History
Before Puerto Vallarta: the name Las Peñas and the story of 1851
The city’s official founding account is one chapter in a much longer history of the bay.
Bahía Journal · October 17, 2026
The settlement’s earlier name
Puerto Vallarta’s municipal government dates the founding of Las Peñas de Santa María de Guadalupe to December 12, 1851. Its account names Guadalupe Sánchez Torres, Ambrosia Carrillo and their associates. Reading that story changes the way the modern city appears: the resort identity is recent beside the settlement’s older names and relationships.
Why the name changed
The municipal history explains that Puerto Vallarta honors Ignacio L. Vallarta, a Jalisco jurist and former governor. A 2012 article in Revista Angelus Novus also records the renaming in 1918. Names on a map are not merely labels; they reflect which people and moments a community chooses to remember.
1851 was not the beginning of human life here
The municipality identifies La Pedrera as a location of early archaeological remains and suggests settlement may reach back to around 300 BCE. That estimate is attributed to the municipal account, not presented here as an independently settled archaeological conclusion. The important distinction is simpler: an official founding date does not mean the bay was uninhabited before that date.
Sources & references
Reviewed October 17, 2026. Rules and event programs can change; confirm details with the original source.