It was named in 1829 by one Rafael Rivera, a scout in the party of Antonio Armijo, a Mexican trader traveling on the Old Spanish Trail from Santa Fe to southern California (which had been blazed in 1776 by two Franciscan friars). Rivera discovered a shortcut along the route that passed by springs bubbling up from an artesian aquifer; he was the first non-Indian to set foot on the land that he called "Las Vegas," for its life-saving water and soul-soothing greenery.

John C. Fremont labeled it Las Vegas Springs on his maps of the area (1844); Octavius Gass, the earliest homesteader, called it Las Vegas Rancho. The ranch was turned over to Archibald Stewart in lieu of payment for a debt and Stewart's widow, Helen, became the first postmistress of what the U.S. government called Las Vegas.

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