- published: 31 Aug 2015
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Texas (i/ˈtɛksəs/) (Alibamu: Teksi ) is the second most populous and the second most extensive of the 50 United States, and the most extensive state of the 48 contiguous United States. The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in East Texas. Located in the South Central United States, Texas shares an international border with the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south, and borders the US states of New Mexico to the west, Oklahoma to the north, Arkansas to the northeast, and Louisiana to the east. Texas has an area of 268,820 square miles (696,200 km2), and a growing population of 25.7 million residents.
During the Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas: La Provincia de Texas. Antonio Margil de Jesús was known to be the first person to use the name in a letter to the Viceroy of Mexico in July 20, 1716. The name was not popularly used in daily speech but often appeared in legal documents until the end of the 1800s.
El Paso /ɛlˈpæsoʊ/ is the county seat of El Paso County, Texas, United States, and lies in far West Texas. According to the 2010 census the city's population is 649,121. It is the sixth largest city in Texas and the 19th largest city in the United States. Its metropolitan area covers all of El Paso County, whose population in 2010 was 800,647.
El Paso stands on the Rio Grande (Río Bravo del Norte), across the border from Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico. The two cities form a combined international metropolitan area, sometimes called El Paso–Juárez, with Juárez being the significantly larger of the two in population. They have a combined population of two million, two-thirds of which reside in Juárez. In 2010 El Paso was awarded an All-America City Award, the oldest community-recognition program in the United States.
El Paso is home to the University of Texas at El Paso (founded in 1914 as The Texas State School of Mines and Metallurgy, and later, Texas Western College; its current name dates from 1967) and the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at El Paso. Fort Bliss, one of the largest military complexes of the United States Army, lies to the east and northeast of the city, with training areas extending north into New Mexico, up to the White Sands Missile Range and neighboring Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo. El Paso is the first large city in the world to have a spaceport in the vicinity. Spaceport America, which lies 90 miles from El Paso, has seen the completion of several successful manned, suborbital flights. The Franklin Mountains extend into El Paso from the north and nearly divide the city into two sections; the western half forms the beginnings of the Mesilla Valley, and the eastern slopes connect in the central business district at the south end of the mountain range.