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A talk at the Placitas Library Sunday, May 15 will explain Spanish land grants in this part of New Mexico along with the traditional acequia irrigation system. The presentation by land grant heir Rebecca Correa Skartwed and land grant historian Jacobo Baca will begin at 2 p.m. The two presenters will talk about the irrigation system and those people entitled to used them, known as parciantes, as well as activities taking place in Placitas over the past 10 years.
 Baca’s lecture is titled “Las Mercedes Que No Mueren: Land Grant History in New Mexico.†It includes an overview of land grant history in New Mexico, and how land grant recipients had a complex relationship with the region’s indigenous nations.Â
 A land grant heir raised an acequia parciante, Baca has studied and taught courses about acequias for nearly 20 years. He holds degrees in history from the University of New Mexico, where he wrote his dissertation “Somos indigena: Ethnic Politics and Land Tenure in Modern New Mexico, 1904-2004, which examined changes in Hispano and Pueblo Indian land tenure in the Tewa Basin of north central New Mexico across three centuries.Â