“Today, not a trace of Fort Fillmore is visible. There is not even a historical marker to commemorate the ill-fated post.” — Roadside History of New Mexico The corner of Ft. Fillmore Road and South Main St., Las Cruces (Highway 478) – the only mention or trace of the old fort in the area. Johnson’s New Military Map of the United States, a replica of a map printed for the United States War Department in the year 1861, places all [...] Read more »
La Mesilla, New Mexico — the last 100 years
La Mesilla, New Mexico, has changed little since Billy the Kid and Jesse Evans died at the end of its lusty frontier atmosphere. Thick-walled adobe buildings erected by the remarkable men who trekked the heels of Don Rafael Rules from the heart of Old Mexico to settle in the spawning Rio Grande Valley are much the same as they were when 10-year-old Mary Maxwell, the daughter of one of La Mesilla’s forthright citizens, was carted off by a hungry mountain [...] Read more »
Fort Selden and General Douglas MacArthur — the first seeds of devotion
Visitors Center at Fort Selden. One of the photos often seen in World War II literature is of General Douglas MacArthur wading ashore at Leyte in the Phillipines in 1944, honoring his “I Shall Return” promise to help liberate the islands from the Japanese. As a young boy 60 years earlier, the future General of the Army might well have waded barefoot in the muddy Rio Grande River in Southern New Mexico. On a recent visit to Fort Selden State [...] Read more »
Discover Hatch, NM – and its annual Chile Festival
Roasting chilies at the Hatch Chile Festival Photo by Carla DeMarco. Just when the rest of New Mexico begins to cool at the dawn of autumn, Southern New Mexico begins to sizzle. The fiery happenings begin on Labor Day Weekend when the normally pacific village of Hatch is transformed into blissful pandemonium. Hatch, known as the Chile Capital of the World, lies in the fertile Rio Grande valley, some 30 mostly-arid miles northwest of Las Cruces. The tiny town is [...] Read more »
Celebrate Chiles at the Hatch Chile Festival
Chile is not going to come and go, like kiwi fruit. It’s going to stay, like rock’n'roll. — Paul Bosland, "Mr. Chileman," New Mexico State University Hatch, New Mexico calls itself the "Chile Capital of the World" Chile is surely not going to go away in tiny Hatch, New Mexico. As a matter of fact, there’s a bit of a frenzy this time of year. It’s just the annual Chile Festival in Hatch, a forty-minute drive along the Rio Grande [...] Read more »
The birds of spring in Las Cruces — shameless caboodling
“Lovebirds” Photo by Carla DeMarco Last spring, our second in Southern New Mexico, my wife and I discovered that this part of the country has the most shameless bunch of birds we have ever seen. I mean, it’s disgraceful! They sing all day, sometimes even into the night, and they want us to think they are a charming delight, but we know what they’re really up to. It’s caboodling. That’s what they’re really up to. Birds can’t outsmart us! I [...] Read more »
Hatch — chile capital of new mexico
Chiles displayed at the Hatch Chile Festival. Photo by Carla DeMarco Some of the 1,136 residents of Hatch might say "Chile Capital of the World." And of course, they are sure to point out that New Mexicans spell their chili with an e on the end instead of an i. According to the Roadside History of New Mexico, in 1988 the New Mexico State Legislature passed a facetious memorial threatening to deport to Texas any New Mexican caught using the [...] Read more »
Anthony, New Mexico/Texas — leap year capital of the world
Anthony welcome sign. Photo courtesty Anthony Chamber of Commerce. Few cities, towns, villages or individuals, without moving, find their address and even their country has changed. The towns named above are some of those few, because that is what happened to them. In 1853, the Gadsden Purchase changed the southern boundary of the U.S. New Mexico and Arizona were not yet states. The treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 had vaguely described the U.S./Mexico border, but President Franklin Pierce wanted [...] Read more »
Sunland Park — more than a race track
Looking toward Sierra del Cristo Rey Mountain from Sunland Park City Hall. Photo by Phyllis Eileen Banks Does Sunland Park, just outside El Paso, Texas bring to mind horse racing? It is much more than that. It is not in Texas, either, but in New Mexico. Until 1960 this area was known as Anapra, where Don Juan de Onate crossed from the east side of the Rio Grande into New Mexico in the 1500s. Robert Julyan in The Place Names [...] Read more »
Santa Teresa, New Mexico
Santa Teresa Port of Entry. Photo courtesy Mesilla Valley Economic Development Alliance Santa Teresa is a young community at the junction of New Mexico Highways 278 and 9. It is about four miles north of the Mexico border, practically adjacent to Sunland Park, New Mexico and El Paso, Texas. It consists primarily of residences in a gated community, although there are three or four churches nearby. The community evolved from the dream of a country club. According to Roadside History [...] Read more »