This locale was first a paraje at an unreliable spring in the Aleman Draw, along the route of the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro between Paraje del Perrillo and Laguna del Muerto in the Jornada del Muerto. It acquired its name following the discovery of the remains of a German merchant at that paraje in 1670. This man, Bernardo Gruber, accused of witchcraft, had escaped his prison and fled with the aid of an Apache friend, from the Inquisition in Santa Fe by trying to cross the desert to the south on the Camino Real. He had been forced to cross it in a bad time of the year when it was hot and in a season when no rains had yet fallen, and the Laguna del Muerto and then the spring at the next paraje was dry. Despite the attempt by his friend to get water to him in time, Gruber did not survive and only fragments of his body and garments were found later in the vicinity of the spring after they had been picked over and scattered by vultures and other scavengers. From that time that paraje was known as La Cruz de Alemán for Gruber's grave there. The tale of his death also gave the surrounding desert its name, Jornada del Muerto.
Alemán Ranch
The first settlement of the site of Aleman, was made in 1867 by Captain John "Jack" Martin an ex-officer in the Union Army, one of the California Volunteers of the California Column, that came to New Mexico Territory in 1862. Captain Martin served first in Arizona Territory and then in New Mexico Territory at Las Cruces, serving in escorts of stagecoaches along the route of the Camino Real there, and especially that of the Jornada del Muerto, until his unit was mustered out at Las Cruces in 1866. The following year, Captain Martin established a cattle ranch he called Alemán Ranch at the old paraje of Alemán, and began digging a deep well there in 1868, the first one dug in the Jornada del Muerto. Without taking any money from the Territorial Legislature or the Federal Government, he successfully struck water at 85 feet. He then charged travelers for his water and received a tax exemption for the business. He gave free water to the military and arraigned to have a post of troops from Fort Selden at his ranch to protect travelers traveling through the Jornada del Muerto region. He also arraigned the first telegraph lines to Las Cruces. The Alemán Ranch was much smaller than the Armendáriz Grant to the north, having an adobe ranch house facing the road with surrounding, corrals, stables and outhouses. From the first it was a stagecoach stop that remained so until the 1880s when the railroad arrived and established a stop on the tracks nearby called Aleman. Martin also maintained a small hotel and established an Aleman post office at the site in 1869 that remained until it closed in 1890 and was replaced by one 2 miles north of San Diego Mountain near the Southern Pacific Railroad at Detroit, New Mexico from 1889 to 1892 when it moved to Rincon. John Martin left the ranch in 1875 and moved to Santa Fe where he ran a hotel until he died in 1877. By the mid 1880s, Alemán Ranch became part of the Bar Cross Ranch, a huge ranch, some its land purchased from the Armendáriz descendants, that ran from Dona Ana County to near the vicinity of San Marcial, in Socorro County. Later, in the 1890s, its headquarters was moved to Alemán Ranch from Engle.
The site today
Buildings of the Bar Cross Ranch built on the site of the old Alemán Ranch can be seen north of County Road A039 to Spaceport America near its junction with the County Road A13.
