It came to an end when the river flow was diverted by western provinces, causing a significant loss of surface waters in the whole province. In 1978, Puelches was officially recognized as Argentina's geographical center by a national decree. A stone marker indicates the exact center. The developing committee was granted the municipality status in 1995.

Geography

The village lies in south of La Pampa province, serving as the seat of the Curacó Department with its rural area expanding into the Lihuel Calel Department. The town is served by National Route 152, Provincial Route 107 and Provincial Route 15. It is located from the province capital, Santa Rosa and from

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

. The elevation is

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of a location's vertical distance (height, elevation or altitude) in reference to a vertical datum based on a historic mean sea level. In geodesy, it is formalized as orthometric height. The zero level ...

. The Salado River runs through the region, irrigating the La Dulce, La Amarga and the Urre Lauquen lagoons, before joining the

Colorado River The Colorado River () is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The river, the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), 5th longest in the United St ...

near Pichi Mahuida.

Climate

Just as a big part of La Pampa province, Puelches has a

temperate climate In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (approximately 23.5° to 66.5° N/S of the Equator), which span between the tropics and the polar regions of Earth. These zones generally have wider temperature ra ...

Demographics

In 2020 it was estimated that 870 residents inhabited the area. As of 2010, the Argentine census showed 560 residents in the municipality, which is a slight increase of 3,7% in comparison to 2001, when 540 people inhabited the area. In 1991 Puelches had a population of approximately 352 people.

Economy

Despite being located in a livestock farming area, the town's economy is based on

production, taking place in the nearby evaporation ponds. Mining also contributes to the local economy, with

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

and

sodium sulfate Sodium sulfate (also known as sodium sulphate or sulfate of soda) is the inorganic compound with formula Na2SO4 as well as several related hydrates. All forms are white solids that are highly soluble in water. With an annual production of 6 mill ...

being extracted in the area. Being the closest town to the

Lihué Calel National Park Lihué Calel National Park () (Mapudungun Lihue = "life" and Calel "mountainous area", "mountains of life") is a national park in Argentina, located in the Lihue Calel Department, in the center of La Pampa Province. The area is one of mountain ...

, it serves as a service center for the tourists visiting the National Park.

Landmarks

In Puelches, it is possible to visit the stone that indicates Argentina's exact geographical center. The old chapel Angel Custodio, built by the locals in 1963 using almost entirely stone and some other materials from the region, remains almost in its original form. Another exponent of the local history is the monument honoring ''

cacique A cacique, sometimes spelled as cazique (; ; feminine form: ), was a tribal chieftain of the Taíno people, who were the Indigenous inhabitants of the Bahamas, the Greater Antilles, and the northern Lesser Antilles at the time of European cont ...

'' Ñancufil Calderón, one of the town's founding members.

References

{{Reflist Populated places in La Pampa Province