Coamo, Puerto Rico: History
When Spanish settlers arrived, Coamo was inhabited by the Taino. Modern archeology has found evidence of at least four pre-columbian villages in the territory that is today the Coamo municipality:
"Buenos Aires" village was located in the current downtown southern section, were today is Buenos Aires Street
"Baños de Coamo" village was located by the hot springs, across the river from the modern baths.
"Cuyón" village was located in what is now Cuyón barrio
"Las Flores" village was located west of the Las Flores neighborhood in San Ildefonso barrio. Artifacts found here suggest a high status cacique lived here.
It is believed the Coamo villages had strong ties with the coastal village "El Cayito" (in what is now Santa Isabel municipality) and the "Toíta" village (in what is now Cayey municipality) due to the large quantities of marine shellfish remains found in the Coamo and Cayey villages.
After the Taino rebellion of 1511 was defeated by the Spanish fuerzas españolas, the hard labor in encomiendas, epidemics of smallpox and other European diseases, and conversion to Catholicism and intermarriage with Spanish colonist contributed to the assimilation of the Taino into the Spanish society and culture.
Founded on July 15, 1579, the town of Coamo is the third-oldest settlement of the island's post-Columbian period (after San Juan in the north and San Germán in the west). At that time, Coamo was the administrative center for a larger area that would eventually be subdivided into several municipalities: Guayama, Cayey, Juana Díaz, Orocovis, Barranquitas, Cidra, Patillas, Aibonito, Santa Isabel, Salinas and Arroyo.
By 1582, there were twenty families living in Coamo, in the same area where the Tainos had had their village of Guayama . Coamo officially became a town in 1616, and was given the title of "Villa" by Spanish Royal Decree in 1778.
Coamo was the administrative center that encompassed most of the southern half of the island during the early colonial period. As the agricultural and sugar industries grew and became the mainstays of the colony's economy, the province would eventually subdivide into several distinct municipalities, and the administrative center of the region would later shift west to the coastal town of Ponce.
Coamo is the home of a series of natural hot springs, Los Baños de Coamo, which have attracted visitors since before the Spaniards landed. These springs were once rumored to have been Juan Ponce de León's legendary fountain of youth. In the early nineteenth century, a system of pools of varying depths, sizes and temperatures was constructed at the site of these springs to serve as a spa for the colonials. During the American invasion in the Spanish–American War (1898), this site was the scene of one of the decisive battles of that conflict (the Battle of Coamo). The American troops took possession of the island, and the spa was subsequently abandoned. Though the site lay in ruins for most of the twentieth century, it continued to be a landmark to the Coameños, who would often go to bathe in its healing thermal waters. The pools remain, but the old buildings which once hosted the island's affluent and colonial soldiers are gone, except for the remains of one central wall structure. …