Since the conquistadores of old Mexico would never have stooped to the common labor of tending horses and cattle, they enlisted the services of the commoners, their servants and slaves. It was from this class that the vaquero developed. When Coronado advanced into present-day Arizona (about 1542), he brought horses and cattle with him; a number of the cattle escaped into the brush and twenty-five years later, some thousands of wild cattle were roaming the northern frontier of Mexico increasing the need of skilled riders and "cow persons" to bring them under control. 

Later entradas, even that of Father Francisco Kino, brought more and more horses and cattle into what is now Arizona, and the work of skilled vaqueros became increasingly necessary. All of this expansion gave rise to the hacienda system, whereby large land grants were awarded to loyal followers of the Spanish king.

Those who had already learned the skills of working with horses and cattle, often the peones, were enlisted into service of the Spanish hacienda owners, or hacendados, their patrones, to work the cattle and the horses as they built their empires in the New World.

To be a vaquero, one must have been descended from the "Old World" culture of the horse. The invading Spanish conquistadores had brought both horses and cattle to the new world, establishing the industry that fueled the American Westward expansion.

It is from this class that men like Roy Edward Vasquez descended. His father, grandfather, and uncles had been very much a part of tending the cattle and horses for landowners in Southern Arizona. He, in fact, may have been among the last of the vaqueros in the twentieth century.

Coming from a long tradtion of Mexican vaqueros, it was only natural that as a youngster he began to work with his father tending to the livestock on the ranch where the elder Vasquez worked.

Sadly, many twentieth century vaqueros often found that they could not make a living for a growing family working only for a rancher. Consequently, Roy Vasquez worked a variety of other jobs during his lifetime--even a stint in the US Navy during the Korean War, but first and foremost he was a cowboy. It was his first love and, given the choice, Roy would have chosen no other vocation.