Rio Grande Rift
The Rio Grande rift is a north–south rift valley in the Basin and Range Province of western North America.
- Rifting began in Late Oligocene period.
- The Rio Grande rift begins in central Colorado and runs southward to end in the state of Chihuahua, Mexico.
- Due to the rollback of Farallon Plate, a temporal pattern of magmatism oldest in east and swept progressively westward
- Mantle upwelling providing heat and extension.
- Gravitational collapse due to crustal thickening of the subduction zone, with deformation occurring as far west as Death Valley, California.
- Collapse extension of the Basin and Range and the Rio Grande rift continues even today, although at a reduced rate compared to the Oligocene and the Miocene.
Read more about this topic: Potrillo Volcanic Field
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“I hear ... foreigners, who would boycott an employer if he hired a colored workman, complain of wrong and oppression, of low wages and long hours, clamoring for eight-hour systems ... ah, come with me, I feel like saying, I can show you workingmen’s wrong and workingmen’s toil which, could it speak, would send up a wail that might be heard from the Potomac to the Rio Grande; and should it unite and act, would shake this country from Carolina to California.”
—Anna Julia Cooper (1859–1964)