The Magazine of Lincoln & Otero County
ALAMODOSO Connections
Inside This Issue A Spiritual Witness Shorty’s Legacy Lost Padre Mine Recipies Local Advertising
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A SPIRITUAL WITNESS
Hi there, this is Miss Alice again, and I want to tell you a little bit more about Willie, but first, I have to tell you how we got to this story here.
“We’ve been robbed!” “What? Robbed?” I said. “Yeah, someone jimmied the back door, came in and cleaned the cash drawer.”
Mr. Bill & I would travel all over the United States to buy furniture or, what we called, our junk.
Immediately all I could think about was Victoria has
Well, at that time my grandson-in-law was the police chief and my son-in-law was the Judge.
Many of you might remember all the gorgeous antiques we would bring back from our wanderings before the bottom fell out of the antique market, and before we decided that we got too old and decided to quit traveling.
When we got back the police chief said, “Miss Alice, why don’t you inter view Willie?” I said, “What?”
One day in August of 1998, we were in Arkansas going down the road enjoying the scenery, and my phone rings. Back then we didn’t have these fancy little phones we have now, my phone was the size of a small brick; maybe some of you guys remember that.
been trashed. You can imagine what would happen if Victoria had been been trashed, what a sad state affairs of hurts that would be.
Sometimes you could hear it ring or maybe you couldn’t. But anyway I could. Therewas hysterical voice that came through , “ Mom!” That was my daughter calling,
Quickly she added, “Momma, not a thing was hurt everything is perfect the only thing missing is the money in the cash drawer and the back door is open.”
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I said, “Whew.” Well we continued on our trip. When we got back home, we found out one of the ladies discovered the back door open and called the cops. They came in and sure enough everything in the cash drawer was gone.
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Well let’s back up a little bit. The first day after the robbery I came in the back door and I was so mad at Willie, if I could have gotten him I would have choked him, seriously, he has been here a hundred some years, this is his building, I’m just camping here. He’ll be here after I’m long gone. Can you imagine Miss Alice yelling at a spirit of Willie? But I did, I was so upset. Anyway the chief of police continue next page Alamodoso@gmail.com
Happy Thanksgiving!
said to interview him, so I said, “Why not? He ought to know, he was here” . So I got with Pat and had coffee and we asked about this intruder, robber or whatever he was that came and took our money. I have the exact words Willie said, I have them written down, so I’ll read them to you what he said to me.
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Removed all traces then was on his way. I guess he wiped it down of finger prints Dressed In blue jeans, a white t-shirt and worn boots. Clothing was not new but in good condition. Slender, dark hair tied to the neck. See, Willie doesn’t know what a ponytail is, that’s why he said tied to the neck. He had a bad aura, not pure evil, but bad. Couldn’t make any impression on him.
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He was impervious to me. I stood right across the counter from him and he didn’t know me. Might be a good idea if you clear the energy here and place some protection around. I will help you. No I don’t think he’ll be back he’s on his way to somewhere else. I got the feeling he’s heading north but that’s just a guess. And now, going on with this story surrounding his one. I talked to the police chief, he said “You’ve got a witness. Let’s catch him. “ (Laughing) You see where this is going? “Yes your honor I have a witness” . continue page 20 Alamodoso Connections
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Shorty’s Legacy
Legends live on only through those that care to hold on to them. The death of a cowboy a century ago still sparks interest because someone cared to honor it.
placed a sign at the grave site to mark it. During his quest for the sign and his research to find out more about Shorty, as well as locate any family the cowboy might have had, Walt wrote a poem about Shorty.
Not much is known about Shorty except that he lies in a roadside grave on the west side of New Mexico State Highway 54 near Oscuro 15 miles south of Carrizozo.
Shorty Lee --A Bar W Cowboy Here lies a cowboy named Shorty Lee
R.L. “Shorty” Lee, thought to be about 20 years old, was a Bar W Ranch cowboy working for W.C. McDonald, New Mexico’s first governor. Shorty and some other cowboys were moving cattle when a thunderstorm brought a deadly lightning strike to a single spot on a vast plain. Shorty and another cowboy, their horses and seven head of cattle were killed by the lightning.
If I’d been born when I should’a, it could’a been me. Shorty rode the range through a thunderstorm’s force. Blue lightning came down, killed him and his horse. Now both of em’s buried right here in the ground
With no known relatives, Shorty was buried near where he fell, along what was then only a trail. When the trail became a highway, W.W. Gallacher, Sr. of the Carrizozo Gallacher Ranches, was instrumental in keeping the highway department from moving Shorty’s grave. Gallacher, as a young man, had known Shorty and fought to keep his resting place honored.
And mighty few folks know where they can be found. Just north of Oscuro beside the blacktop, Hundreds go by but damn few of ‘em stop. At the little old cross that marks his last home, Just a simple wood cross, not even a stone.
The white picket fence around the site is long gone, worn by the wind and weather. A few stands of wire, some old posts and tumbleweeds are what remain.
I didn’t know the cowboy named Shorty Lee But if I’d been born when I shoulda’, it could’a been me.
At the request of White Oaks writer, storyteller and cowboy Walt Birdsong, the New Mexico Department of Transportation Alamodoso Connections
Walt Birdsong 9-30-03 9
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By the end of the 19th Century, women's clubs in Silver City, Alamogordo and Roswell were distributing books from lending libraries. In Alamogordo, library volunteers raised money for the library by selling cemetery plots. The only problem, as one volunteer put it, “Alamogordo’s healthful climate was not conductive to the sale of cemetery plots!”
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Thanksgiving Turkey Cookies Ingredients 1 roll (16.5 oz) Pillsbury™ refrigerated sugar cookies or 1 package (16 oz) Pillsbury™ Ready To Bake!™ refrigerated sugar cookies (24 cookies) 1 container (16 oz) chocolate creamy frosting Candy corn Orange decorating icing Black decorating gel Miniature candy-coated chocolate baking bits Steps 1: Bake cookies as directed on roll or package. Cool completely, about 10 minutes.
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2: Spoon chocolate frosting into 1-quart Ziploc® Brand storage bag; seal bag. Cut off tiny bottom corner of bag. On each cookie, pipe frosting on outer edge of half of cookie. Arrange candy corn over frosting for feathers. 3: Pipe orange icing onto cookies to resemble turkey face and feet. Use orange icing to attach baking bits to turkey face for eyes. Pipe black gel on baking bits for centers of eyes.
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Brown Bread Stuffing with Fruit Ingredients 1/2 stick unsalted butter, plus more for baking dish 1 pound loaf whole-wheat bread, cut into large dice 3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced 3 celery ribs, roughly chopped 1 large red onion, roughly chopped Salt and freshly ground black pepper 1 cup dried cherries 1 cup dried apples, roughly chopped 1 cup roughly chopped pecans 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh thyme leaves 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh sage 1 cup vegetable broth 1/2 cup apple juice
Directions 1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. 2. Coat a 13 by 9-inch baking dish with butter and set aside. 3. Add the bread in a large bowl and set aside. 4. Meanwhile, add 1 tablespoon of the butter to a large frying pan over medium heat.When it foams, stir in the continue next page Alamodoso Connections
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garlic, celery, and onions, and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste. 5 Cook, stirring occasionally, until just softened, about 5 minutes. 6. Add the thyme and the sage and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. 7. Remove from the heat and stir in the cherries, apples, and the pecans. 8. Transfer to the bowl with the bread and toss to evenly combine. 9. Combine the remaining butter with the broth and the apple juice in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. 10. Drizzle over the bread mixture and toss to coat. 11. Transfer to the prepared baking dish and bake until golden brown on top and heated through and the internal temperature registers 160 to 165 degrees F on an instant-read thermometer, about 30 to 45 minutes 12. Serve and Enjoy. Tell everyone that it is an old, old family recipie
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The Lost Padre Mine Stationed at Chihuaha, New Mexico in 1797 during the last years of the Spanish occupation, was a priest named LaRue. Father LaRue, while sitting with an old dying soldier, listened while the soldier told him of a rich gold-bearing load in the mountains north of El Paso The soldier explained to LaRue that the mother lode could be found by traveling one day north of El Paso until three small peaks could be seen. When the peaks came into view, the journey would turn east across the desert to the mountains. In the first mountain range, there would be a basin with a spring at the foot of a solitary peak. Upon this mountain was to be found a rich vein of gold. Shortly after the soldier died, Chihuaha settlement was devastated by drought and famine. The Padre called the villagers together asking if they would follow him north to a better climate and more water. They agreed and the party migrated to the north. They followed the course of the Rio Grande to the village of La Mesilla near Las Cruces. North of there, they sighted the three peaks and turned east across the dreaded Jornada del Muerto desert, finally arriving in the San Andreas Mountains. After a couple of days of exploration, they located a basin in which there was a spring at the base of a solitary peak, just as the old man had said. Settling the new colony at Spirit Springs in Dona Ana County, Larue sent the men out to search for the gold. On one side of the peak,
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they located a rich vein in a deep canyon southwest of the springs. They tunneled into the mountain and followed the vein downward. The deeper they went, the richer the ore became. The priest assigned dozens of monks and Indians to mine the gold, form it into ingots and stack it along one wall of a natural cavern inside the mountain. For two years LaRue extracted the gold from the mountain, stockpiling it. Word leaked into Mexico that LaRue had set up his own little empire and he was extracting large quantities of gold. The Spaniards wasted no time in rounding up an expedition to send north. When a small group was in La Mesilla purchasing supplies they learned the Mexican Army was on the horizon. Hurrying to camp, they spread the alarm. It was one thing for Padre La Rue to leave his post without permission of church officials in Mexico City, but it was quite another not to deliver the Royal Fifth of the gold for shipment to Spain. Father La Rue immediately set about concealing all traces of the mine. Working day and night, knowing the soldiers were drawing ever closer, he had his little group labor to seal the entrance to the mine. When the soldiers finally arrived and demanded to know where the gold came from which was used to purchase the supplies in La Mesilla, Padre La Rue refused to answer. He died under torture, as did many of his followers. The soldiers searched the entire area, but finding no clues, they returned to Mexico empty-handed.
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THE MOST IMPORTANT and LEAST RECOGNIZED
INVENTION of the NINETEENTH CENTURY Throughout history governments have had courier services to carry documents between various officials. These were generally reserved for official use only, though for a few pieces of silver on the side, the carriers could be induced to carry private correspondence illegally. Starting in the Renaissance, more and more countries started allowing private correspondence to be carried by the official carriers at high prices to earn money for the governments to help pay for their own usage. Until 1840 in Great Britain, 1847 in the United States, and various other mid nineteenth century dates in other countries, letters were very expensive to send, and service was often sporadic. Within Britain a letter could cost upwards of a week’s salary for a poor workman depending on the distance. Letters could be sent collect. Many sent collect letters to their relatives who could not afford to pay, but the fact the letter was sent served as news that all was ok. Unpaid letters were destroyed. The result was low mail volume and a great loss to the government. Mr. (later Sir) Rowland Hill pushed the concept that uniform cheap postage would result in a great enough volume of mail that it could become more efficient and profitable for the government. After several years the Crown inaugu-
rated the penny post. Letters had to be prepaid but could be sent anywhere in Great Britain for one penny for a single sheet. Evidence of payment of postage was a one penny stamp, the Penny Black, showing then Queen Victoria. This was the world’s first postage stamp, issued May 6, 1840. Hill was correct, as the volume of mail increased by thousands of times in short order and the Post Office indeed showed a great profit. Once their success was demonstrated more and more countries started issuing stamps, so that within a few decades virtually everyone in the world could mail a letter at little expense.
The importance of the invention of cheap mail as evidenced by the stamp can not be overemphasized. The quality of life of the average citizens was greatly improved as they could now correspond with friends and relatives at a distance, and they also gained from the improved roads and bridges built by the governments to facilitate moving the mails. Both retail and wholesale businesses grew rapidly with the advent of current information and the ability to place and receive orders quickly. Here in the United States post office contracts helped pay the costs of road and bridge building
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Later contracts led to the expansion of railroads in the last half of the nineteenth century and of air lines in the twentieth.
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Despite the complaints about the frequent postage increases in recent years and the slight decline in service, it is still very convenient to be able to drop a letter in the mail and have it delivered anywhere in a short time at an affordable cost. Think about the contributions that cheap postage as evidenced by the stamp have made to our modern world!
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Story courtesy of Jeff King, owner Alamo Stamp & Coin Shop end a spiritul witness - continue
“Well produce your witness” “Well we can’t (laughing) he’s a ghost’” Anyway, we had fun with that one and all we lost was about a hundred dollars.
Open Tuesday - Thursday 9 A.M. ~ 6 P.M. Friday 9 A.M. ~ 5 P.M. Saturday by Appointment
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Story courtesy of Miss Alice of Victoria on New York Ave.
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IRON MADE CROSSFIT
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People and their pets. If you have a funny picture of you and your pet, email a high resolution ďŹ le of it to Alamodoso@gmail.com and we will publish it here in future editions of Alamodoso Connections as space allows. We look forward to your submissions! We look forward to your submissions
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The Alamodoso Business Directory
12th STREET COFFEE
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