One of the things that differentiates Santa Fe from other cities in the United States is its long, rich history. Although some date the city’s history from 1608, the date Governor Peralta and the Spanish colonists settled here, the area had seen millennia of human habitation before that. The story of Santa Fe stretches from the nomadic natives who camped here around 10,000 b.c. to modern trailblazers using Santa Fe as a base for their work in human gene research or to develop practical uses for the technology born of the atomic bomb at nearby Los Alamos.