Tradiciones 2015 by The Taos News

Leyendas 2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s • T he Ta o s Ne w s

Courtesy photo

Long John Dunn of Taos looking over the bridge and road he built across the Río Grande. Photo by Max Evans, 1950.

Leyendas

The Río Grande Gorge Bridge

Ageless tales

Remembering the Leyendas of Taos

aos has a captivating book of unvarnished stories and animated legends. Those of us who call this beautiful valley home have heard many fables. Some might be called myth, while others are so true they can be literally touched. Some of the verifiable stories even exude a mythical quality. Whether it be seemingly insurmountable bridge building, inexplicable cattle mutilations, the fire tower’s lonely watch over the forests that roll over the mountainsides, how trees can date historic structures, the calling of a significant

‘After all, I believe that legends and myths are largely made of ‘truth’, and indeed present aspects of it that can only be received in this mode; and long ago certain truths and modes of this kind were discovered and must always reappear.’ — J.R.R. Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien

sanctuary or one man’s mission to simply beautify a street, Taos is a book full of allure. In the Taos tradition, welcome to another installment of “Leyendas,” in which the real and imagined sometimes intertwine but nonetheless celebrate the legends that make this place a unique and enduring palette of colorful characters. By retelling stories and searching for more answers — more possibilities — our community continues to breathe this valley’s mystique into the lungs of future generations. — Scott Gerdes, special sections editor

Leyendas

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Contents 4

Cattle mutilations mystery by Cody Hooks

The cottonwoods of Burch Street by Yvonne Pesquera

Taos “outlaw” John Dunn by Cindy Brown

Forest watch towers, the silent sentries by Andrew Oxford

Río Grande Gorge Bridge’s 50-year span by Andrew Oxford

San Francisco de Asis Church anniversary by Teresa Dovalpage

Tree-ring dating of the Ranchos Valley grist mill by J.R. Logan

Staff

Robin Martin, owner • Chris Baker, publisher • Joan Livingston, editor • Chris Wood, advertising manager • Scott Gerdes, special sections editor Michelle M. Gutierrez, lead editorial designer • Virginia Clark, copy editor, Karin Eberhardt, production manager • Katharine Egli, photographer Cody Hooks, Andrew Oxford, J.R. Logan, staff writers

Contributing writers

Yvonne Pesquera, Cindy Brown, Teresa Dovalpage

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Leyendas

Cattle mutilations

Legitimate lore or cold-file mysteries

By Cody Hooks

magine this — it’s a July evening in Arroyo Hondo. The waning sky and moon are beginning to give way to night. A rancher latches a gate behind him after checking the livestock for the evening. It all seems fine, especially the 6-month-old bull. But in the morning light of a new day, it becomes clear that nothing about his pasture is fine, especially the bull. No signs of struggle mar the pasture beyond the willows where the bull lay dead. Skin was missing from around the jaw. One eye, the tongue and its penis were totally gone, nowhere in the field to be found. The animal’s rear end was cored out. The scene was absolutely bloodless. The mutilated cows of Taos were serious business in

the mid-’90s. Ever since one of the first reported cases in 1976 near Pot Mountain came to light, the mystery of how cows ended up dead and disfigured only grew more stupefying. The Hondo case shared the same elemental traits with cattle mutilations spread across the globe. From Mora to Brazil and Dulce to France, mutilated cows and other large mammals had organs and skin missing — removed with surgical precision — and bones exposed, as white and clean as an alabaster gravestone.

Despite the mutilations appearance across time and space, no one has come up with a definitive explanation for what happened. Most folks who call themselves level-headed chalk it up to predators. But what an imperfect explanation, as many of the ranchers whose cows turn up dead say the eery ease of the fields look nothing like a predator kill they had ever seen. Most everyone else hypothesizes UFOs. But that, too, fails to take the story from A to Z. Perhaps it was simply a crime spree with dedicated copycats; a government coverup of mad cow disease; a secret pseudo-military base in Archuleta Mesa; santanists, or just demented pranksters. But do ambiguous theories really satisfy curiosity? Perhaps it is the very veil of mystique that has lodged the story of cow mutilations so firmly in our local mythology.

Katharine Egli

Cow crossing sign, complete with UFO and Hula Hoop.

Leyendas

haedra Greenwood, a local author and former reporter with The Taos News, started looking into the phenomenon in 1995 when one reported mutilation turned into several. The tell-tale signs of mutilations kept turning up in Sheriff’s reports and call logs. Greenwood even joined a team of local police and investigators, recording the sites and talking to neighbors when dispatched to another weird cow death. Of course, not all mutilations were real. Some were simply the work of coyotes and vermin. But that didn’t stop folks from being on alert. And there were official pushes to verify what it could be, to separate the wheat from the chaff. A former district attorney investigator and judge, John Paternoster, had a client who was a rancher north of Questa. Like so many other human victims of these mutilations, the rancher lost several head of cattle to mutilations. That was serious business, especially when every lost cow meant less profit — realistically, most “profits” were just enough to get by until the next year. Paternoster called for an official investigation into the phenomena, saying law enforcement ought to treat each mutilation as a crime scene and use an official protocol, thus legitimizing the investigations and hopefully find a way to the root of the costly mystery. Enticing theories aside, Paternoster once told Greenwood, “There are few frontiers available to curious minds, and this is one of them.” But the insatiable desire to understand the mystery wasn’t isolated to Taos. Gabe Valdez, an FBI investigator, spent years traveling across New Mexico talking to ranchers and everyone else who might have had some piece to the puzzle. The New Mexico Livestock Board kept their own tabs on the happenings, and a Los Alamos chemist did his own analysis of dead and mutilated cattle on the side. Taos even hosted a conference for freelance investigators and the generally curious alike. Understandably, fear and confusion were palpable. Folks got spooked. Not only were their animals dead and cut up in the strangest of ways, but the mutilations were oftentimes associated with people seeing strange lights in the sky — white, blue and red orbs, disks, things zooming past the stars hundreds if not thousands of miles per hour. Several paranormal investigators, including Chris O’Brien from the San Luis Valley in Colorado, documented story after story of black helicopters landing and taking off from the very

Phaedra Greenwood

Arroyo Hondo residents Sara and Alexander Levy monitor a mutilated cow for radiation on Aug. 5, 1995.

Phaedra Greenwood

Newspaper clipping of local cow mutilation.

As the Los Alamos chemist told Greenwood in ’96, “The deeper you get into it, the more mysterious it gets. fields where mutilated cows had been found. The weirdness didn’t stop there — just north of the state line, one rancher told a story of finding his herd circling methodically around a dead and mutilated cow, and giving out the most mournful mooing he’d ever heard. And throughout official probes and investigations, from the late 1970s when the FBI first got publicly involved onward, relevant files went missing while investigators got death threats in the night.

As the Los Alamos chemist told Greenwood in ’96, “The deeper you get into it, the more mysterious it gets.” As the millennium approached, reports of mutilations stopped. Greenwood didn’t get the calls she used to, and ultimately, the phenomena of the mid-90s dried up. The legitimate financial blow of losing a cow to a mutilation — as well as the national hype at the time — was lost in the day-to-day as folks went on with their lives, planting another field and raising another herd. The reality of cattle mutilations gave way to local lore. Myth and mystery, though, have a way of coming back into play every now and again. Cattle mutilation investigator Christopher O’Brien wrote in “The Mysterious Valley,” his 1996 book about the phenomena, “Maybe strange events that occur through time, and subsequently become a part of the mythic tradition, are somehow sparked by a veil of unconscious cultural uncertainty.” If everyone gets to telling these stories and asking these questions again, who knows what else they might start to see?

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Leyendas

Michelle M. Gutierrez

Burch Street in the fall.

Photogenic street

Alvin Burch’s cottonwood trees continue to enchant Taos

By Yvonne Pesquera

lvin Burch and his wife Sarah came to Taos in 1912 and gave it a gift that continues to keep on giving. One hundred years ago, Burch planted the Río Grande cottonwood trees along his namesake street. Today, the towering majestic cottonwoods make Burch Street the prettiest street in the Town of Taos.

The area from Burch to Montoya streets was once an alfalfa field. Burch surveyed the land into lots for his seven children. Over time, the extended family lived along the dirt road of Burch Street –– as well as other families, too. Burch was an entrepreneur. He began a mercantile on Taos Plaza in a building that still bears his name on the exterior facade. Today, the Burch Building is home to Taos Mountain Outfitters on North Plaza. He started with that one store, but

eventually had stores in Arroyo Seco, Arroyo Hondo, Ranchos de Taos and Peñasco. “Remember, in that era people didn’t have a whole lot of mechanical transportation. So they would use wagons. And if they had a store close by, they would go to that store to get their merchandise. His stores were run by the family, like my mother Pearl, who could speak Tiwa and Spanish,” says Benton Bond, Burch’s grandson and former owner of Dow Bond Plumbing.

Leyendas

or this article, Bond and his wife, Arabella, graciously gave of their time to share family history (as well as rare photographs of Taos) –– thus shaping an understanding of how Burch quite literally planted a legacy for all of Taos to enjoy. The junction of Kit Carson Road (U.S. Highway 64) and Burch Street is a busy three-way-stop intersection today. In Burch’s time, that portion of highway also saw a lot of activity. A notable entrepreneur, he built Burch Camp, which still stands today as the Adobe Wall Motel on Kit Carson Road. Burch Camp was a wagon stop on the way from Taos to Eagle Nest. People would pull in with their wagons, buy supplies from the Burch Store and stay in those little Burch Camp units. Burch planted cottonwoods throughout the motel property, and his main residence was right next to Burch Camp (where Lora Realty is now). It was there that he raised his family. Among them was Pearl –– Benton Bond’s mother and Darren Bond’s grandmother. Darren Bond is the owner of Gearing Up Bicycle Shop (129 Paseo del Pueblo Sur). He says, “I’m 48 years old and Burch Street has always had a canopy from the trees. But they’re a lot bigger than they were 40 years ago.” The cottonwoods flourish so well because the water table is only 15 to 20 feet deep –– and the trees have very shallow roots. “On Burch Street, my grandfather and his son, Clyde, planted the trees because he just had this big open area and he wanted trees. It is a very fertile area from the dirt from the mountain and the stream that comes down from Río Pueblo,” Benton says.

The cottonwoods flourish so well because the water table is only 15 to 20 feet deep—and the trees have very shallow roots. Burch also owned a Ford dealership, which is now Cabot Plaza on Kit Carson Road off Taos Plaza intersection. Burch Street itself was a commercial district, not the residential street it is today. It housed the Hanlon Funeral Home; and Clyde Burch and his wife, Eunice, had the first flower shop in Taos, called The Lilac Shop. For the Taos Historical Society, Benton Bond serves as vice president and Darren Bond serves as treasurer. “How important are trees to Taos? The trees are significant. They add shade, but they also just add to the scenery. Between the trees and the hollyhocks, there’s no place like it,” says Darren Bond. There used to be cottonwoods along Kit Carson Road (in front of present-day La Buena Vida Condos). They were starting to fall due to age and had to be taken down a number of years ago .

Courtesy of Benton and Arabella Bond

Portrait of Alvin Burch by Irwin Myers.

“All of the cousins lived up and down the street and we used to play in the cottonwoods. There used to be a deep pile of fall leaves we used to jump in,” Benton says. “I can still visualize it in my mind. And well, the beauty, all you have to do is look up. It’s still there.”

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Leyendas

Courtesy photo

Dunn was known to be a gambling man.

John Dunn

From outlaw to the king of Taos By Cindy Brown

hen it comes to Taos legends, they don’t get much bigger than the story of Long John Dunn. Perhaps because his actual life was so incredible or because his biography was written by a good friend shortly after Dunn’s death, the tale doesn’t seem to need much embellishment. As his friend and biographer Max Evans says, “He lived, in his 90 or more years, one of the most incredible lives of any of the old-time Westerners ... John was one of the best gunfighters, gamblers, bronc riders, ropers, stagecoach drivers, trail-herd drivers, saloonkeepers, outlaws, and ironically, hardheaded businessman.” Before coming to Taos, Dunn by his own admission, had killed several men and was a horse thief, smuggler and gambler. But although his life was a rough one, there was always a thread of nobility in his actions. He first killed a man when involved in a fist fight with his brother-inlaw who had been abusing Dunn’s sister. One of his main purposes in making money by whatever means possible was to send it back home to his mother to support the family. Dunn’s father was a Civil War veteran and died shortly after the war due to his injuries, leaving the family constantly poor. Dunn was born in 1857 in Victoria, Texas, to a family of farmers. “In Long John Dunn of Taos: from Texas Outlaw to New Mexico Hero,” by Max Evans, Dunn is quoted as saying “We were trying to make a living on a little rolling dry-land, slow-starvation farm.” Dunn was hired out to work on farms for others. As an inexperienced teenager, he was often low in the farm pecking order – doing the hardest work, receiving the lowest pay and sleeping in the barn. After one of his early employers kept him working day and night, and then underpaid him, Dunn stole the man’s stallion and headed west. His travels led him to a ranch near the Río Grande in Texas and then on a trail-drive north to the N-Bar-N ranch in Montana with 2,000 steers. As Evans says, “The trail drive tested every good and bad quality in a man. During the trails of hundreds of miles across open spaces, the best or the

worst was certain to come out.” Dunn became well-known for his expert use of both his gun and rope, as well as having a keen eye for outlaws lying in wait to rob the cowboys. This trail drive stopped in Dodge City, Kansas, where he saw his first train, which he tried successfully to lasso. Dodge City is also where he first learned to gamble. It was on his return to Texas that Dunn encountered his drunk and abusive brother-in-law in the street. Dunn got a good punch in to the jaw and the other man went down, hitting his head on a hitching rail. He died and Dunn was sentenced to life imprisonment at the state penitentiary. Using a smuggled file, Dunn cut himself free of his leg irons and made his escape by jumping into the surging river nearby. After a period of gambling and smuggling in Mexico, a time marked by brawls, double-crossing and tequiladrinking cats and another escape from the law, Dunn was smuggled into New Mexico by a man headed to Elizabethtown to investigate a gold-mining boom. After becoming friends with the town marshal, who was also on the run from the law in Texas, Dunn won enough money gambling to open his own saloon. In 1889, Dunn rode through Eagle Nest into Taos Valley. He noticed how isolated the town was and began to work on an idea to bring transportation to Taos. Dunn learned that there was a bridge across the Río Grande at Taos Junction owned by a Mr. Meyers. When Dunn tried to buy the bridge, the price was set at $15,000. With money won during a gambling tour across several states, Dunn eventually bought the bridge from Meyers for the reduced price of $2,000. He found out that the price was lowered because another bridge was being built farther north near Arroyo Hondo. Dunn purchased that bridge too, only to have both bridges destroyed by a flood. Undeterred, Dunn rebuilt the bridge in Arroyo Hondo and charged a toll to people and animals to cross. He established stagecoach service and mail delivery from the train station in Tres Piedras to Taos. He also built a hotel near the bridge and arranged the stagecoach schedule, so that the passengers on the last coach of the day found it most convenient to stay overnight at the hotel before continuing on to Taos. With his stagecoach, hotel and bridge tolls, Dunn was quite well-off. He also owned four saloons

‘…if you spend the four seasons of nature in Taos, it won’t matter whether you reside there permanently or not, its powerful earth-forms and ethereal mountain mists will follow and enwrap you forever. Long John Dunn is an immutable part of the magic matrix.’ —Biographer Max Evans

and a gambling hall. As he had a virtual monopoly on travel in and out of Taos, he had the opportunity to meet the wellknown artists who were coming to Taos to paint. He also brought them art supplies and took their paintings into the outside world to sell. Dunn would later own the first car in Taos, transitioning his business from stagecoach to automobile. As time went on and more roads reached Taos, he felt that something was lost. He said the roads “changed peoples’ personalities – friendships broke up when folks no longer needed to depend on each other for company, sympathy and entertainment.” Later in his life, Dunn married a woman named Adelaide and had four daughters and a son, John Dunn Jr. The boy died when he was 11 years old, breaking Dunn’s heart. Evans recently met with Polly Raye, the owner of the John Dunn shops to share some of the stories that were not told in his biography from 1959. Evans says that Dunn became good friends with Mabel Dodge Luhan. “Between them, they controlled the art scene in Taos. John helped her with Georgia O’Keeffe, Frieda and D.H. Lawrence, Leopold Stokowski and others,” he said. According to Evans, there was a third player in the power structure, sort of a triumvirate who was reputed to be a witch with mystical powers. “Together they controlled all of Northern

Leyendas

Katharine Egli

The John Dunn Shops also hold many events like the glam Trash Fashion show .

New Mexico,” he said. Raye has collected stories about Dunn and honors his memory by preserving his history in the John Dunn Shops between Bent Street and the Taos Plaza. The walkway that connects the two is called Juan Largo Lane, after Long John Dunn, who was 6-feet, 4-inches tall and “ladder-like straight.” She said that according to her discussion with Evans, “John Dunn was highly respected in the region. In his later years he held ‘court’ four to five days a week near or on the plaza. Everyone came up to ‘the King’ to talk and pay

their respects. He showed a lot of dignity.” Dunn died on May 21, 1953, and tributes to him covered most of the front page of El Crepusculo, the forerunner of The Taos News. In 1982 Harvey Mudd asked Raye to buy the John Dunn House because they shared a philosophy about creating community and supporting merchants, rather than running a business only to make money. She owned the Apple Tree Restaurant, now Lambert’s, and was interested in creating a beautiful walkway to connect Bent Street with Taos Plaza. Over the years, she has preserved John Dunn’s historic

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home, expanded a second building where he stabled his horses to include 10 more shops, and built a third structure for more shops on a formerly abandoned lot. John Dunn’s porch is still visible, wrapping around three sides of his home. It houses Coffee Cats and Op Cit book shop. Mudd’s original seven stores have changed ownership over the years, but as in the early 1970s, they still sell leather, maps, fabric and books. Raye says that with a brick walkway through the shops rather than a road, friendships and connections are nurtured, bringing back some of the feeling of comaraderie that existed before there were so many roads to Taos.

Leyendas

Courtesy U.S. Forest Service

Picuris lookout tower circa mid-'40s.

Silent sentries

Carson’s stand empty, but there’s still a case to be made for staffing forest lookouts eventually outfitted with a propane tank and kitchen. With horizontal windows on all sides, it is certainly a ach wildfire season for decades, a lookout room with a view at an elevation of 10,801 feet. on Picuris Peak kept watch over the Carson The Kiowa lookout is what is known as a 7x7, National Forest. referring to its dimensions in feet. Constructed in 1923, With views into Colorado, down to Los the tower rises 51 feet above the 9,735-foot peak. Alamos and beyond, the peak was a prime Neither are staffed. spot to keep an eye on much of the forest’s 1.5 million acres. But fire lookouts are not just relics of the past rendered totally useless by satellites and drones. It was not idle gazing, as former lookout Eli Romero recalls. This summer was the 14th season Philip Connors has staffed one of the Gila National Forests’ 10 lookout Romero staffed the tower for approximately three towers. decades starting in 1958, residing there most days each week between April and November, manning a radio between 8 “I’m confronted constantly with the technofetishists a.m. and 5 p.m., but living on the peak round-the-clock. who believe a drone or satellite will be better than a fallible human being,” says Connors, who wrote about As more traffic flowed through the forest and more roads were created, the lookout’s job became busier, says Romero, his experience as a fire lookout in the 2011 book Fire Season. “What’s lost is a deep knowledge of a piece of who lives in Vadito. country. I’ve hiked every trail within 20 miles of my And while a fire lookout may conjure thoughts of a partlookout tower. I can tell you which ones don’t exist hermit-part-bureaucrat residing on a far-flung mountain, anymore. Those are the kinds of things you learn by Romero says his job was not lonely. sitting there season after season.” Situated as it is between Taos and Peñasco, the lookout That deep knowledge of the country and human tower drew plenty of visitors. Romero recalls a priest who touch can prove crucial to firefighters heading into unfamiliar liked to drive up the forest road to his lookout to view the areas or search-and-rescue teams traversing remote terrain, stars. Connors says. “And my two oldest boys learned a lot from the tower,” “They have a sixth-sense,” says Keith Argow, chairman he says. of the Forest Fire Lookout Association, which promotes restoration of lookouts around the U.S. and Canada. It was a job that required not just watching the horizon, but knowing the ground — being able to pinpoint the In New Mexico, staffed lookout towers are most common source of smoke in some remote canyon and guide firefighters in remote wilderness areas that are more prone to fire, such to a blaze via radio. as areas of the Gila. In that sparsely populated corner of New Mexico, fires are less likely to be spotted by motorists It was a job that entailed an intimate knowledge of the on a highway or from a local resident’s back porch, as might forest. be the case in more developed forests where subdivisions This summer, though, the Picuris lookout is empty as it overlap with woodlands. has been for most fire seasons since 1990. “It’s not like someone driving down the highway is going The Carson National Forest has two other lookouts, one to call in the fire,” says Connors. on Kiowa Mountain near El Rito and another at Cedar Rock Lookouts have also been important in the Gila as the near Navajo City. Forest Service has taken a “let it burn” approach to many The Picuris lookout is an L-4 cabin constructed in 1932. naturally caused blazes. L-4 cabins were designed in 1929 as 14-foot by 14-foot While fire managers are content to let fires burn up fuels frame cabins. Romero says it had few amenities when he such as dense brush and immature trees to prevent a forest started working there in the late 1950s, but that it was

By Andrew Oxford

In New Mexico, staffed lookout towers are most common in remote wilderness areas that are more prone to fire, such as areas of the Gila. In that sparsely populated corner of New Mexico, fires are less likely to be spotted by motorists on a highway or from a local resident’s back porch, as might be the case in more developed forests where subdivisions overlap with woodlands.

from becoming overgrown, such an approach often requires keeping a close eye on a blaze’s progress. “We’re their eyes in the sky,” Connors says. “We’re telling them about weather. We’re telling them about lightning. We’re telling them about any changes in their smoke.” While the Carson National Forest’s lookout towers are no longer regularly staffed, the facilities have proven useful during recent busy fire seasons. The towers on Picuris Peak and Kiowa Mountain were staffed as recently as 2011, when drought created perfect conditions for fires. The Santa Fe National Forest still maintains four active lookouts — at Cerro Palado, Encino, Dead Man’s Peak and Barillas Peak. Lookouts at Glorieta Baldy and Dome are still maintained but not used. This has been a quieter fire season. Even in the more fireprone Gila, Connors says he only reported five or six fires. But, as he points out, there is still a good argument for posting lookouts over the forests.

Leyendas 2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;¢ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Leyendas

Fifty-year span

The Río Grande Gorge Bridge: ‘It was just a matter of putting the pieces together’

By Andrew Oxford

t was the original bridge to nowhere. When the Río Grande Gorge Bridge opened Sept. 10, 1965, there was little between the river’s western rim and Río Arriba County. It was “a big-sky country of rolling hills, sagebrush, piñon and wheat grass” that had “reverted to its ancient stillness” after a railroad west of the Río Grande ceased service more than two decades earlier and homesteaders drifted away, a local reporter wrote at the time. But with the bridge, civic boosters envisioned a link not just to the furthest reaches of Taos County, but to all of Northern New Mexico from Farmington to Raton, opening up the region to a potential stream of tourists from America’s ascendent motoring middle class. U.S. 64 may not have become synonymous with a road trip through the American West in the same way as Route 66, but 50 years later the bridge has become a tourist destination in its own right and given rise to new communities that are now distinctly Taos.

The vision

U.S. 64 as it is today really began to take shape in 1959. That year, a group of civic leaders formed the U.S. 64 Association to advocate for a paved road cutting across the state. At the time, U.S. 64 stretched from North Carolina to Taos where it turned south to Santa Fe along what is now State Road 68. But an illustration in the Oct. 1, 1959, issue of The Taos News mapped a proposed route that would lead west to Chama, Aztec and Farmington. From there, the proposed route would head to Tuba City, Arizona, and St. George, Utah. Cutting through California’s central valley, the route as proposed would lead motorists all the way to Monterey, California. The map hints at aspirations of developing a route for tourists eager to see America, leading through the Land of Enchantment to Las Vegas and the Pacific Coast. “This will be the first highway New Mexico has with Colorado-like scenery,” then-Gov. Jack Campbell said in

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1962, pointing out there were “plenty of potential ski runs.” The road never got any farther than Teec Nos Pos, Arizona. And while those ski runs were never built, New Mexico’s portion was constructed as planned. But connecting Taos to Farmington via Tres Piedras posed an obvious challenge. There was not a road leading west from the Old Blinking Light as there is today. The quickest route at the time wound through Arroyo Hondo down into the Río Grande Gorge. In 1960, the State Highway Commission contracted a Denver engineering firm to prepare plans for a bridge over the river, which would create a more direct route. The contract was canceled two years later when the estimated cost increased from $1 million to $1.5 million. “And I’ll bet it will be $2 million by the time we get ready to build,” Commissioner Wayne Collins said. Scrapping plans for the bridge was seen by some as a blow to Northern New Mexico, however, and Campbell, who was running for governor as a Democrat, turned the bridge into a campaign issue. On his election in 1962, Campbell said “the number one project in New Mexico is an east-west highway across the northern part of our state. And the real key to development of this highway is the building of a bridge across the Río Grande Gorge.” With support from the new governor, plans for the bridge

There was not a road leading west from the Old Blinking Light as there is today. The quickest route at the time wound through Arroyo Hondo down into the Río Grande Gorge. went speeding ahead. There was opposition from the south, though. One group, which included some Taoseños, proposed building the bridge near Española. Meanwhile, Taos Pueblo leaders initially declined to provide right-of-way for a stretch of highway approaching the proposed site of the Río Grande Gorge Bridge. But on July 11, 1963, The Taos News reported more than 1,000 people gathered on the gorge rim to witness the groundbreaking. The construction Construction began with a nylon string. Tossed from one side to another, crew members yanked the strings tight and pulled a piano wire across. Then, a smaller cable. When they were done, three 3-inch cables crossed the gorge and up a 100-foot tower to create a tramway for ferrying materials and men across the deep divide. Bridge continues on Page 14

Leyendas

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File photo

Workers inspect the Gorge Bridge in August 2007.

Bridge continues from Page 12

he construction site that sprang up around the tower and gorge were not exactly teeming scenes, however. “We never had a whole lot of people. The bridge didn’t require a lot of people,” recalls Edmundo Lucero, a retired engineer whose first job after New Mexico State University was to survey the site. “Once you got started, it was just a matter of putting the pieces together.” There were plenty of pieces, though. The three-span steel continuous deck-truss structure with a concrete-filled steel-grid deck spanning nearly one-quarter of one mile 600 feet above the Río Grande was constructed with more than 2,000 tons of steel and 60 tons of bolts. The trusses are approximately 100 feet deep from bridge deck to the top of the piers, narrowing to 20 feet at the top of the center span. Lucero primarily worked on the substructure — the piers, pedestals and abutments. Two telescoping 105-foot piers, which support the bridge, were built on lava flows approximately 400 feet above the canyon floor. The piers reach roughly 15 feet below ground to bedrock. It was Lucero’s job to ensure the piers were in the right place. As GPS had yet to be invented, he spent a lot of time ascending and descending the gorge. “When I first started in surveying, we had crews of six. We had crews up to 15 people. The location crew was up to 15 people,” he recalls. “Now, one guy can do most of this stuff by himself.” But for Lucero, it required “checking and checking and checking again.”

Once the substructure was in place, a team from American Bridge began assembling the steel structure, which was designed in-house by New Mexico Dept. of Transportation engineer Charles Reed. All the while, crews paved roads from Tres Piedras and the Old Blinking Light to meet them. The construction project was not without controversy. Plans were changed, for example, to pave over the bridge deck rather than leave it an open grid. There was concern visitors might be afraid to walk across the bridge if they could see through it to the river hundreds of feet below, and ranchers said they could not drive their sheep across the metal grade. Even so, Lucero says “I can guarantee you I don’t think there has ever been a sheep that crossed that bridge.” The project proceeded safely — more so than anyone expected. Fatalities were expected, according to Lucero. But no one perished in constructing the bridge. “These guys were hellbent on safety,” Lucero says of the American Bridge crew that put together the steel structure. Unionized and highly experienced, the American Bridge team traveled the country assembling bridges. After working on the Gorge Bridge, for example, some of the crew are said to have gone on to help construct the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in New York City. There were a few injuries, which Chief Inspector Rocco Chicarilla told The Taos News in 1965 were caused by “falling objects, mainly nuts, bolts washers and drift pins.” A bigger danger might well have been rattlesnakes. Chicarilla was told before the project that “if the height didn’t get him the snakes would.” So he arrived equipped with a safety belt and snake-bite kit.

A Taos Tradition of Historic Proportions

Construction began with a nylon string. Tossed from one side to another, crew members yanked the strings tight and pulled a piano wire across. Then, a smaller cable. When they were done, three 3-inch cables crossed the gorge and up a 100foot tower to create a tramway for ferrying materials and men across the deep divide. “When working on the west side of the bridge he saw more rattlers than elsewhere, with many killed in the traffic, and also there he met a ‘good many lost utopia-seekers,’” a profile written about the project leader reported. The project blazed ahead without the environmental regulations that would be de rigueur today. Crews routinely bulldozed rock into the Río Grande. Lucero recalls so much waste accumulating at one point, it nearly dammed the river. There were not any qualms, either, about using lead paint on the bridge. Though the paint job appears to be holding up after 50 years, removing it would require extensive precautions to ensure lead does not fall into the Río Grande. The opening The bridge seemed to be moving Sept. 10, 1965, when it first opened and a stream of pedestrians walked across. “There for a while, a good number were thinking they celebrated a little too much the night before,” the Sept. 16, 1965, The Taos News

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15 And with the tourists, a marketplace for local artisans sprouted. Vendors have set up shop along U.S. 64 near the bridge for years, prompting an on-again-off-again battle with the New Mexico Dept. of Transportation, which maintains it is illegal for the merchants to peddle their wares in the highway right-of-way. Lucero returned to work at the bridge just a few years ago. The New Mexico Dept. of Transportation launched a renovation project that was completed in 2012 and included painting the bridge railing, replacing bearings and gusset said, recounting a politico-studded party at The plates, installing a new guard rail and sidewalks Kachina Lodge Sept. 9 and a barbecue so welland installing concrete polyester overlay on the attended by state officials a reporter wondered bridge deck. who was minding the store in Santa Fe. “Some even hit the deck in the best earthquake style. But The most recent addition to the bridge are 10 the bridge’s movement was natural—it’s designed telephones labeled “Crisis Hotline” up and down to move. As a matter of fact, if it were completely the span’s sidewalks. rigid it would collapse with the first freeze … or Connected to the New Mexico Crisis and the first strong wind.” Access Line, the call boxes were installed last But as another article one week earlier asked, year as a response to suicides at the bridge. where did the bridge lead? It seems to have been a problem no one “You can go to Tres Piedras and take your anticipated when the bridge was constructed. choice, north to Denver via Antonito and Alamosa But the site has earned a morbid reputation as a on U.S. 285,” the Sept. 9, 1965, issue of The Taos destination for those seeking to end their own News said. “You can even go a few miles west into lives. the rough country that is a hunting fishing paradise The New Mexico Dept. of Transportation — but not too far.” undertook a study in 2009 at the behest of state U.S. 64 was not yet complete. The route lawmakers to examine options for preventing had not even been designated U.S. 64. A few visitors from jumping off the bridge. Options miles between Tres Piedras and Tierra Amarilla included fencing along the sidewalk or a net were the only stretch in the entire length of the beneath the structure. But no action was taken. continent-crossing route that was not paved. Another feasibility study was completed in The bridge opened up the West Mesa to January but it remains unclear whether such development, providing a crucial link between proposals have a future. Taos and what would come to be known as Two Any changes to the Gorge Bridge that Peaks. might impact the view would likely come with The structure has become a tourist destination controversy. in its own right, too. While many never travel After all, it may not be the world’s tallest west of the rest area, which was not included in bridge or the longest, but the scenery rivals that of the design of the bridge, the view has become a must-see for any visitor to Taos. the Golden Gate or the Brooklyn bridges any day.

... it may not be the world’s tallest bridge or the longest, but the scenery rivals that of the Golden Gate or the Brooklyn bridges any day.

Rick Romancito

The confluence of the Río Grande and Río Pueblo, just above the Taos Junction Bridge.

AQUÍ EN TAOS It’s not just a slogan. It’s a way of life.

CONTINUING OUR COMMITMENT For nearly a century Chevron Questa Mine has been a member of the community. Even though operations have ceased and our focus is on final remediation and reclamation, we remain a part of the area. We strive to be a good neighbor, sharing the concerns of our community, upholding safe practices at work and at home, and working to create a viable future through economic development, improving educational opportunities and by developing local talent. We continue our dedication to supporting local nonprofits to fund initiatives that strengthen and invigorate the communities where we work and live. With the strength of our non-profit partner organizations, in 2015, we are supporting programs that make a difference. We salute the organizations that represent the traditions that play a role in bettering our community.

It’s not just a slogan. It’s a way of life. Since 1971, Taoseños have embraced our family and business. You could say the Mountain has accepted us . . . Thank you Taos, for 44 years and counting!

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Rick Romancito

Father and son, Albert and Miguel Romo, work on the 1994 enjarre.

San Francisco de Asís Church Faith, mystery and a labor of love

By Teresa Dovalpage

he San Francisco de Asís Church is the heart and soul of the Ranchos community. It is also a National Historic Landmark and one of the most photographed and painted buildings in the country. “But, above all, our church was, and still is, the hub of social and spiritual life in the Ranchos Valley,” said Ranchos resident David Maes, whose ancestors came with the Spanish settlers who settled the Ranchos Valley sometime around 1720. “She is also an icon of the Spanish colonial era and this year we are celebrating her 200th birthday.” There aren’t precise records that indicate how long it took to build the church, but Señor Maes estimates it would have taken at least several years. “The only thing we know for sure is that it was completed

in the fall of 1815,” he said. “But for me, the big question is how it was built, considering that there were only about 70 families living in the plaza-fort at that time. How many were able-bodied young men, physically able to cut and haul trees from nearby mountains to make the vigas, and to produce the thousands and thousands of adobes needed to build the original church? Beyond working on the construction of the church, they had to plant crops, irrigate, hunt, grow and store food for the winter … How did they manage to complete it?” This is one of the mysteries surrounding the church, but it’s not the only one. THE MYSTERY PAINTING

“The Shadow of the Cross” is an 8-foot painting made by a Canadian artist, Henry Ault, in 1896. It was donated to the Ranchos Church by Mrs. Herbert Sidney Griffin, a wealthy parishioner, in 1948. The painting is known for its unexplained luminescent quality, which can only be appreciated in the dark. In regular

light, it shows a life-size image of Jesus standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. When the lights are turned off, the image becomes a luminous three-dimensional silhouette and over his left shoulder, the shadow of a cross becomes visible. There is also a small boat in the distance. Neither the cross nor the boat can be seen in daylight. Julia Katz, from New York, is visiting the Ranchos Church. “I find the painting mysterious, inspiring and intriguing,” she said. “I am also very curious about what materials the artist used.” Janet Oliver, a Taos resident, came to see it for the first time. “I have only one word,” she said. “Awesome.” Tina Torres, who works at the gift shops, explains that scientists have confirmed that no radium or other luminescent materials are present in its composition.

Leyendas

File photo/Taos News Archives

“F

File photo/Taos News Archives

An undated image of the annual enjarre at San Francisco de Asis.

or me, the importance of the painting is the impact it has on people when they first lay eyes on the barefoot Jesus standing on the shores of Galilee.” said Señor Maes. “I believe the painting is an actual representation of Jesus, the manGod. Notice that his skin isn’t white, but coffee colored. The Jesus in the painting looks like a God. Maybe He is trying to tell us that the painting is a true representation of the way he looked when He walked the Earth, and perhaps that is what produces such a miraculous effect.” THE ENJARRE: A LABOR OF LOVE

Cindy Miera Jeantette is the parish secretary. Born in Ranchos de Taos, she has attended the Ranchos Church all her life. She was baptized, made her first communion and was confirmed and married there. “All the sacraments, up to now,” she said. She has also helped in different manners during the enjarres, the annual replastering of the exterior walls and buttresses of the building that is done every June by local parishioners and volunteers. “In the ‘60s, the walls were coated with cement stucco, but it didn’t work because the adobe bricks need to breathe,” Miera said. “We almost lost the church! So we went back to the way of los viejitos, doing what our ancestors

did. The cement coating was removed and we started enjarrando every year after that.” They use traditional adobe (sand, straw and clay) to replaster the building. The enjarre has also a spiritual meaning for Miera and many other participants in the annual ritual. “The church is alive because of the labor of love done by the enjarradores,” said Margarita Martinez-Maes, a native of the Dominican Republic who considers herself an adopted Taoseña. “When we come together we are not only repairing the church, but also renewing our faith.” Between 40 and 60 people show up every day during the two weeks that the enjarre work lasts. “The mayordomos make sure that everyone is fed,” Martinez-Maes said. “We all bring something to eat and it’s like a big family feast.” The mayordomos are stewards who help prepare the liturgy of the mass and keep the church clean at all times. There are eight couples of mayordomos that take care of the Ranchos Church and four for the chapels associated with the parish: Nuestra Señora de San Juan de los Lagos (Talpa), Our Lady of Mount Carmel (Llano Quemado) and San Isidro Labrador (Los Cordovas). THE 200-YEAR CELEBRATION: LECTURES AND MORE

An undated image of the annual enjarre at San Francisco de Asis.

The two-century celebration includes open exhibits in the Parish Hall and a variety of lectures offered by historians and experts on the church. Presenters include Maes with “A Short History of San Francisco de Asís Church,” Rev. Msgr. Jerome J. Martinez y Alire with “The Penitente Brotherhood in Northern New Mexico” and New Mexico State Historian Dr. Rick Hendricks, who will talk about the Catholic Church in Northern New Mexico in the early 1800s. Gustavo Victor Goler, an award-winning santero who lives in Talpa, will also make a presentation about Spanish colonial folk. “There is a lot to say about the art preserved inside the church walls,” said Señor Maes. “For example, the altar screens are painted in the style of an early santero named Molleno, whose pieces date between 1829 - 1845. He became known as the ‘chile painter’ because many of his paintings contain red space fillers that resemble chile peppers.” On Oct. 4, the feast day of San Francisco de Asís that also marks the official 200th anniversary of the Ranchos Church, the archbishop will come from Santa Fe and celebrate a special mass. “Our church, nuestra iglesia, holds a bond unbroken for 200 years with her faithful,” said Señor Maes. “We invite the Taos community to come and celebrate with her.”

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Leyendas

J.R. Logan

Clockwise: A wooden plug marked “63” shows where a tree ring core sample was taken from this log at the Duran Molino near Ranchos de Taos. Results from that sample show the tree dates to around 1617, and was cut down around 1879; The ends of this beam are worn and rotten, but growth rings preserved on the inside of the log were used to date this tree back to 1617; The face of this log shows adze marks where it was squared off by the men who helped build the Duran Molino in the late 1870s.

Field Sample 63 and the Duran Molino Tree-ring dating offers valuable details in history of Ranchos Valley grist mill

By J.R. Logan

he men who went searching for timber in the late summer of 1879 must have been thrilled to come upon a stout ponderosa pine that had stood sentinel over the Taos Valley for nearly 300 years. These men, probably of the Salvador Duran clan of Los Cordovas, came to the foothills that day searching for lumber to build a grist mill — a molino — to grind wheat, corn and other crops growing in the bustling, verdant fields of the Ranchos Valley. Young Inocencio Duran, just 14 that summer, may have been among the family crew that felled that proud pine. The trunk of this ponderosa was a foot wide — thick enough to demand plenty of braun and sweat to bring it down, one swing of the ax at a time. Inocencio and his older brother, Antonio, may have taken turns with the ax, chipping through the trunk with swift, clean strokes until the mighty beast cracked and groaned and collapsed to the earth. Once down, the men, whoever they were, took an adze to the log’s flank, squaring off one side of the old brute, the blade leaving a splintered notch each time it bit through the vanilla bark. Then the men, salty with sweat, most likely affixed the log to a horse or mule to drag it over several miles back to the valley below. When the molino was erected, that timber would have been one of the first to be set. It was the backbone of the

purely utilitarian structure — the primary beam that would support the grist’s upper level. Several strong backs would have been needed to lift the log — still green — into place, atop two even more massive vertical stumps where it was shimmed snug. If they worked fast enough, the Durans may have finished the mill that same season, in time to grind grain from that fall’s harvest. For the next 50 years, generations of the same family would continue the operation until the millstones finally stopped turning in the ’30s. Today, four centuries after first emerging as a sapling, and nearly 150 years after it was felled, that ponderosa still rests firmly in place at the molino, hidden among the cottonwoods and apple trees off Camino Abajo de la Loma, just a stone’s throw from the Acequia Madre del Río Grande del Rancho. The structure is generally in poor shape. The roof is all but gone, and a sheet of black plastic has been strapped to the top to keep out as much water as possible. Vigas are failing. Some have rotted and snapped inwards, smashing through the floor. And there’s plenty of graffiti marring the inside and outside walls. Yet in spite of those blemishes, much of the valley’s history can be read in those slowly decomposing logs. In fact, thanks to the sophisticated science of tree-ring dating, they reveal a surprising amount of detail. A few years back, Thomas Windes, an archaeologist with the University of New Mexico, was approached by Corky Hawk of the Taos Historical Society about using tree-ring

dating to get a firm idea of when the molino was built. Hawk has since done extensive research of the structure on his own, and wrote a paper for the Historical Society on the molino’s history and efforts to preserve it. Windes was already doing research on other structures in the valley, and he agreed. In 2011 he and some students drilled into dozens of logs at the molino to gather dozens of core samples — cylindrical fingerprints meant to show growth rings for the tree’s entire life. Since environmental conditions directly affect how a tree grows from year to year (especially moisture), scientists can compare the core sample from a single tree with a “master chronology” that depicts the general growth pattern of trees in a particular region. If the rings are clear enough, the sample will reveal the entire lifespan, down to the year, and sometimes even the season, it first emerged then finally died. Windes sent samples from the molino to the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona in Tuscon. The results were overwhelming: Nearly all of the logs used to construct the mill stopped growing in 1879. It’s a very strong indication that’s the precise year most of the timber was cut and the molino was built. “If we give a date, it’s an exact date,” says Ronald Towner, Associate Professor of Dendrochronology and Anthropology at the University of Arizona, who analyzed the core samples from the molino. That level of precision inspires the imagination of archaeologists and historians who want to get beyond the data and understand the very human element that piece of wood represents.

Leyendas

Courtesy Corky Hawk • Sketch by Tom Windes, Veronica Arias and Emily Cochran

This diagram shows the south section of the Duran Molina, including the numbers of core samples taken from individual timbers. Nearly all of the samples that were tested show the trees were cut down within a year of 1879.

onsider the foot-wide ponderosa at the heart of the mill, which Windes labeled “Field Sample 63.” According to the lab results, the innermost ring that could be read on Field Sample 63 dates to 1617. The outermost ring in the core sample dates to 1878, the lab results suggest some rings may have been lost, meaning this wasn’t the last year the tree was alive. However, beetle galleries — the tracks left by bark beetles — were present on the outside of the sample, suggesting the outside date was pretty damn close to

the actual year the tree died. To Windes, the ability to pin down the construction of a building to a specific year offers more than data in a spreadsheet. “I like to get at the human behavior involved in these things,” Windes says. “I’m more interested in wood as an artifact and not just a date.” Sunday Eiselt, an archaeologist with Southern Methodist University, worked with Windes when several samples in the Ranchos area were taken. She says the results of these studies help paint a better picture of what life was like for people then.

“The manner, method and style of treating wood differs from culture to culture,” Eiselt says, noting that a lot can be gleaned by paying close attention to how wood was worked. “It’s not that people go cut this log and drag it and stick it in a building. They manipulate it, treat it in certain ways. If you have a viga or a log that has been planed with axes, then the angle of an ax cut might be consistent with a righty or lefty, or whether they were strong or weak.” Those are the details that add another dimension to re-imagining history. “That’s where it becomes really interesting,” Eiselt says.

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- Ancient Indian Proverb

Taos Mountain Casino is proud to honor those who both exemplify the best of the past and who help us weave it into the future. These people are our own links in what continues to be an unbroken circle of tradition at Taos Pueblo.

Raíces 2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s • T he Ta o s Ne w s

Courtesy Library of Congress/John Collier, Jr. Collection Patricio Lopez, left, and his father Juan clean beans in their Trampas kitchen in 1943.

Raíces

Courtesy of the Ernest Knee Collection

Forever grounded

Mabel and Tony Luhan

Our roots run deep and strong

ur raíces (roots) are not only where our ancestors came from or ended up, but what happened to them on their journeys. What was discovered, altered, preserved and endured stretches, bends and absorbs much like roots of a tree reaching out for nourishment and growth. Raíces anchor us.

Northern New Mexico inhabitants remain steadfast as conservationists of history, stewards of tradition, celebrators of those who came before us and lovers of a good story. Raíces are all around us every day, from the petroglyphs at the Orilla Verde Recreation Area to the ancient hunting tools found buried under our shoes.

‘In different hours, a man represents each of several of his ancestors, as if there were seven or eight of us rolled up in each man’s skin, — seven or eight ancestors at least, and they constitute the variety of notes for that new piece of music which his life is.’ — Ralph Waldo Emerson The lives of Arroyo Hondo men who sacrificed all to defend us in war are now immortalized in their hometown, thanks to the vision, energy and heart of one man. And days

of yore captured on film of a Northern New Mexico family and town are still vivid to one of its subjects. Ingenuity and necessity spawned the Molino de los Duranes Grist Mill and new transportation routes. The mountain slopes that cradle Taos provide shelter, jobs and recreational opportunities dating back to the New Deal era and the erection of the Agua Piedra cabin. Another architectural gem immersed in history is the Mabel Dodge Luhan House, which has served as a residence and in modern times, a gathering place for artists of many disciplines. These stories presented in this 15th installment of Raíces are our conscience and the echoes of those that came before. — Scott Gerdes, special sections editor

Raíces

FIFTEENTH ANNUAL

Tradiciones honrar a nuestros héroes

Contents 4

Rock art: Petroglyphs of Taos by Cody Hooks

Agua Piedra Cabin by Cindy Brown

Archaeological artifacts by Cassandra Keyes

Molino de los Duranes by Andy Dennison

Flashbacks: A young boy and a photographer by J.R. Logan

Honoring Hondo veterans by Jordan Miera

The Mabel Dodge Luhan House by Teresa Dovalpage

Staff

Robin Martin, owner • Chris Baker, publisher • Joan Livingston, editor • Chris Wood, advertising manager • Scott Gerdes, special sections editor Michelle M. Gutierrez, lead editorial designer • Virginia Clark, copy editor • Karin Eberhardt, production manager • Katharine Egli, photographer Cody Hooks, J.R. Logan, staff writers

Contributing writers

Cindy Brown, Andy Dennison, Teresa Dovalpage, Cassandra Keyes, Jordan Miera

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fter nearly 100 years building Taos, you could say our roots run deep. An honest day’s work, a firm handshake, and a fair price. That’s what we believe in.

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Raíces

Rock art

Petroglyphs of Taos’ borderlands

By Cody Hooks

own in the Río Grande Gorge just a little south of Taos and near the southern end of the Río Grande del Norte National Monument is the Taos Junction Bridge. A few steps past that is Vista Verde trail, an unassuming footpath in an otherwise brilliant landscape. There, an ancient and deep past lies almost hidden in plain sight. Under the blazing New Mexican sun, they are almost impossible to see. But with a little cloud cover, these markings — petroglyphs — come to life. Petroglyphs are symbols, images and sometimes words carved, pecked and scratched into the black basalt of Taos’ volcanic flows and rifts. Some are dots and lines, others clearly human. Still others detail down to the day when a particular Spanish settler made their way through the gorge. People will casually call petroglyphs “rock art.” But in a constantly changing human landscape where borders, cultures, economies and religions of different nations meet, mingle and intertwine, petroglyphs are among the most concrete of histories that tell of Taos’ past. Since humans started moving through the Río Grande Valley at least 12,000 years ago, they’ve been leaving their marks on the rocks of the Gorge. The oldest glyphs, so called “archaic vocabulary,” come in long series of dots, concentric circles, zigzags, random lines and some plants and animals. Made by hunter-gatherers, the style lasted until about 1,000 years ago. Merrill Dicks, archeologist with the Bureau of Land Management in Taos, cautioned against trying to interpret the meanings of such old glyphs. “That gets into shaky ground,” he said. “But they establish a long record of folks affirming their connection with the landscape.” At the end of a little walk on the Vista Verde trail is what Gary and Dorothy Grief, citizen-archaeologists with the Taos Archaeological Society, call Ancient Rock. The circles, wheels and spirals on the face of the boulder may be markers for a solar calendar used long ago. “You can tell they’re old,” they said, “because of the patina covering the glyph.” Much of the rock art on the Río Grande is pecked into the black basalt, a tough geologic canvas. People made these images by meticulously chipping off the black patina, or desert varnish, on the surface of the rock to reveal a starkly lighter layer beneath. Over time, as the iron and manganese of basalt react with air and water, the black varnish returns and the glyphs blend evermore flawlessly back into the environment. The Río Grande-style of glyphs began to

Katharine Egli

Gary Grief points to a petroglyph of a war scene off the Valle Verde trail in the Orilla Verde Wilderness Recreation Center on Sunday, Aug. 2.

appear when Pueblo people settled the area. Their agricultural lifestyle translated to symbols of corn and cloud terraces, sunlight and rainbows, to name but a few examples. Of course, with different groups living alongside each other for centuries, Dicks said the line between the petroglyph styles of hunter-gatherers and settled people is anything but black and white. From the the late 1600s onward, the Comanches traded, raided and fought their way to become a North American empire that stretched from southern Canada to northern Mexico. Oral histories and the colonial written record even tell of the Comanches in Taos. But archeologists couldn’t reconcile that history. The Comanches, it had seemed, left no physical record of their Northern New Mexican sojourns. Just a few years ago, Columbia University anthropologist Severin Fowles and a group of students took a little extra time to really look at certain “scratches” on the rocks along Vista Verde. They are faint, single lines that most people assumed were graffiti. Meticulously recording each line and running them through computer programs, they found depictions of shields, parfleches (buffalo-hide bags), and scenes of skirmishes, horses and teepees. Fowles consulted with the Jicarilla Apache, Utes and Comanches, three tribes who were known to visit Taos in the early 19th century. Through long conversations and sharing photos and sketches back

and forth they realized they’d found something huge in the archaeological record — actual evidence of the Comanches’ time in Taos. Horses weren’t widely found or used in American American communities until after the Pueblo Revolt of 1680-1692, but they are found aplenty in the steppes of the gorge. There are depictions of idly grazing herds and mounted warriors in battle. But one image is missing from the glyphs — guns. Guns weren’t widespread among tribes until the middle of the 18th century. Once they were, though, guns showed up everywhere in the rock art, especially that of the Plains Indians. Those two clues, corroborated against historical evidence, suggest the Comanches likely made their camps and their rock art in the Taos Gorge during a brief 50 years around the turn of the 18th century. Like other Plains groups, the Comanches were used to making their rock art in soft limestone, where a simple line would show in stark relief. But that technique on Taos’ black basalt made for far less visible glyphs. But why weren’t those glyphs noticed, let alone understood, for so long? Oftentimes, you can’t see something if you don’t already know it’s there. Such was the case for the Comanche glyphs, scattered alongside the pecked glyphs of the Río Grande.

Katharine Egli

A teepee petroglyph on a rock near the La Vista Verde trail in the Orilla Verde Recreation Center.

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Katharine Egli

Gary Grief walks toward a petroglyph of a war scene off La Vista Verde trail in the Orilla Verde Recreation Area on Sunday, Aug. 2; If you look hard, ancient petroglyphs can still be seen on the rocks along La Vista Verde trail in the Orilla Verde.

f course, Comanche, Pueblo and Spanish people weren’t the only ones who left parts of their world traced into the basalt of the Taos Gorge. Hippies, drawn to Taos in the 1960s, left plenty of their own. And along Vista Verde, not but a few feet away from dozens of other hundred-year-old glyphs, someone left a more recent carving of a pickup truck and a cell phone. But the rock art of Taos is endangered. Dicks talked of professionals who go out into the night with diamond saws and loot the glyphs, a trade that’s highly illegal and can

— As with any gem on public lands, it’s possible to love them to death.

easily lay waste to these outdoor museums already facing run-of-the-mill graffiti, defacement and the steady wear of time and battering of elements. As with any gem on public lands, it’s possible to love them to death. The magic place that is the Río Grande Gorge is just one of the reasons the area was set aside as the 242,500-acre Río Grande del Norte National Monument in 2013 by President Obama. “These are fragile environments, archaeologically as well as ecologically. We want people to enjoy it, but we have to preserve and protect the landscape,” Dicks said.

In 500 years, the monument itself will be part of the archeological record. What will it say, he wonders, of the people of Taos and the United States that a ribbon of the Río Grande — and its petroglyphs, those enduring testaments of the fluid borders of Taos — was set aside to be enjoyed, studied and protected for future generations?

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Courtesy of Carson National Forest

Undated image of the Agua Piedra cabin as a warming house.

Agua Piedra cabin Lasting legacy

By Cindy Brown

he log cabin at the Agua Piedra Campground is part of the lasting legacy of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). The CCC was formed in 1933 as an early New Deal program. The intent was to provide employment and stimulate the economy, while improving the nation’s forests and other public places. In Taos, the CCC and other New Deal programs were responsible for many improvements to the forests and state parks, along with the construction of rock walls, bridges, adobe school houses and special projects like the Agua Piedra cabin. The log cabin was constructed in the 1930s and served as a warming hut for one the earliest ski areas in New Mexico. “Visitors used the cabin … to warm up by the fireplace and eat snacks, while drinking hot chocolate after a day of skiing. By 1940, the area had become a popular ski hill …” says information from Carson National Forest (CNF). “The Agua Piedra Ski Club was formed in the late 1930s by skiers from the local communities of Las Vegas, Taos and Peñasco, and it later came to be called the Tres Ritos Winter Sports Area.” There was a rope-tow ski lift powered by a gas engine that ran between 1940 and 1952, as well as a second lift that operated for several years. The lifts provided access to the Cordova Canyon race course and ski slopes as well as other trails located nearby. Lift tickets cost 25 cents per day. The Agua Piedra cabin and ski area changed the landscape and had far-reaching effects into the future. Sipapu founder Lloyd Bolander learned to ski here before establishing the resort area at Sipapu.

Visitors used the cabin … to warm up by the fireplace and eat snacks, while drinking hot chocolate after a day of skiing. By 1940, the area had become a popular ski hill …

Cindy Brown The stone fireplace in the Aqua Piedra cabin.

Local men were hired to build the cabin and their lives and those of their families were changed forever. One of these men was Alfredo Dominguez from Chamisal. Dominguez was the grandfather of Anna Dominguez, a rangeland management specialist at the CNF. Anna Dominguez has collected stories about her grandfather from her family. She came to understand that her grandfather had a hard life and was independent at 7 years old, out on his own working as a shepherd. She says that Grandfather Alfredo was “excited and eager to work on a community project. He was an individual thinker and doer, eager to accept change as it was occurring.” Anna Dominguez says that with the coming of the CCC, the wage economy was introduced to the area, which had previously operated on a more traditional system of barter.

She tells the story of her grandfather’s first day on the job: “My grandfather was eager to work for the CCC. It was a rare opportunity to have work in the community for wages. It was also exciting to experience and learn; to do something different than agriculture-related practices. The people of Chamisal had experienced minimal influence from the industrial world, only one man had a truck in the area, in which he transported many of his neighbors. “My grandparents did not have a clock to know precise time, but they woke up early in the morning to prepare lunch and cover his boots with gunny sacks to protect them from the mud. He walked to the neighbor’s house in the dark and woke them at 3 a.m. He realized he was an eager early bird. This is how important the first day of CCC work camp on the Agua Piedra cabin was to my grandfather. Many of our Dominguez family reunions were held in the cabin, in which the story was retold.” Alfredo Dominguez continued to earn a living by working for the Forest Service as a firefighter until his retirement. Anna Dominguez says that she remembers a consistent greeting behavior of her grandfather when she

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Cindy Brown

Courtesy of Carson National Forest

The Agua Peidra cabin today.

visited her grandparents’ house as a child. “He would sit down by the wood stove, pull out his wallet and intently give us each a dollar with a happy, humble nod. I understood these were special dollars, as a kid, but now I know how special they really were. He was giving a part of himself to us with the dignity and honor of earning that dollar.” Through the CCC program, the local people learned new skills and the influence of the wage system over barter increased. The projects left a lasting legacy of improved parks areas, restored forests, and also established a base for the growth of the recreation industry near Taos. An existing ethic of protecting the resources of land and water was reinforced by the New Deal programs. The tradition of training youth with skills to care for the land

The Agua Piedra cabin in 1940.

continues in the form of learning from family, as well as being part of programs like the Rocky Mountain Youth Corps. As Anna Dominguez says “Many of these projects were efficient in using the available earth resources of rock, earth and wood, along with the human resources of labor, intellect and cooperation. The cooperation between coordinating agencies and youth groups has the greatest opportunity to influence the earth garden.” Today, the Agua Piedra cabin is used for family reunions, weddings, picnics and other events. The cabin is located at the Agua Piedra campground and trailhead, on State Road 518, approximately 25 miles southeast of Taos. For more information and reservations, visit reserveamerica. com.

A Taos Tradition of Historic Proportions

‘He would sit down by the wood stove, pull out his wallet and intently give us each a dollar with a happy, humble nod. I understood these were special dollars, as a kid, but now I know how special they really were. He was giving a part of himself to us with the dignity and honor of earning that dollar.’ — Anna Dominguez

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Archaeological artifacts

Big game nomadic hunters became cultivators of corn

By Cassandra Keyes

iving in the Taos area it would be hard to not have some familiarity with the region’s archaeology. Black-on-white pottery shards are ubiquitous and easily recognizable. Projectile points and other stone tools are frequently seen in shadow boxes. The Taos Pueblo, whose architecture is characteristic of Native peoples throughout the Southwest, is the nation’s oldest continuously inhabited community dating back at least 600 years. But the Upper Río Grande Valley has seen seasonal influxes of nomadic tribes and bands for roughly 10,000 years. The artifacts they left behind are evidence of their presence, and they provide some indications of their way of life as it changed and evolved over time. Before people began settling down in multistory mud apartments and growing corn for subsistence, they were small, itinerant clans of hunter-gathers. “Archaic foragers roamed over this ancient landscape while hunting and gathering a variety of plant and animal species. These annual rounds involved a seasonal pattern of movement up and down the valley between lowland and upland areas,” says Dr. Bradley J. Vierra, an archaeologist with Statistical Research, Inc., who has written extensively about this period in Northern New Mexico. The Archaic period begins around 8,000 years ago and continues to about 1,500 years ago. In 1973, Cynthia Irwin-Williams introduced the term Oshara Tradition to refer to the Archaic period in New Mexico and Colorado and was among the first to use the archaeological record to culturally connect the Archaic to the earliest phases of recognizable Pueblo culture. But little is known about the period that precedes the Archaic — the Paleo-Indian period. During the time from

about 12,000 to 9,500 years ago, archaeologists believed people migrated to the Americas via the Bering land bridge following herds of now-extinct giant and extraordinary mammals — mammals such as the giant beaver, mastodon, woolly mammoth and bison. Known as Clovis and Folsom, these Paleo-Indians were highly mobile, covering hundreds of miles in a year as they hunted and foraged across the land. Their toolkits were designed for efficient hunting, butchering and processing the hides of Pleistocene megafauna. The climate during this time was cool and wet, and food was varied and abundant during the warmer months. The climate, vegetation and landscape, however, changed dramatically in the roughly 2,000 years that separates the Paleo cultures from those of the Early Archaic. In fact, the cultural connection between the two resides in an archaeological gray area. Within the Upper Río Grande, the shift towards a drier climate coincides with the drying up of several nearby major bodies of water. The transition towards a warmer and drier climate had a profound effect on residents, who now relied on a new mix and new distribution of plant and animal resources. “Early Archaic foragers were experiencing more restricted movement and hunting a wider variety of large, medium and smallsized game,” says Vierra. Evidence of this is often seen on the ground as nondescript piles of chipped stone. These lithic scatters are what make up the majority of Archaic archaeological sites, which are fairly common in the Upper Río Grande. The earliest phase of the Archaic period is known as the Early Archaic. Early Archaic sites within the Upper Río Grande date to as early as 8,000 years ago. Hunters of the Early Archaic used Jay and Bajada points, which are large-stemmed points designed to withstand multiple hunts.

‘Early Archaic foragers were experiencing more restricted movement and hunting a wider variety of large, medium and small-sized game.’ — Dr. Bradley J. Vierra Rather than hunting large game in an open prairie setting, like their predecessors, hunters of the Early Archaic began spending more time in the woods targeting medium and small-sized game. And rather than following the herds across the plains, their seasonal settlement pattern shifted to a north-south pattern within the Northern Río Grande. Following the Early Archaic is the Middle Archaic (6,000-2,500 years ago), there was yet another shift in environmental conditions, this time towards a more favorably wet habitat. This allowed for the expansion of piñon-juniper forests within the Northern Río Grande. Hunting strategies once again evolved to fit the new landscape. “It may be during the Middle Archaic that fall hunts in the Río Grande Valley were becoming less successful, so these hunter-gathers would have shifted their residence to the uplands where they could collect piñon nuts and hunt deer,” says Vierra. Along with a change in hunting strategies came new stone tool technologies. Points get smaller and there is some notching happening later. But most notable was the development of blade serration. These changes could have allowed for more successful hunts in the upland forests. Artifacts continues on Page 10

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Courtesy photo The evolution of early man’s hunting tools in the Upper Río Grande Valley.

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EARLY ARCHAIC MIDDLE ARCHAIC LATE ARCHAIC Artifacts continued from Page 8

“S

erration,” says Vierra, “may enhance penetration while creating a more irregular wound that would enhance a blood trail, something important for hunting in wooded settings.” Materials of choice changed with time as well, as people shifted their foraging and hunting tactics from the lowlands to the wooded uplands. Early and Middle Archaic hunters preferred a material called dacite (similar to basalt), which made for more durable points and reflects a north-south pattern of land use within the open lower valley. But point durability became less of a factor as people began targeting a greater variety of game. Impacting the animal effectively became more important. Obsidian gained popularity towards the end of the Middle Archaic, in part because it was widely available in the new areas being hunted. The change in material corresponds to this shift in hunting tactics following a lowland-upland seasonal migratory pattern. The earliest use of maize agriculture in the Northern Río Grande, believed to be about 3,000 years ago, corresponds with continuing favorable environmental conditions and actually marks the beginning of the Late Archaic.

Advantageous climatic conditions continued until about 1,800 years ago. Within the Upper Río Grande, people began following a lowland-upland pattern of land use restricted to the immediate valley. During the early summer, Vierra says folks were exploiting Indian ricegrass, then moving on to the upland forests for wild onions, berries and wild potatoes in the late summer, and then down to the low woodlands in the fall for pine nuts, acorns, yucca and cacti followed by overwintering near permanent water sources. The projectile points also become varied and specialized. “This diversity of Late Archaic point types presumably reflects the implementation of a variety of hunting tactics designed to efficiently procure specific types of game,” Vierra says. These point types set the stage for the bow and arrow.” The limited addition of maize to the diet is thought to be one of the reasons people stopped wandering and decided to settle down. According to Irwin-Williams, “It presented a relatively concentrated, relatively reliable and seasonally abundant resource, which could for the first time provide a source of localized temporary seasonal surplus.” This seasonal surplus no doubt allowed for larger group size and seasonal gatherings. Over time (1,800 years ago to roughly 1000 AD) regional population grew and dispersed.

Within the Upper Río Grande there is evidence that favorable campsites were increasingly occupied for longer amounts of time, and eventually these favored spots became permanent residential settlements employing more of a farmer-forager strategy of subsistence. Climatic conditions around 1000 AD allowed for the growing of maize at 7,000 feet and by 1200 AD the ancestral Puebloans of the Northern Río Grande had developed their own system of survival and community. There is evidence at Pot Creek, for instance, of pit houses being built during this time, to be replaced by above ground structures that look more pueblo-like in the 1200s and 1300s. The trend towards small agricultural villages is thought to be a cultural response to climate, continuing population growth and availability of resources. The advance from small bands of peripatetic huntergatherers to sedentary agricultural communities was long and gradual with myriad advancements in tool technologies, hunting and foraging strategies, and social organization. Change in climate reflects humans’ ability to adapt, evolve and progress. And while the archaeological remnants of the Paleo and Archaic people may not be as elaborate or obvious as those of their Pueblo descendants, they are nonetheless important in understanding and interpreting the region’s past.

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Courtesy of Taos County Historical Society

Molino de los Duranes as it stands today.

Molino de Los Duranes Preserving Taos’ agricultural history

By Andy Dennison

ne of the many foreign items that came up the Río Grande with the Spanish was wheat seed. This domesticated grain, traced to prehistoric times, quickly joined corn as one of the staple foods for the initial settlers of the 1700s. Small fields sprouted up all around Taos. Into the 19th century, Taoseños hand-ground the raw wheat into flour on flat stones called mano metates, which was sufficient for the consumption of a family or two. The flour became tortillas and breads as an essential source of protein for the early Taoseños. “Anywhere you could get water, wheat was grown,” said Corky Hawk, chairman of preservation for the Taos County Historical Society. By mid-century, however, the population of Taos Valley had grown so as to increase agricultural production beyond original subsistence levels. The metate couldn’t keep up with all that wheat, and the first molinos – mechanized grist mills – came into existence to serve what was known for a while as the Breadbasket of New Mexico. “We don’t know for sure since most of them aren’t around anymore, but there were likely a bunch of molinos, along most of the acequias in Taos Valley,” said Hawk. “It quickly outdistanced the distilling of whiskey as the valley’s leading industrial activity.” One such grist mill was the Molino de Los Duranes, which served the valley of the Río Ranchos del Río Grande – today’s Ranchos de Taos and Talpa. It still stands, four walls of hand-hewn logs stacked atop a mud and rock foundation, on the north side of the Camino Abajo de la Loma. Hawk and others have been instrumental in garnering

preservation grants from the Healy Foundation and the state Historic Preservation Division to conduct an engineering study and determine how to best save the 135-year-old structure for posterity. Their efforts have received awards from the Taos Mountain Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution and the State of New Mexico Cultural Properties Review Committee. Named for the family that operated it, the Ranchos grist mill was built in 1879, according to tree-ring dating, and operated into the 1930s. The last miller was Innocencio Duran, who took over operation from his grandfather who built the mill. “From all reports, he was a kind and generous man to all who needed to use his family’s molino,” said Yolanda Romero y Santistevan, a descendant of Duran. While wheat was the main raw material, corn also was reduced to corn meal at the molino. Able to grind up to 300 pounds of flour daily, the mill’s design came from the small villages of Spain – and before that, Alexander the Great. Measuring 20x20 feet with two floors, the structure’s top floor had two large millstones of local basalt. Each was cut and carved into a circular shape, then stacked horizontally on top of each other and centered around a vertical Ponderosa pine axle. The top stone rotated while the other was stationary. On the bottom floor was a waterwheel with grooves cut into its top. Water was diverted from a nearby acequia and its flow accelerated down a flume, or canoa, onto the waterwheel. Wheat came in on the upper floor and, as the top millstone rotated, the wheat got milled into flour between the two stones and deposited into a granary bin nearby. “The miller could make adjustments for the amount of grain that was coming into the molino,” said Hawk. “If things got too fast, he would close the headgate and stop the flow of water.”

Able to grind up to 300 pounds of flour daily, the mill’s design came from the small villages of Spain

Historians contend that the millers were the first entrepreneurs in this part of the country, grinding wheat and corn for those who lived nearby. According to records, they took 10-20 percent of the flour or corn meal as payment for use of the molino, which operated from the August wheat harvest until the water in the acequia froze or stopped flowing. Expenses were not minor, however, as millstones had to be replaced frequently, and the log walls had to constantly be chinked with mud to keep dust, wind and bugs out. Local milling began to dwindle as the 20th century arrived. Larger and more efficient mills came into being, like Alexander Gusdorf’s four-story, steam-powered mill on the plaza in Ranchos. Motorized vehicles and better roads made transportation to and from far-off markets cost-effective. Fully-stocked grocery stores sprung up around Northern New Mexico, and the new cash economy made the molinos obsolete, especially as more and more irrigated land got subdivided and less wheat grew in the fields. “For more than 50 years, molinos were a significant part of an economic system that helped make agriculture as successful as it was in Taos,” Hawk said. “That’s something that’s definitely worth preserving.”

Sources: Charles “Corky” Hawk, preservation chair for Taos County Historical Society; Yolanda Romero y Santistevan; “Structural Evaluation of Molino de Los Duranes,” by Druc Engineering, Santa Fe

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Courtesy Taos County Historical Society

The southside view of the Molino de los Duranes grist mill.

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Flashbacks

A young boy and a photographer

By J.R. Logan

n January 1943, an ambitious young photographer named John Collier, Jr. hitched a ride into Las Trampas while traveling with a priest. The trip was part of an assignment from the Office of War Information, which was looking for images to use as propaganda during World War II. While Collier was ostensibly there on official government business, he seemed mesmerized by what he found in Trampas, which he described as the “center of this mountain region and full of oldness.” Later in his career, Collier emphasized the importance of using photographs as a method of cultural resources. The dozens of photos Collier took of Trampas and of the Lopez family are an early indicator of that later work. The candid pictures give a unique peek at everyday life in rural Northern New Mexico before it was truly invaded by the modern world: gathering wood by wagon, sorting beans for dinner, spinning wool by the fireplace. Patricio Lopez was 7 years old when the strange gringo with a camera showed up and spent a few days poking his lens at the family. Seventy-two years later, he’s still in Taos County. Now living in Questa, Patricio Lopez spent a morning going back through Collier’s photographs on his front porch. Here’s a little of what he remembered about life back then. Photos 1-3: Everybody had a good axe, and they took very good care of their axe. They’d sharpen it on one of those grinding stones where you use your feet to turn the wheel. Very strong handles that didn’t break that easy. All the wood was got during the winter time, as far as I know. We’d have to go a mile and a half, two miles, maybe, at that time to get wood. Going south of Trampas, and also east of Trampas. I remember the old timers used to know exactly how to split a piece of wood. They knew exactly the grain of the wood. Once they got started, they used a lot of wooden wedges. And wood, during the winter time, it’s a lot easier to split than in the summer time. They used to find dead logs, dead trees, and when they dropped them, a good majority of the time a log would break in half or a certain amount of splitting took place. Usually when they’d drop the log, then they hooked it on to a team of horses and they would drag it home. Splitting wood or cutting wood. That was something we kids used to do. I imagine I did spend a lot of time with an axe. People used to work maybe 14 hours a day. Not just our family. Everybody used to. They were very busy. Very committed to do what they had to do. That was mandatory. That was a way of life. A way of survival I suppose. They were pretty tough hombres, I’ll tell you. The way they handled things. My dad was just no bigger than my size — 5’6” — but strong. More than a mule. Photos 4-5: That’s me cleaning beans, peeling potatoes. They raised a lot of beans. You pick them up, you go through process of cleaning them up, put them in storage so you can get what you need for your meal. They had two kinds of beans back then. One was pinto beans, the other one they called it bolita. One was supposed to be better than the other. My dad had maybe 40 acres. We used to plant wheat barley, oats, alfalfa hay, stuff like that. And we used to raise just about anything and everything. Like red beets and carrots and lettuce. They used to grind a lot of corn — blue corn and white corn — flour that went to a mill. They would probably have 400 or 500 pounds of flour by the end of the year. It was separated into different stages: the good, the better and the best. And the rest when to the animals. That’s one thing about people back in the old days. They were so proud of their team of horses. Everybody was always comparing about who had the best team of horses. The strongest, how much they could pull. They used to butcher a lot of hogs in October, November. They used to have a little house where they used to hang all their meat and kept it frozen during the winter time. Whenever they needed meat. During the fall, they used to gather all the corn, and on top of the corral, they used to load up that thing with corn. And we used to clean it during the night time. After supper, the whole family’d get together up there in the dark and shuck the corn. There were other things we did in the day time, and it was a few more minutes to do work. Photos 6-7: I guess that’s me. I kinda liked that hat. I’ve been looking all over the country for one of those things. Apparently it was something that was available at that time, because I’ve seen a few kids from that time wearing the same hat. That hat was never left behind. People used to dress up pretty much the same. There was no difference. Everybody used to wear, what do you call them, pecheras. There was a general store in Trampas. They

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15 9

sold just about anything and everything that was needed back then. But they were all the same. You see the pants. It’s the same kind of pants. Everybody — from the oldest to youngest — used to wear the same thing. I would imagine some of those shirts were homemade. Money was something that we never saw as kids. We were very proud of what they had, and I can see that in my hat. I was very proud of my hat. Photos 8-9: You can see there was no electricity. There was no water. The lighting of the room was either with the light of the fireplace or by kerosene lamp. Kerosene was very important at that time. They were very conservative with those lamps because of the lack of kerosene. They had a little container, half-gallon container,

they used to make sure it had kerosene in it all the time, make sure that it never ran out. There was no running water, so you had to go get your water from the river. It was quite a ways, I’d say, to go get your water. They didn’t waste. They had to haul it that far, they weren’t going to waste it. When mom said, go get some water, the kids didn’t say no like they do now, they had to jump up and do it. There’s not ‘wait a minute, why do I have to do this?’ When they were told to do something, there was no way out of it, you had to jump up and go do it.

When mom said, go get some water, the kids didn’t say no like they do now, they had to jump up and do it. There’s not ‘wait a minute, why do I have to do this?’ When they were told to do something, there was no way out of it, you had to jump up and go do it.

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Joseph Garduño stands in front of the Hondo Hall of History and Heroes and Honor. The photographs on the left honor Arroya Hondo World War I veterans.

Honoring Hondo veterans Joseph Garduño’s patriotic project

By Jordan Miera

oseph Garduño has created something to honor both Arroyo Hondo and the veterans from the village who have served in the military. He has arranged for photos of veterans ranging from World War I to the present day to hang in the Arroyo Hondo Community Center. Garduño calls the display the “Hondo Hall of History and Heroes and Honor.” About eight years ago, Garduño returned to his hometown of Arroyo Hondo with Rosie, his wife, after 54 years of living in Glendora, California. He worked there as an engineer. Garduño served a tour of duty in Korea with the U.S. Army. He was there for two years during the second half of the 1940s, before the Korean War started. In 1999, Garduño wrote a book titled “Arroyo Hondo With its Beautiful and Magnificent People — Past, Present and Future” (Maverick Productions, Inc.; Bend, Oregon). In it, he lists four Arroyo Hondo veterans who gave their lives in World War II: • Esmel Herrera, son of Albino and Silverita Herrera • Leopoldo Martinez, son of Nicolas and Rosanita Martinez • Alberto Rael, son of Silverio and Refugio Rael • Eliseo Sanchez, son of Gregorio and Aurora Sanchez

In the book, Garduño also recognizes Paul Vigil, son of Simon and Genoveva Vigil, a man from Arroyo Hondo killed during the Korean conflict. He also recognizes Eugenio Romero, son of Alfredo and Rosita Romero, who was taken prisoner of war at Bataan in the Philippines during World War II. According to a display hanging in the Hall of History and Heroes and Honor, Romero survived the Bataan Death March, returned home and died Pearl Harbor Day, Dec. 7, 1981. “These seemingly ordinary HONDO residents accomplished extraordinary things in the U.S. Army,” Garduño wrote in his book. “They defended liberty and preserved our values and made America the world’s best hope for freedom and peace. We call them our exemplary heroes. They paid with their lives.” After the book came out, a group of people from Arroyo Hondo, led by Isabelle and Carlos Rendon, made a framed display honoring those men. That display hangs in the Hall of History and Heroes and Honor now, and it is the same display that provides the additional details about Vigil. It provides images of each of the six men mentioned in the book Garduño wrote, along with their birth and death dates, the names of their parents and other information. The poster, made in 2001, also features a painting with

the American flag, a church building, a bald eagle, airplanes and an ocean. It also carries an inscription: “They stand in the unbroken line of patriots who dared to die, that freedom might live and grow and increase its blessings. Freedom lives, and through it, they live in a way that humbles the understanding of most men.” Garduño knew those men, although they were older than him. They were the only men in the Hall of History and Heroes and Honor who died in the service. Garduño has met and knows many of the other veterans with photos in the hall, and two of them are his cousins. According to Garduño, he was invited to attend a Veterans Day meeting at the Arroyo Hondo Community Center, Nov. 10, 2013. All veterans who attended that meeting received a certificate of appreciation from the Arroyo Hondo Community Association recognizing their military service. When Garduño was at that meeting, he thought it would be a great idea to gather photos of all veterans from Arroyo Hondo who have served since World War I and honor them. He mentioned that idea to others, who agreed it would be an excellent thing to do. Garduño took the lead and began gathering those photos, and he estimates that around 100 pictures of veterans have

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Jordan Miera

One section of the Hondo Hall of History and Heroes and Honor.

been collected and are currently on display. Each veteran, with the exception of two, has one photo on display. The two veterans with more than one picture have two photos each, each in two different stages of life or service. “Everybody who knows about it — they’re very happy that somebody started doing that, because it was about time somebody did something,” Garduño said. “But everybody has been cooperative, and they like the idea.” He has not yet been able to collect photos of all veterans. Various factors have made that task more difficult: many of the veterans have already passed away or moved out of state,

and their family members are difficult to find. He is waiting on photos of at least 20-30 more veterans. Garduño thanks Elijia Medina-Espinoza, Pasquala Medina, Isabelle Rendon, Ray Trujillo and Genara Sanchez for their help. They helped spread the word of Garduño’s efforts. Photos of Arroyo Hondo’s past and history hang on the wall opposite of the photos of the veterans. Garduño put those photos up as well. The Arroyo Hondo Community Center is not open all the

time. To see the Hall of History and Heroes and Honor, call Garduño at (575) 776-3010. He will open the community center. He also encourages Arroyo Hondo veterans and their families who currently do not have photos displayed to contact him. “My humble wishes [are] that other communities will do the same thing for the veterans, like what we’re doing in Arroyo Hondo,” Garduño said. “The many places like Ranchos de Taos, Arroyo Seco, Peñasco, Taos — they all have veterans. They should do what we’re doing here in Arroyo Hondo.”

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The Mabel Dodge Luhan House Still a living, breathing artistic hub

By Teresa Dovalpage

eclared a National Historic Landmark in 1991, the Mabel Dodge Luhan House is more than a historical place; it is a living, breathing haven for all creative types. Inspiration is everywhere, from memories of famous guests like Willa Cather, Ansel Adams, Georgia O’Keeffe and Thornton Wilder, to the soothing sounds of the acequia that runs through the property under cottonwood trees. Workshops and educational conferences take place year round, and the property lives up to its reputation as a hotbed of visual and literary arts. The many names of a house The sprawling hacienda began as one big house named “Los Gallos.” Mabel Dodge Luhan and her fourth husband, Tony Luhan, started building it in 1918 and finished the first living quarters in 1920. It originally had six rooms, but a sunporch and more rooms were added over the years. There she lived, sometimes in the company of famous guests like D. H. Lawrence and O’Keeffe, and hosted salons with prominent intellectuals of the time until her death in 1962. When Dennis Hopper purchased the house in 1970, after he filmed “Easy Rider,” he renamed it “Mud Palace.” “I used to come by in the ’70s and traded gemstones with the jewelers who stayed here with Dennis Hopper,” said Charles Franchina, also known as Taos Trader Chuck, who currently works in the Mabel Dodge Luhan House kitchen. “The place was always full of people — filmmakers, hippies and musicians among them.” In 1977, the property was bought by George and Kitty Otero, who did massive renovations of the place and renamed it “Las Palomas de Taos,” a nonprofit organization that offered workshops all throughout the 1980s and ’90s. Lois Palken Rudnick writes in “Utopian Vistas: The Mabel Dodge Luhan House and the American

Katharine Egli

The famed Mabel Dodge Luhan House in Taos has served as a residence and an artist’s retreat.

Counterculture,” that Las Palomas was recontextualized as a “psycho spiritual center” where Jungian dream analysts Pat and Larry Sargeant offered workshops on self-integration and Natalie Goldberg’s writing workshops attracted people from all over the country and beyond.

Currently owned by The Attiyeh Foundation, based in California, the property was renamed once more, becoming The Mabel Dodge Luhan House. It has retained nonprofit status and functions as a historic inn and retreat center, where more than 20 workshops are offered every year.

LEADER TIMELESS EMPATHIC PERSEVERANCE CONFIDENT EXTRAORDINARY Fifteenth Annual

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Tradiciones Our most important issue of the year, focusing on the positive contributions and progress made by individuals, volunteers, nonprofit and community organizations.

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Katharine Egli

An inviting room in Mabel Dodge Luhan House; dining room at the Mabel Dodge Luhan House.

The workshops Bonnie McManus, the Program Manager and workshop coordinator, speaks enthusiastically about the mission of the center. “With our retreat-style meetings and literary and artistic workshops, we continue to carry out Mabel’s legacy to keep her home as a hotbed for the arts,” she said. They host around three workshops every month. “Our most popular ones are those focused on writing, mixed-media art or yoga,” said McManus. The Annual Taos Writing Retreat for Health Professionals is now going on. Started by writer, filmmaker, and teacher Julie Reichert, Ph.D., in 2000, the workshop has been taking place steadily for the last 16 years at the Mabel Dodge Luhan House. “I started it with writer David Morris as a writing workshop for medical practitioners,” Reichert said. “It’s not only for doctors and nurses, but for anybody who works in health care and wants to explore the power of narrative writing.” “This retreat has been like the meals we have eaten here every day,” said Dr. Catherine Brandon, a participant from Ann Arbor, Michigan. “Very nourishing, plenty of it and great variety. They will be in my heart and my hips for the rest of my life.” Chef Melody Sayre, author of “From Taos with Love:

Recipes from the Land of Enchantment,” uses mostly local products to prepare tasty, nutritious menus for the retreat participants. “We serve three meals a day,” she said. “So I incorporate many salads, soups and healthy dishes that give them energy to create.” Strong women in charge Noreen Perrin is the financial manager of the organization. “Something very interesting about the house is that the people who are running it are very strong women, just like Mabel, and that has been the case for quite a few years,” she said. Julie Keefe came to the Mabel Dodge Luhan House for the first time to take Amy Bogard’s workshop, “Creating the Illuminated Travel Journal” in 2011. She returned later as Bogard’s assistant and, in April 2015, she left her job as a management/program analyst for the federal government and became the general manager of the property. “This is my dream job,” she said. “I love working here and supporting the mission of the house, which is to educate people while taking good care of them in a beautiful environment.” New building and new blog Despite the fact that it is almost a century old, the Mabel Dodge Luhan House keeps growing. A new space called “The Meditation and Yoga Building” is currently under construction.

“A concerted effort to preserve our heritage is a vital link to our cultural, educational, aesthetic, inspirational, and economic legacies - all of the things that quite literally make us who we are.” – S. Berry

“Many people who come here want to practice yoga,” said McManu., So, we plan to set up a permanent space equipped with yoga mats always ready for them. We will have yoga instructors available as well.” Writer and editor Liz Cunningham, in charge of Community Engagement, has just started a new blog on the organization’s website. An invitation to Taoseños As an educational institution, the Mabel Dodge Luhan House welcomes local literary organizations that can get a discount when they rent their space. “We have also hosted activities organized by SOMOS, Holy Cross Hospital, the Fire Department and other associations,” Keefe said. “They can use our ‘log cabin,’ a smaller meeting place in the Historic House, or the Juniper House classroom, which can accommodate up to 60 people.” “This is not a museum, but an active learning center,” McManus said. “People are welcome to come and visit us. We have self-guided tours where they can learn about the history of the place and its impact on Taos’ literary and artistic life.” Coffee and homemade cookies are always available in the dining room. “Come by and try them,” she said. The Mabel Dodge Luhan House is located at 240 Morada Lane, Taos, NM 87571 • (575) 751-9686 • mabeldodgeluhan.com

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Artes 2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;˘ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Katharine Egli

Donated to Holy Cross Hospital by Ed Sandoval.

Artes

Courtesy photo

POD (Flotsam), 2015, wool, beeswax, thread, netting, rusted steel, recycled fill; hand felted, stitched, encaustic by Merce Mitchell.

Creative spirits

Taos continues to shine as a guiding light

s the saying goes, art often mirrors life. You could argue, however, that life here in Taos IS art. For many decades artists from all walks of life, from near and far, have been inspired by and beckoned to this mountain mecca of creativity. For some artists it’s the special light spreading down from the sun that catches their eyes and spins the wheels of their imaginations. For others it’s the diversity in materials

‘Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.’ — Pablo Picasso and artistic interests that draw them in. Spirit-moving traditions and historic structures give pause and clarity to many a painter, sculptor, songwriter, potter, metalsmith, wood carver, jeweler, actor, author ... Taos’ guiding light is as boundless as its horizon.

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The talented people of Taos live life lyrically, in which feelings are more powerful than reason. They are thirsty for the magnificent and the mysterious. They courageously strive to transform inanimate materials into lively pieces that make the viewer look and feel. Within these pages of Artes is a taste of Taos expression and passion, often throwing reality to the wind leaving us to applaud and wonder. — Scott Gerdes, special sections editor

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Contents 4

Carpio Bernal WaterCrow: Catching art in the wind by Mel A. James

Taos Society of Artists: Stories from three descendants by Joan Livingston

The artist within: Taos Municipal judge is a canvas maestro by Yvonne Pesquera

Merce Mitchell: Seeds of art by Mel A. James

Healing power of Taos art: Incomparable collection graces Holy Cross Hospital by Yvonne Pesquera

Drag Specialists Car Club: The best of times by Andy Dennison

Lorrie Garcia: A Marian santera by Teresa Dovalpage

The art of the Acuña bow: A lifelong quest by Jordan Miera

Staff

Robin Martin, owner • Chris Baker, publisher • Joan Livingston, editor • Chris Wood, advertising manager • Scott Gerdes, special sections editor Michelle M. Gutierrez, lead editorial designer • Virginia Clark, copy editor • Karin Eberhardt, production manager • Katharine Egli, photographer

Contributing writers

Editor Joan Livingston, Andy Dennison, Teresa Dovalpage, Mel A. James, Jordan Miera, Yvonne Pesquera

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Carpio Bernal WaterCrow Catching art in the wind

By Mel A. James

young boy, perhaps about 8 years old, walks into a shop at Taos Pueblo with his mother. He is carrying a walking stick. When the boy explains to the man behind the counter that there is a crack in the wood, the man takes it without uttering a word and begins carving a deep crevice into the fracture. As the boy watches in wonder, the man then carries it to his tiny workshop at the front of the gallery and begins mixing some glue. As he does, he asks the boy his name. When the boy responds “Arrow,” the man says, “Nice name,” and then suggests he should change his own name from WaterCrow to “Bow,” so they could be “Bow and Arrow,” which tickles the boy. WaterCrow mixes the clear glue with a bit of sparkling ground turquoise and begins to carefully paint it into the crack of the stick with the end of a feather. The boy’s eyes are locked on WaterCrow. Sometimes the most rewarding part of owning a piece of artwork is getting to meet and visit with the artists themselves. Their history and their stories have an impact on the work they create and when you have the opportunity to hear them firsthand, it brings richness to the work, infusing it with memory. Carpio Bernal WaterCrow is from Taos Pueblo. It is where he lives and where his gallery is located, but that is only one part of his story. He shares the gallery along with his wife Rose (married for 30 years) and several of his children, all of whom are artists in their own right. In this shop, pieces of his story are scattered throughout. There’s the story of his father, one of the group of Taos Puebloans integral in regaining Blue Lake from the federal government in 1970. There are photographs of the people he has worked with in cinema, including Jeremy Irons and Neil Young. There is a book, written and personally inscribed by Helen Mirren, whom he met while touring as part of the Native American Theatre Ensemble (NATE), the first all-Native theater group. There is an image of his spiritual teacher, Bruce Miller, who

Sometimes the most rewarding part of owning a piece of artwork is getting to meet and visit with the artists themselves.

Mel James

Taos Pueblo artist Carpio Bernal WaterCrow holding his piece "Coastal Eagle."

also taught WaterCrow the crafts of basketweaving and woodcarving. His time with NATE took him all over the United States,

YOUR SACRED

JOURNEY IS JUST BEGINNING.

Canada and Europe. But it was in the Pacific Northwest, specifically Washington, where he met his wife and Miller, and where he lived for some time. The influence of the Pacific Northwest is clearly seen in a lot of his work. After all his travels and the time he spent in Washington, he eventually returned to Taos Pueblo, bringing Rose with him to raise their family, and here he stays, creating artwork and furniture that reflects this myriad of experiences. But it was at his home, Taos Pueblo, where the lessons in art and the history of his culture began. It was his grandfather who taught him many of the traditional crafts he employs today. In addition to the basketweaving and woodcarving, WaterCrow has experience in jewelry and metalwork, pottery and furniture. He also practices traditional crafts such as the construction of spears, knives, bows and arrows, and dreamcatchers. He is quick to point out this is the “real stuff,” not something created to have the appearance of authenticity. The myriad of his talents can be attributed to his learning style, which he says allows him to be taught a craft once and then he can do it on his own. His furniture employs his woodcarving skills and delicate inlay work, utilizing crushed stone such as turquoise, coral, lapis and malachite, to name a few. The wood he uses is primarily cedar, but he also works in others like oak and cherry. Outside his gallery, inviting visitors to sit, is a chakra chair. The chair itself is relatively simple with only two intersecting pieces of wood comprising its structure,

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WaterCrow fixes a crack in a young boy's walking stick.

but it has multiple stones in different colors, representing the chakras or energy points of the body. It is designed, when used properly, to put your body into alignment. This involves stretching your arms up and behind you, and slowly progressing downward to stretch and relax the body. When asked about his inspiration and process, WaterCrow says, “I catch my art in the wind. There are so many things that go in the wind, travel in the wind, ideas from all over the world. I put it in my mind and when I’m

done with it, I take it out of my mind and let it back into the wind. I love creating from the earth. Everything we use has a heartbeat. I talk to them [the elements], sing them a small song, then create it into something beautiful.” True to WaterCrow’s nature to always seek new opportunities and adventures, he is currently involved in a project to renovate the old Adobe Wall Motel, 227 Kit Carson Road, which is under new ownership. As the plans stand now, it is to be expanded and called Little Pueblo Inn;

the design reflecting an ancient pueblo and will include a gallery of WaterCrow’s artwork and several large totems on the property. As the visitors come and go in WaterCrow’s gallery, the young boy with the cracked walking stick is happily bounding away, hand in hand with his mother. He looks up at her and says, “I think I’m gonna name my stick, Mom!” “Oh? What are you going to name it?” “WaterCrow.”

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Courtesy Couse Foundation

E.I. Couse with grandchildren, Irving and Virginia in 1935.

Taos Society of Artists Stories from three descendants

By Joan Livingston

‘We have everything in the house

he story is a well-known part of local history: artists Ernest Blumenschein and Bert Phillips broke the wheel of their wagon on their way to Mexico and found inspiration in the people, landscape and light of Taos. Seventeen years later, in 1915, six men formed the Taos Society of Artists. By time the group disbanded in 1927, it had 12 members, including the original six: Blumenschein, Phillips, E. Irving Couse, Oscar E. Berninghaus, Joseph Henry Sharp and Herbert Dunton; plus Julius Rolshoven, Walter Ufer, Victor Higgins, Martin Hennings, Kenneth Adams and Catherine Critcher. This year, Taos has marked the 100th anniversary in various ways. Here is one more. Three descendants who live in Taos — Barbara Brandenburg Brenner, Virginia Couse Leavitt and Margot Beutler Gins — share family stories. Barbara Brandenburg Brenner Oscar E. Berninghaus was a loving and humorous grandfather, Barbara Brandenburg Brenner recalls. He entertained at her birthday parties and made her pancakes rolled up with jam and sugar. “Of course, growing up in Taos we were close, which was wonderful,” said Brenner, who was in her early 20s when her grandfather died in 1952. Brenner rode her horse to visit her grandfather, who lived nearby on La Loma. “He would stop whatever he was doing and visit with me, ” she said. “We were more important to him.” A widower, Berninghaus didn’t marry again until his children were grown and educated. Brenner said it wasn’t until the last 40 or 50 years she realized Berninghaus’ artistic legacy. Before, he had simply been her grandpa and painting was his job. “My mother always used to say painting was his vocation and his avocation,” she said. “He got up and went to work like going to the bank or anyplace else. I think he certainly loved it.” Brenner has amassed extensive archives concerning her grandfather. In 1985, she published a hardcover book about her grandfather filled with photos of his paintings. She has volunteered in a number of capacities for local museums and was a founding member of the Taos Arts

as it was, my father didn’t want anything to change because he loved it as a child.’

— Virginia Couse Leavitt Festival. Of the other artists, Brenner knew Blumenschein, whom she said was very sure of himself. “He told people what was right and how to do it,” she said. “He knew what a fine painter he was.” His wife Helen was “a lovely, lovely lady” and Taos’ first Girl Scout leader. She was friends with their daughter, also Helen, who was a fine portrait painter. Sharp — “bless his heart, a nice guy who was deaf as a post” — gave a painting when she and John Brenner married. Brenner says the Taos Society of Artists joined together to sell their paintings on the road since Taos had no galleries. “I think they were friends because they were all in the same boat,” she said. “They all appreciated each other’s talents.” She doesn’t recall any major disagreements, probably because of her grandfather’s role as peacemaker. “My mother used to say my grandfather was the glue that held the society together,” she said. She believes the group disbanded when they tired of being on the road. Also they were becoming well-known. Collectors like the Starks came to Taos. The Stark Museum of Art in Orange, Texas, she noted, has one of the largest collections of Taos artists including 75 paintings by Berninghaus. Virginia Couse Leavitt The family of artist E. Irving Couse never threw anything away. Virginia Couse Leavitt says that is fortunate because her grandfather’s house is a treasure trove of paintings, archives and furnishings. “We have everything in the house as it was,” she said. “My father didn’t want anything to change because he loved it as a child.” Couse Leavitt was born in the house on Kit Carson Road that is now the Couse-Sharp Historic Site. She was 4 when her grandfather died in 1936.

She recalls her grandfather was not to be disturbed while he painted in his studio. “But for some reason, I was allowed to call him to lunch,” she said. “And then he put me on his shoulder and called me his sack of potatoes.” Her father Kibbey Couse wanted to build a factory to produce mobile machine shops. A widower, he went east after E. Irving Couse died. The children lived with an aunt in California and spent summers in Taos. Now Couse Leavitt and her husband Ernie Leavitt, who was a museum curator at the University of Arizona, divide their time between Taos and Tucson. Couse Leavitt has memories of the other artists. Blumenschein, she noted, was very competitive. Phillips was a great storyteller who did a magic trick for children. “He would pull a nickel out of our ear and we just thought that was fantastic,” she said. Sharp was a next-door neighbor who treated the Couse family as his own. Couse Leavitt, an art historian, says it wasn’t until she studied at the University of Arizona she realized the Taos artists’ importance. Their art was overlooked for a while although long coveted by Southwest collectors. After Kibbey Couse died in the late ’70s, Couse Leavitt’s brother Irving Walker Couse stayed at the house “to keep it from falling down.” During the next decade the family recognized the importance of preserving the house and its contents. For instance, the museum has 276 of her grandmother Virginia’s letters, which are filled with stories. (She met Couse in Paris the first week she was there to study art. She gave it up because of eye trouble but put her artistry into the home’s garden.) “It’s heartening to hear people’s reaction every time we give a tour,” she said. A foundation, established in 2001, took over the CouseSharp Historic Site in 2012. A freestanding archive building is in the works. And Couse Leavitt’s biography of her grandfather is now at the University of Oklahoma Press. Margo Beutler Gins Everybody called Bert Phillips by “Mr. Phillips” — even his wife. That’s one of the family stories his greatgranddaughter Margo Beutler Gins shares.

Artes

Courtesy of Carson National Forest

The Agua Piedra cabin in 1940.

Rick Romancito

Barbara Brenner, granddaughter of Oscar Berninghaus, at a June 5 rountable discussion about the Taos Society of Artists held at the Taos Community Auditorium.

Here’s another: Phillips’ father did not want to him to be an artist and gave him one year to study in New York. “Since he did well as an illustrator, he proceeded on to Paris, thus coming back with Blumie, traveling to Denver, getting the wagon and I exist because the wagon wheel broke,” she says, laughing. Gins, who was born several years after Phillips died in 1956, traces her lineage to Bert and Rose Phillips’ daughter, Margot. Her parents owned galleries in Taos and Scottsdale, Arizona, where Gins moved when she was in fifth grade and where she made a name for herself as “an idiot savant child portrait painter.” Gins, who had careers as a nurse and a forensic sketch artist for the Secret Service, returned two years ago with her husband, Joshua. Painting again, she is in the midst of a project to create the portraits of 25 American Indians. Bert and Rose Phillips also had a son, Ralph. Gins recently connected with that side of the family when Ralph

Rick Romancito

Virginia Couse Leavitt, the granddaughter of E. Irving Couse, at the June 5 roundtable discussion.

Phillips Jr., who lives in Nevada, came this summer to a roundtable discussion about the Taos Society of Artists. Gins first realized her great-grandfather’s legacy when she took an art history class at Arizona State University. (She was there to study dance.) Even though her father knew the Taos artists, he was not as interested as Brenner and Couse Leavitt in preservation although Gins is — and in strengthening Taos’ artistic reputation. She recently joined the Taos Art Museum board. Gins said her great-grandfather had strong ties to Taos Pueblo, where she says he participated in ceremonies and won a footrace. A realist, Phillips spent nights at Taos Pueblo painting and as a result, went blind for a while. When he regained his eyesight, Indians from Taos Pueblo built a stage at his studio — now a retail shop at Paseo del Pueblo Norte — so they could pose there. Her favorite painting by her great-grandfather, a gift from her grandmother, is titled “Song of the Aspen Forest” and features his favorite model from Taos Pueblo.

Joan Livingston

Margot Beutler Gins is the great-granddaughter of Bert Phillips, one of the founders of the Taos Society of Artists.

A realist, Phillips spent nights at Taos Pueblo painting and as a result, went blind for a while. When he regained his eyesight, Indians from Taos Pueblo built a stage at his studio — now a retail shop at Paseo del Pueblo Norte — so they could pose there. Phillips, who was the first ranger for the Carson National Forest, owned an early RV, which was a Model T Ford built for sleeping. “Dad would drive him into the mountains so he could paint and when the weather was bad they’d go fishing,” she said.

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Artes

The artist within

Taos Municipal judge is a canvas maestro

By Yvonne Pesquera

ichard Chavez was born and raised in Taos. He says he was fortunate to have grown up there. He married Consuelo (“Connie”) Rivera from La Loma. She was also born in Taos. “Fortunately, our whole family is in Taos. We have no relatives out of town,” Chavez says. He graduated from Taos High School in 1959 and married in 1961. He and Connie recently celebrated their 54th wedding anniversary. Reflecting on his upbringing, Chavez notes that his mother did not work outside of the home. But when he was a junior in high school, she took a job to send Chavez to college. Except he tried college and lasted only a month. The reason? He simply did not like it. “This is not for kids to follow in my footsteps, but in a way I am glad I didn’t go to college. Because if I had gone to college, I probably would’ve become a teacher. And, unfortunately, I think teachers are underrated; they’re not paid enough,” Chavez says. After graduating high school, Chavez went to Utah and California for work. He eventually returned to Taos. He worked at the post office for 15 years and then went into construction. “I was a contractor for 10 years and built several homes here in Taos,” he says. In 1985, Chavez was elected to the Municipal School Board and served for six years. When the Taos Municipal Judge position became open, he decided to run for it. “And fortunately, I won by eight votes.” Chavez says, out

‘I’ve always loved to draw, ever since I was a kid...’ — Judge Richard Chavez of the eight or nine candidates on the ballot. “I was elected in 1990.” As of the last election, this is the seventh time he has been elected. He plans on running again. In 1990, the same year he became a judge, Chavez won an art kit at a Randall Lumber drawing. The kit contained a small canvas, some brushes and a couple of tubes of paint. “I’ve always loved to draw, ever since I was a kid. I painted a church and we didn’t like it. But there is this professional artist friend of mine, Tico Mascarenas. He saw my painting and he told my perspectives on it were great –– because I know buildings. So my building was perfect but my colors were all messed up. So I took lessons with him for 10 years,” says Chavez. The judge eventually set up a studio and has been painting ever since. But he doesn’t paint to sell. “First of all, I’ve been painting for my wife. In fact she’s my biggest art critic. She knows nothing about art, but my work is not finished until she says it’s finished,” Chavez says. In addition to painting for some family members, Chavez also paints for cancer patients. “Most of my work, nearly all of my work now, I give away to cancer patients for raffles to raise money for medical

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expenses. I find that very, very gratifying,” he says, noting that he gives away seven or eight paintings every year. Although the judge’s formal name is Richard, he has been called “Dickie” by his friends and family his entire life. But for his paintings, he signs his name as Ricardo Chavez. He prefers to paint in oils because the paint stays wet for three to four days, which gives him the opportunity to work on the image until it is right. “I mostly love landscapes. I’ve done one vase of flowers and that’s my wife’s. I mostly do landscapes and Taos. I love to do Taos ‘tapias’ with hollyhocks. That’s very, very Taos,” Chavez says. The realistic paintings come from the images in his mind. For example, for Taos Pueblo and San Francisco de Asís church in Ranchos de Taos, he says he doesn’t need to look at a picture as it is well-imprinted “up here” (he points to his head). But there are some paintings he does from imagination, such as a lush winter scene that hangs in his office. In his position, Judge Chavez handles misdemeanors. Some are critical (such as DWI) and a high amount of shoplifting. The courtroom contains his paintings as well (an eagle and a Taos tapia with a blue door and hollyhocks). The waiting room houses his large 4-foot-8-inch painting of Taos Pueblo for which he made the custom frame to fit the nicho. “This is my pride and joy. I did this in 1994. It’s been here for 20 years. I’ve gotten a lot of positive comments on it. The painting was appraised at $13,000,” Chavez says of the painting. Some of Judge Chavez’s artwork is featured on the opposite page.

Roberto “Bobby” J. Gonzales

State Representative District #42 Democrat

The Light, the Land and the People of our Community Make Taos a World-Class Arts Destination. Thank you Taos County for your ongoing support. If I may assist you please call 575-770-3178.

Celebrating 44 Years In Taos.

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The realistic paintings come from the images in his mind. For example, for Taos Pueblo and San Francisco de Asís church in Ranchos de Taos, he says he doesn’t need to look at a picture as it is well-imprinted “up here” (he points to his head). Katharine Egli

Clockwise: One of Judge Chavez’s paintings that hangs behind his bench in a municipal courtroom; Another one of Judge Chavez’s paintings that hangs behind his bench in a municipal courtroom; One of Judge Chavez’s most popular paintings of Taos Pueblo that hangs in his courtroom.

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Artes

Merce Mitchell Seeds of art

events take pride in not adding to pollution generated by shipping and large-scale production.

By Mel A. James

delicate copper wire framework gently cradles a fuzzy woolen pod, fairly pulsing with perceived life. It’s almost as if one could carefully plant this thing in the ground, patting it over with soft loam and the most fantastical fauna could emerge. Merce Mitchell’s work has that effect; her seeds and pods reflecting nature’s aesthetic, yet they exist in an imaginative world. Mitchell pays careful attention to the juxtaposition of textures and of color through her use of soft felted wool and natural materials such as lichen, alongside the cooler/harder feel of metals like copper. Through her use of a multitude of techniques and materials, many of which are under her control right down to the dye she uses, Mitchell creates pieces that reflect years of trial and error, and a bit of play. Mitchell majored in environmental studies and geology in college – this interest is a clear influence on her work – and minored in fine art. She explored papermaking and photography while in school, but later found fiber to be her preferred medium and began to teach herself to felt. She has also been hand-spinning on spinning wheels for more than 20 years and just began dying her own wool in the last year. In the past she outsourced it, but has found that doing it herself gives her more creative control. The last 25 years in Taos have found Mitchell involved in a multitude of endeavors including a yarn-dying business, teaching and involvement with the Taos Wool Festival for the last several years. She has taught felting all over the region including classes in Colorado, at Santa Fe public schools and The Harwood Museum of Art in Taos. These days, however, most of her classes are in Taos and at the Española Valley Fiber Arts Center in Española. Mitchell refers to teaching as a “two-way street,” citing how the act of teaching provides an avenue for learning new approaches. By watching and interacting with the students she finds inspiration to look at her own work in new ways.

Besides her community involvement, Mitchell still has time to create her sculptures, which have been shown at a myriad of gallery exhibits and festivals including the World of Threads Festival in Canada, a recent group show in Santa Fe and the popular annual Seed show (2009-2012) here in Taos, just to highlight a few. When asked about the influence Seed had on her work, she had this to say: “The show was a turning point for me, it changed my artwork. It pushed me from two-dimensional work into more sculptural forms. The impetus for the show was a book called “Seeds: Time Capsules of Life” by Rob Kesseler and Wolfgang Stuppy. The book, with its rich and vibrant macrophotography of the basic structure of fauna, served as a springboard for local artists to explore this deceptively simple theme. For Mitchell, it moved her deeper into her own work. Courtesy photo

POD (Hermannia), 2015, wool, beeswax, thread, pigment, metal, recycled fill; hand felted, stitched, embroidered, encaustic by Merce Mitchell.

Another one of Mitchell’s endeavors includes the continually successful Taos Wool Festival — she has been on the board for the last seven years and as the acting activities coordinator for the last four. This is her first year as the event’s chair, so she will be the site coordinator for the festival, overseeing everything on the field from the vendors to the events. This will also be the first year in which the Town of Taos is a partial sponsor, which she says she finds “Very supportive. It feels like the town is now recognizing that this is a successful and vibrant event.” She feels part of the success of the event is due to location and timing. “Who doesn’t want to come to Taos in October?” she asks with a smile. She refers to the festival as “The Farmer’s Market of Fiber,” due to its similarities with a local farmer’s market; firstly, dollars are spent on local and regional vendors, keeping money in the area and secondly, both

Sponsors five Junior students yearly to take the trip of a lifetime; all expense paid trip to Washington, DC. The Government-In-Action Youth Tour Contest is open to all Junior students in our service territory. The students submit a 750 word essay on the selected topic, the reports are judged and a winner from each service district is selected. Our selected winners take the amazing trip to Washington, DC with over 1,500 other students from across the United States. Kit Carson Electric Cooperative Inc was represented by the following winners this year:

When queried about her artistic process, Mitchell says, “I start with a very general size and form. I like to be really very open about how it’s going to turn out. I try to respond to that creative flow, where one thing will lead to another. Sometimes, when there are things going on my life — that emotional energy will become a part of it, it makes the artwork become what it is. When a friend of mine died, I was working on a piece and everything he had done for me as a person went into that — it’s in there.” In keeping with her “explore and learn” process, Mitchell is planning to pursue more frequent use of metalwork that she will incorporate into her fiber pieces. Already using crocheted wire and some found metal, she seeks to manipulate it more and explore the combination of found object versus a new creation. From these seeds, even more biological wonders could emerge. For more information on Mitchell and her work, visit mercemitchell.com.

Your Co-op has a program that works together with local law enforcement and emergency agencies to report or assist with any youth, senior citizens or any other individuals in need. All employees have the ability to radio in to obtain immediate assistance How It Works: If you are ever in need of immediate assistance look for the Safe Haven bumper sticker on any Kit Carson Electric, Telecom or Energy company vehicles.

Left to Right: Gentry Haukebo, Carlos Amador, Antonio Pena, Diego Gallegos, Angelique Rodarte Government-In-Action Youth Tour application information and deadlines can be found on our website: kitcarson.com/content/government-action-youth-tour-0

A citizen in need of help, for example a child headed home from school is being followed by a suspicious person, can find a KCEC, KCT or KCE truck with a Safe Haven bumper sticker and report the trouble. The employee will then use the trucks radio to call the proper law enforcement agency. The child may then remain with the utility employee until help arrives. Also a Safe Haven serves as a port in a storm for anyone in an emergency situation. For example, an elderly person who is confused or lost might approach a Safe Haven vehicle and ask for directions or assistance. Injured people, frightened children or stranded motorists might do the same.

Safe Haven is another way in which we can all work together to give our communities a safe place to live, work and play! Kit Carson Electric Education Foundation is available to qualified high school students who attend either a public or private school and whose parents are members of the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative service area. Scholarships are granted to qualifying high school students who will be attending a recognized and accredited institution of higher education. Applicants are selected by their levels of good character, academic achievement and can demonstrate a coherent degree plan and willingness to pursue a course of higher learning. Over the past 18 years, the Foundation has been proud to help these students achieve their dreams where they may not have been able to move scholastically forward without the Foundation’s assistance. Kit Carson Electric is proud to announce that since the inception of the Kit Carson Electric Foundation, it has awarded $477,750 in scholarships. 526 scholarships have been awarded since 1997, as follows: District 1 = 176, District 2 = 90, District 3 = 89, District 4 = 88 and District 5 = 83. Scholarship application and deadline dates can be found on our website: kitcarson.com/content/scholarship-information

2015 Scholarship Recipients District 1Anna Donaldson HannaGunther Roy Madrid Larissa Lynn Martinez Shay Moon District 2Matthew Cisneros Bridgette Herrera

District 3Damonica Alderette Reina Duran District 4Gabrielle Martinez Megan Martinez District 5Amy Gonzales Nathan Mieras

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2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;˘ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Courtesy photo

Diatom (Skullcap), 2015, wool, beeswax, thread, recycled fill; hand felted, stitched, encaustic by Merce Mitchell.

Artes

Katharine Egli

Art lines one of the hallways in Holy Cross Hospital.

For many years, artists have been donating works to Holy Cross Hospital.

Healing power of Taos art

Incomparable collection graces Holy Cross Hospital

By Yvonne Pesquera

riginal art is found throughout Taos, defining the creative character of our community. And even in our moments of routine health care or urgent medical need, we find the healing power of Taos art.

Holy Cross Hospital on Weimer Road is part of the Taos Health Systems network. In this one-story building patients, visitors and employees enjoy an astounding, unique art collection of 450 pieces. The works represent all mediums –– mixed-media, paintings, photography and sculpture. Most of the works are done by Taos artists, many of whom are still living. Many have achieved prominence in the art market regionally, nationally and internationally.

“The collection started out years ago. People were either expressing their gratitude or paying their bill,” says Mark Russell, former director of development for Taos Health Systems. In the 1930s, Mabel Dodge Luhan built a hacienda for her son, but his wife was not interested in living in Taos. So Luhan donated the large house to the Town of Taos recognizing the need for a community hospital. She was responsible for bringing the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth to run it. “The nuns were not great recordkeepers when it came to the artwork,” Russell says. “We do know anecdotally that artists gave out of an expression of gratitude or literally paying their bill. That’s how the collection got started and it’s blossomed.”

The donation of art is not a thing of the past. At the time of this interview, Russell had accepted a donation of signed lithographs. “We’re very fortunate,” he says. To date, the hospital has not had the resources to properly curate the collection. That would include researching the history of the collection, and optimally hanging the pieces for conservation and viewing. “Ideally, I’d love to have an advisory committee of artists and art historians from the community who can help us with this,” Russell says. There also is a hope of integrating the art as a formal part of a therapeutic program. “We know our patients staying in the hospital get great comfort walking up and down the hallways, stopping and

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the art of customer satisfaction.

Taos Mountain Energy Bar founders, Kyle Hawari and Brooks Thostenson

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With the completion of the Questa Economic Development Plan, the Fund is working to develop opportunities for entrepreneurs, just as it has supported the opening of a production facility for Taos Mountain Energy Bar at the Questa Business Park.

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Artes

Katharine Egli

From top: A painting donated to Holy Cross Hospital by George Chacon; One of three moon paintings in a series by Beatrice Mandelman.

looking at the art; for families, too. If you have a family member in the hospital for an extended period, it’s great to have something to do instead of walking up and down empty hallways. So in that regard, there is a therapeutic component that I would love to see grow,” Russell says. He points out that long-term, the art collection could be the genesis of a true art therapy program. “So that we’re working with children and young adults in the community, and using the art as a means to help them with whatever their therapeutic needs may be. Whether it’s physiological or psychological,” says Russell. The Holy Cross Hospital art collection –– as well as the art found throughout all the satellite offices of the Taos Health Systems –– is an incredible asset. Different from big city hospitals and institutions, executives didn’t buy art to further the value of a “portfolio of investments.” Like the best things in Taos, the art collection just grew organically. “We have not paid for any of it. So that’s what makes it unique. Other organizations deliberately go out and buy art for investment purposes. This is just so Taos. Especially the bill-paying part. Instead of chickens, we’ve got paintings,” Russell says. The Holy Cross Hospital Foundation, which manages the art collection, is a nonprofit organization. All donors complete and receive a donation form for their tax records. In the past few years, Holy Cross Hospital had the collection appraised by Julia McTague from Questa. McTague is an accredited senior appraiser with the American Society of Appraisers (mctagueappraiers.com). As a local, McTague has long been familiar with the art collection, even when it was located in the old hospital. “In its present location the halls are open and well-lit, giving the collection maximum exposure. It’s a fine show of work,” she says. She was pleased to be hired to appraise the collection. She had experience appraising several other historic collections in Taos available for public viewing. “And the hospital collection — in terms of artists, content, period and quality — continues in this tradition of Taos and New Mexican arts,” McTague says. The appraisal was prepared in the fall of 2009 with 424 works. The project was completed in three months. An update to the original report was prepared in 2013 with the addition of 36 works.

‘We know our patients staying in the hospital get great comfort walking up and down the hallways, stopping and looking at the art; for families, too ... So in that regard, there is a therapeutic component that I would love to see grow.’ — Mark Russell An appraisal is the process of developing an opinion of value, competently, in a manner that is impartial, independent and objective. Each appraisal is unique. “The Holy Cross Hospital Collection is an ambitious body of work, numbering several hundred pieces. Hanging the collection is a challenge, but there is always room for more. Gifts to the collection benefit donor and viewer alike, and strengthen the cultural and creative energy of the community,” McTague says. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Taos Society of Artists. Mabel Dodge Luhan had a close association with the society members, and that had an ongoing impact to the broader community. “Sharing and showing art didn’t just stay among these small groups of artists. It really became infectious to the entire community,” says Russell. “They created a lasting legacy that continues to this day, which is why we celebrate them 100 years later. We’re still the benefactors of their generosity, their talent and their investment in this community.” Indeed, today’s living local artists continue to showcase Taos on a national and international scale. Taos, too, is an international town. People visit here from all over the world to enjoy our culture, history, outdoor activities and natural environment. “Sometimes people on vacation –– like hikers, bikers and skiers –– end up here as patients. They see the art,” says Russell. Whether a native-born Taoseño or a visitor, everyone experiences the quality of the artwork –– making the Holy Cross Hospital art collection a true Taos treasure.

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Top: The Taos Drag specialists pose with their cars at Kit Carson Park on Aug. 25. Bottom: From left, Miguel Martinez photographed with his 1953 Buick Skylark; Tom Martinez, a member of Taos Drag Specialists, photographed with his 1955 Ford F100 pickup; Iggy Peralta, left, and Pat Mo

Drag Specialists Car Club The best of times

By Andy Dennison

euben Martinez, Tom Martinez, Larry Martinez, Miguel Martinez, Mike Cordoba, Iggy Peralta, Pat Montgomery and Paco Santistevan. They were all born in Taos around 1950, just as the automobile cemented its grip upon American culture. Small towns like Taos wholeheartedly embraced all things motorized. The boys were from the neighborhood around Los Pandos, Montoya and Cordoba streets and they all loved cars. They were related either by blood or by proximity – or both – and the eight of them ran together for nearly two decades. They called themselves the Drag Specialists and, recently, five of the original club members got together in Peralta’s garage off Los Pandos Street to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the formation of their informal yet enduring club. They all stood around a bright red “street rod” with beige upholstery. Over the years all of them had had a hand in working on this car, known simply as “The 32,” and pretty much the club mascot since the late ’50s. These days, it’s a few tweaks away from being back on the road — for the fourth time — and it has brought the neighborhood boys together. Being in the same garage again, the five old friends began telling stories. Though formalized as the Drag Specialists in 1965, they got their need for speed long before that. Before they could drive, they hooked up wagons behind cars, careened down Questa Hill in a go-kart and hung on for dear life atop a scooter on a rocky road. Quickly, they began putting cars together from whatever they could scrounge up from the Martinez junkyard or Cordoba’s repair shop. Their first creation was a 1932 Ford with the first flat-head V-8, set on a sculpture-like frame. Once they were old enough to see over the steering

Though formalized as the Drag Specialists in 1965, they got their need for speed long before that. Before they could drive, they hooked up wagons behind cars, careened down Questa Hill in a go-kart and hung on for dear life atop a scooter on a rocky road. Courtesy photo

Reuben Martinez in front of his 1956 Chevy Belair in Santa Monica, California, circa 1968.

wheel, they were driving. Tom Martinez looked the oldest so, at age 12 or so, he sat on a pillow and drove around, ever aware of where the cops were. Soon after that, the drag racing began in earnest. The Los Pandos boys built street rods geared to come off the line quickly. Most warm evenings there would be a race on a side street, often in the Specialists’ neighborhood but also in other parts of town. It was important to avoid the police. Burch Street was a favorite; so was the road to the Pueblo. When things got serious — like if the Questa Boys came down — everyone drove out to just beyond the Gorge Bridge. The money drag strip was in Ratón. That’s where the Specialists got their first taste of the “long necks,” the fuel dragsters with slingshot frames. A number of them ventured out to the airstrip in Ratón to try their rods out against the big boys, without much luck. There is a story of the one Taoseño who made it to the finals. Sadly, he forgot to take it out of reverse after backing into position — and took off in the wrong direction. The 1960s and ’70s were a great time for kids in Taos.

Everyone knew everybody, people kept an eye out for each other, and the kids had a “carefree” life – if they didn’t screw up. The best of times, the Specialists agreed. Eventually, they drifted away from cars — what with marriages and children, mortgages and jobs. A few dabbled in the “muscle cars” of the mid-’70s (Peralta had a Barracuda; Miguel Martinez, a Road Runner), and the young families convoyed to Colorado in vans. But mostly they had to become adults and leave hot rods behind. However, The 32 didn’t go anywhere. Its last race had been against Pat Montgomery’s Z-28. Soon after, Peralta sold the engine to buy his wife a better wedding band before he went into the Army. The car sat under a tarp for 15 years or so until, in 1999, three of the Specialists found themselves unemployed. What else could they do but start messin’ with ‘rods again. And now, both the Specialists and The 32 are poised for another run.

Artes

ontgomery, members of Taos Drag Specialists, are photographed with Iggyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 1932 Ford Roadster; Mike Cordoba and his black 1964 Chevy Nova Super Sport; Paco Santistevan and his 1952 Red Chevy Pickup; Larry Martinez stands next to his green 1966 Chevy Custom C10.

Katharine Egli

Artes

Katharine Egli

Lorrie Garcia carves a new bulto by hand outside her home Sept. 6.

Lorrie Garcia A Marian santera

By Teresa Dovalpage

ome artists discover their vocation early in life. Others blossom somewhat later, embracing a second or third career and excelling at it. Lorrie Garcia, a master santera from Peñasco, is living proof that success is worth the wait. Garcia taught at the Peñasco High School for

25 years. “I enjoyed teaching,” she said. “And I loved my students. This is a tight-knit community, so I knew their parents and grandparents, and by the end of my teaching career I knew the children and grandchildren of some of my former students; we were all part of the Peñasco family. However, just before I retired, I also felt I had something to contribute to the world as an artist.” In 2000, a year before retiring, she and her husband Andrew Garcia (also a high school teacher) decided to take a Spanish colonial furniture-making class taught by one of Garcia’s former students, Daniel Tafoya, also from Peñasco.

“He offered me a lot of help and encouragement when he realized how much I enjoyed carving, but since I was afraid of power tools, I pretty much became my husband’s sidekick,” Garcia said. “That was fun for a while, but it didn’t feed my creativity, so I began to experiment and try different things on my own.” Garcia said she used her newfound carving skills to do relief carvings of wild animals and horses. Her husband encouraged her to pursue her art when he saw the quality of it, so he suggested that they sign up for a bulto/retablo class in El Rito. “That class,” said Garcia, “was the beginning of my career as a santera, and I can honestly say that it changed my life. Art became my passion from the very beginning and 15 years later, it still consumes me. I wake up every day either finishing a project or starting a new one.” She had barely started painting retablos the first year of the Annual High Road to Taos Art Tour. “Andrew and I participated and used our front yard as a showplace,” she said. “I exhibited my pieces there and,

to my surprise, we had a very successful show selling my paintings and Andrew’s furniture. Several of my very first pieces were purchased by my former students. Some of them still collect my work.” Garcia’s artwork can be found in churches, museums and private collections around the U.S. and other countries, but she says the most rewarding and humbling validation of her work comes from her former students, her family and her close friends who continue to support her. Garcia has won many awards and values all of them, but attaches special importance to the Archbishop’s Award, which she has won twice. “Because,” she explained, “it is the highest honor for a santera or santero.” Garcia has also won the People’s Choice Award twice and the Best Collaboration Award with her husband at the Traditional Spanish Market in Santa Fe. Other distinctions include the Women’s De Colores Award of Excellence; Best of Show at the Taos Fall Arts Festival; Best of Show at the Taos Santero Market and Best Traditional Spanish

Artes

Katharine Egli

From left: One of Garcia’s bultos of the Virgin Mary is intricately detailed with paint and pressed tin; Garcia poses for a portrait in her painting studio at her home in Peñasco; tiny angels surround Mary in one of Garcia’s retablos.

Colonial Award at the State Fair Hispanic Arts. The traditional art of the santeros Santera Garcia prefers to call her traditional wood-carved sculptures santos instead of bultos. “Before I began to study santero art, I used to think of a bulto as a spirit, not a carving,” she said. “So I’d rather say that I carve santos.” New Mexico santos, she explained, started as strictly religious artwork that the first New Mexico settlers used to decorate churches and homes. “In the late 1700s and through the 1800s, the local artists didn’t have access to commercial paints and tools that were produced in Mexico or Spain,” she explained. “They were quite isolated here and had to make their own pigments, adze their own lumber to use for retablos and use local woods for carving santos. This gave rise to a very distinct style of devotional art found only in Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado. At first glance, some of these pieces may seem rustic, but a closer study reveals a beautiful, freeflowing style which collectors find so enticing, be it santos, retablos or rededos (altar screens).” Garcia makes Northern New Mexico traditional retablos

out of ponderosa pinewood and uses pigments and gesso that she prepares herself, following the old santeros’ tradition. Among her artistic influences, she mentions José Rafael Aragón, a popular 19th-century santero whose artwork can be found in many museums and mission churches throughout New Mexico and Colorado. “He was a one-stroke artist,” Garcia said. “I always wanted to be as confident in my work as he was in his. His figures have delicate features with careful attention to detail.” Santos, retablos and the Virgin Over the years, Garcia has carved and painted hundreds of retablos and santos. It usually takes her two to three weeks to do the carving of the santo, and a week or two to add the iconography and paint before it is complete. She strives to depict santos in a respectful, but humanlike manner. “I hardly ever depict my santos with a sad or gloomy look,” she said. “I look to them as role models and patrons, but I never forget that they started out as regular people and they experienced many emotions, including happiness, of course.”

Though her work includes a wide range of themes, Garcia considers herself basically a Marian artist. “I have represented la Virgen as La Guadalupana, La Dolorosa, Nuestra Señora de la Luz, La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre and as many Marian apparitions as I’ve heard of,” she said. Art and faith “Through my work, I have a spiritual connection with the saints,” Garcia said. “In that sense, my art is like a prayer. I strive to be a better person because of what I do.” Though she enjoys the “wow” reaction that her artwork elicits in those who look at them, there is a different feeling that she expects to transmit. “I feel at peace when I am working and that’s what I try to infuse my pieces with — the knowledge that there is a God and He loves us, and has sent many saints to help guide us,” she said. “For me, being a santera is a calling that goes beyond technical expertise.” Garcia’s work can be seen at the Spanish Market, the Taos Fall Arts Festival and Garcia Spanish Colonial Art in Peñasco by appointment. Call (575) 587-2968 or e-mail lorriegarcia85@hotmail.com.

Thank you, to the artists who painted and decorated dog houses for Gimme Shelter part II Silent auction proceeds benefitting

Stray Hearts Animal Shelter and

Greg Moon

El Moises

Susan Cady

Linda Gottlieb

Habitat for Humanity of Taos

Linda Gottlieb t Susan Cady t El Moises t Greg Moon Barbara Ann Downs & Silvia Avenius-Ford George Chacon t Sam Richardson t Ann Wyndham Richard Alan Nichols

Barbara Ann Downs & Silvia Avenius-Ford

George Chacon

Sam Richardson

Ann Wyndham

Richard Alan Nichols

Come meet your new best friend! Adopt ttt Foster ttt Volunteer ttt Donate Stray Hearts Animal Shelter strayhearts.org Open Monday through Saturday 11:00 am to 4:00 pm, or call for an appointment!

575-758-2981 s 1200 St Francis Lane

Artes

The art of the Acuña bow A lifelong quest

Jordan Miera

Charlie Acuña shoots a Penobscot bow, which he made himself in 2014. The bow is a re-creation of a type of bow that dates back about 1,000 years, used by the Mi’kmaq people of Penobscot, Maine.

By Jordan Miera

harlie Acuña makes bows, has worked at summer camps backed by a billionaire and has his very own page on IMDb.com. And he lives in the Taos area. People around the world have used bows for a very long time, Acuña points out. A Holmegaard bow was found preserved in a peat bog in Denmark. Carbon dating puts it at being 10,000 years old. One of Acuña’s first bows was a Wham-O fiberglass bow, made by the same company that makes Frisbees. He also tried making them. When he was 8, Acuña learned about archery at a summer camp. “I remember, as a youngster, trying to make a bow,” Acuña said. “I would try anything — a branch with a string tied on it, and I thought it was so cool to make a bow and have it work for a while until the branch actually dried out and broke. It has just been a lifelong quest to figure out how this ancient process was done.” Acuña has been making bows about 25 years now. He was on a road trip with one of his friends when he saw a book: “Bows & Arrows of the Native Americans” by Jim Hamm. This book has step-by-step instructions for making bows, arrows, strings and more. He bought the book and began making bows in earnest. He initially started off by making Indian-American-style bows, and he later started making other types, like English longbows. He made his first bow in his uncle’s garage in Orange County, California. Taos beckoned to Acuña 22 years ago, when he left his job in the airline industry amidst security concerns. At that turning point in his life, he had a friend named Bud Quimby who moved to Taos. Acuña began looking at Taos and saw its mountains, ski industry and artist community. He moved to Taos six months after Quimby did. Acuña estimates he mas made at least 500 bows over the past 25 years, and he’s sold them to people as far away as Norway, Italy and Japan. As far as he knows, he is one of the only bow-makers in Northern New Mexico, if not the only one. Acuña has made various appearances on television. Most recently,

CUSTOMER SERVICE IS OUR ART

623 PASEO DEL PUEBLO NORTE • TAOS WWW.CIDSFOODMARKET.COM • 575-758-1148

Artes

Jordan Miera

From left:After pounding the sinew, Acuña runs it through this metal dog comb to shred it. He then dips it in water and hide glue before applying the sinew to the bow backing; Acuña shows the beginnings of the braid produced using the Flemish twist method of making bow strings; Acuña made these arrowheads. They are meant to be displayed.

he appeared on History Channel’s “No Man’s Land.” The show’s producers called him and pitched the idea; Acuña did not even have to audition. In the show, he leaves his shop in Taos and heads off to survive in the desert outside Bernalillo, where parts of “Breaking Bad” were filmed. For Acuña, one of the more difficult bows to make has been the Penobscot bow, named for the Mi’kmaq people of Penobscot, Maine. It is a compound bow; a second bow is attached to the back of another one, giving it a counter pull against the main bow. The Penobscot bow dates back about 1,000 years, according to Acuña. He made his re-creation out of hickory, which is what the original bow would have been made of. Although Acuña acknowledges bows may now be made of many different types of materials, he prefers more traditional bows made of wood. When he re-creates bows, he tries to make them with the same type of wood they originally would have been made of. A look at how Acuña works Acuña uses a drawknife in the initial phases of bowmaking to trim bark and wood. He works on a 300-pound iron workbench. He places the piece of wood with the bark facing upwards. The lighter-colored sapwood is the layer found under the bark, and the darker heartwood is the layer underneath the sapwood. It’s important to follow the growth rings, or the rings produced by tree growth, to the end of the piece of wood;

try not to cut into the growth rings. Doing so will increase the chances of the bow breaking. If there are knots in the wood, raise them; cut the wood around the knot, but do not cut the knot or flatten it. Flattening the knot will increase the likelihood of the bow breaking. Some bows are backed with sinew, or animal connective tissue. The sinew gives the bow more integrity. Acuña buys sinew and pounds it with a tool. He then shreds the sinew into fine fibers, usually with a metal dog comb. He dips those fibers into water and uses hide glue to fasten the sinew to the bow. He puts two or three layers of sinew on the back of the bow with the fibers side by side. “A bow isn’t a bow until you put a string on it and get it to bend and shoot it,” Acuña said. “Otherwise, it might as well just be a hiking stick.” Acuña makes the strings he puts on his bows. Many different materials may be used to make strings, but he typically uses linen made from flax because it makes for strong strings. There are two main types of bow strings: those made with the Flemish twist and those made with a continuous loop, which is common in Asian bows. Using the Flemish twist method, Acuña takes two- or three-ply of the same material and twists them together. He makes each ply with four strands of linen. He runs each ply through a chunk of beeswax and twists the plies together so

Better Checking. By Design.

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they braid and form string. To string the bow, he invented and made a bow jack, which uses a jack to raise and press the bow against padding. The bow bends and is much easier to string than it otherwise would be. More about Acuña Acuña considers Kassai Lajos, a Hungarian bow-maker and archer, to be a source of inspiration. His bows are featured in many films and television productions, including “Game of Thrones” and “The Scorpion King.” “He shoots from horseback just like it’s child’s play,” Acuña said of Lajos. Bill Gates has hired Acuña three times to teach archery to children at seminars in Sun Valley, Idaho. Acuña has also taught bow-making to high schoolers at the Santa Fe Waldorf School, and he’s organized various archery competitions. There used to be archery clubs in the 1800s, and women used to go out in Victorian dresses and participate in these archery socials. Acuña would like to see a return to archery socials with traditional wooden bows. Acuña doesn’t just make bows; he’s also made flint knives since he was 12 years old. He also prepares food — he is a chef at Southern Methodist University in Taos. For custom bows or archery instruction, contact Acuña at (619) 916-1385 or email him at stonedge2000@hotmail.com.

Artes

“Certain things catch your eye, but pursue only those that capture the heart.” - Ancient Indian Proverb

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Taos Pueblo Governor, Luis Romero LT. Governor, Edwin Concha Tribal Secretary, Antonio K. Mondragon

Citizens of the Year AND

Unsung Heroes

Section 1

Citizens of the Year: The Randall Family

Section 2

Addelina Lucero, Bruce McIntosh

Section 3

Liz Moya Herrera, Walter Allen, Mary Anne Boughton

Section 4

Thom Wheeler, Carl Colonius, Melissa Larson

FIFTEENTH ANNUAL

Tradiciones honrar a nuestros hÃ©roes

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Charles, Paula and Dorothy Randall pose for a portrait in their lumberyard in downtown Taos, Aug. 11.

Citizens of the Year

The Randall family

By Joan Livingston

andall Lumber and Hardware was founded in 1921 — making it the oldest business in Taos. Beginning with Elisha Randall, the business has been a building source for local people building and repairing their homes, a steady employer and a generous benefactor. Of course, one can’t separate the family business, now in its third generation, from the family. When asked about the Randalls’ legacy in Taos, Elisha’s son Charles Randall, says modestly, the family has been “part of the community and filling in when needed.”

When asked about the Randalls’ legacy in Taos, Elisha’s son Charles Randall, says modestly, the family has been ‘part of the community and filling in when needed.’ “Elisha set the base — honest and straight forward,” he said. And for being an integral part of the community, The Taos News honors the Randall family as this year’s Citizens of the Year.

Origins When Elisha and Erna Randall were interviewed on radio station KKIT in 1971, it was the day after Amarillo Hardware gave them a gold hammer to mark their business’ 50th anniversary. “You’ll have to come by the store and see it,” Elisha said in a heavy Maine accent in the recording. “It’s quite a sight.” Elisha was 7 when the family arrived May 5, 1903 after a five-day trek by train from Maine to Tres Piedras. The Randalls were going to help at a San Cristóbal ranch owned by relatives. Randall continues on page 6

Heroes

Joan Livingston

Members of this year’s Tradiciones Selection Committee from left: Eloy Jeantete, Gabriel Romero, Mary Ellen Ferguson, Elizabeth Crittenden Palacios, Kathleen Michaels, Angel Reyes, Stella Mares McGinnis, Marilyn Farrow, Barbara Wiard and Esther Garcia.

Involvement

Congratulations on A JOB WELL DONE The Randall Family

Committee makes Heroes possible

cts of kindness and selflessness by those who quietly go out on a limb to make a difference in other peoples’ lives are Taos’ unsung heroes.

For the 14th year, The Taos News honors a group of citizens for making notable contributions to the community. To help recognize those who oftentimes don’t want to be recognized, The Taos News gathers an assembly of citizens for our annual Tradiciones selection committee. The 2015 committee included Eloy Jeantete, Gabriel Romero, Mary Ellen Ferguson, Elizabeth Crittenden Palacios,

Citizens of the Year

Kathleen Michaels, Angel Reyes, Stella Mares McGinnis, Marilyn Farrow, Barbara Wiard and Esther Garcia.

and

Overseers of the process included publisher Chris Baker, editor Joan Livingston, advertising manager Chris Wood and former special sections editor Andy Jones. No staff members were involved in the selection process. The paper’s management staff, however, did make the final selection for Citizens of the Year from a list of nominees presented by the focus group.

Unsung Heroes of Taos! Your commitment, hard work and perseverance have built a legacy for Taos’ future.

The Taos News staff sincerely thanks the 2015 Tradiciones committee for making this entire series possible. — Scott Gerdes, special sections editor

FIFTEENTH ANNUAL

Tradiciones honrar a nuestros héroes

Staff

Robin Martin, owner • Chris Baker, publisher • Joan Livingston, editor • Chris Wood, advertising manager • Scott Gerdes, special sections editor • Michelle M. Gutierrez, lead editorial designer • Virginia Clark, copy editor, Karin Eberhardt, production manager • Katharine Egli, photographer • Editor Joan Livingston, staff writers Cody Hooks, J.R. Logan, Andrew Oxford, Rick Romancito, Gabriel Weinstein

Contributing writers

Wanda Lucero 575.737.5433 wandalucero.com

Cindy Brown, Andy Dennison, Teresa Dovalpage

On the cover

Dorothy, Charles and Paula Randall pose in front of their family’s business, Aug. 11. Photo by Katharine Egli.

94 Years, 3 Generations,

One Family.

Heroes aren’t born. They’re bred through hard work and perserverance.

94 years of business ownership has thrown us plenty of challenges and hard times. But the joy of serving our families and friends of Taos has always kept us going.

Stop by for a cup of coffee and learn about the Randall difference. “the home experts” 315 Paseo del Pueblo Sur 575.758.2271

www.randalltaos.com

Heroes

Thank you Thom... “Congratulations for your generous dedication to the community of Taos and your life long commitment to causes that are dear to your heart.” -With Our Friendship, Bridget & Chuck Centers “Thanks for all you do to help make Taos such a great place for us all.” -Peggy & John Hamilton “Thank you for your friendship and your generosity. You make Taos a better place to live!” -Love, Tom & Kaye Tynan “My Amigo - Congratulations, Thom. You are a Hero with a big heart for the Town of Taos and all your contributions to so many nonprofits.” -Ed Sandoval “Congratulations, Thom for your continued support of the Taos Community.” -Kirk & Jeri Clark

Heroes

“Well deserved, Thom! You are no longer ‘Unsung’ …Just a Hero.” -David Robinson & Marcia Waldorf “Thom and Lavinia are a great conduit to friends and we are very happy and proud to have been included.” -Tom Work & Joyce Alapa “Thank you for being my friend. I love you.” -Louis Codoné “You have given unselfishly to this community for so many years. Today is your day to realize that all you have done and continue to do has not gone unnoticed and is appreciated by so many. You’re a beautiful soul.” -With heartfelt love, Kellie Harris

...for being our Unsung Hero

Heroes

Courtesy photo

Charles H. Randall, right, stands with two lumbermen after they had cut down a particularly large tree.

Courtesy photo

Elisha Randall stands on a horse-drawn carriage though a lumberyard.

The Randall Family Citizens of the Year

Randall continues from page 2

‘He didn’t talk a lot but when he had something to say it was really important, and when you were in trouble you knew it right away ... ’ — Dorothy Randall

e returned briefly to Maine for high school and served in the Merchant Marines before settling in Taos. The family first ventured into logging, a full days work with a team of horses in the canyons. “Change was very slow then,” Elisha said in the recording. “The streets were deep in mud. Practically all the houses were adobe and there was one store.” Elisha opened the lumberyard in 1921, and

eventually it began selling hardware a little at a time to meet customers’ requests. As for her role in the business, Erna, who married Elisha in 1930, said succinctly, “I try to hold up my end of it.” Charles Randall said his father was “a typical New Englander.” “He didn’t talk a lot but when he had something to say it was really important,” Dorothy Randall, who is married to Charles, said. “And when you were in trouble you knew it right away. He liked me a lot. I was on his good side mostly.” Erna’s family moved from Oklahoma to Moreno Valley; she came to Taos to work at Burch’s store on Taos Plaza. “She was a farm girl, a hard worker,” Charles said of his mother. “She worked alongside dad right from the beginning.” Elisha and Erna had four children: Charles, John, Merlin and Minnie Lou. Paula Randall Ervin, Charles and Dorothy’s daughter and one of the business’ current owners, says it’s fortunate she and her siblings got to know their grandfather before he died in 1972.

Heroes

Everybody knew Erna as “Grandma Randall.” She lived next door at “the big house” and was a constant presence at the store. Even a few years before she died in 1999, she sat and said hello to customers so they’d feel welcome. “He seemed like he was gruff and had a New England accent he never lost,” she said. “He was fun. He loved reading and he read to us a lot. He always wore suspenders. It was always a favorite game to run up behind him and pop his suspenders and then he would chase us.” Paula recalls her grandmother was “very German.” “Cleaning was the most important thing,” she said. “You always had to be cleaning something. The guys around here were always glad that she wore a hard heel so they could hear her coming. They could get busy when she came around the corner. Everybody knew Erna as “Grandma Randall.” She lived next door at “the big house” and was a constant presence at the store. Even a few years before she died in 1999, she sat and said hello to customers so they’d feel welcome.

Next generation Charles Randall, like other members of the family, started working at a young age. “From the time I was big enough to handle anything I was stacking lumber or receiving boards from the planer or the saw, ” he said. After college and serving in the U.S. Marine Corps, Charles worked in the family business for its construction division. He built roads and did earthwork for utilities. Brother John managed the store. Merlin had a moving and storage business before he got into construction and power tools for the store. Minnie Lou worked with the Forest Service. Charles and Dorothy, who married in 1954, have three children — Paula, David and Pamela. When their youngest was a year old, Elisha asked Dorothy if she wanted to work part-time at the store. Randall continues on page 8

Courtesy photo

Mini Mariah Randall poses for a picture with a car.

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Charles Randall

Katharine Egli

Dorothy Randall

Katharine Egli

Paula Randall Ervin

The Randall Family Citizens of the Year

Randall continues from page 7

“I

was dusting,” Dorothy said. “I didn’t like that much. That went on for a year. I got interested in the accounting office so I started learning that part.” She worked while the children were in school as the accountant. That turned fulltime until she retired last year after 52 years. Third generation Prior to the third generation taking over, Randall Lumber had 17 stockholders — all of them family members but only a few actually working in the business. In 1997, Paula Randall Ervin, David Randall, who lives in Fort Collins, and Britt Bland, their brother-in-law, became the sole owners. Pamela Randall Britt owns Unicorn School Supplies next door. Paula was 6 or 7 when she had her first job at Randall’s — dusting and licking stamps and envelopes on statement day. “I’ve loaded lumber and cement,” she said. After graduating from Randolph Macon Women’s College, where she majored in physics, she returned to Taos after graduation, as she knew she would. She and her husband John Ervin, who worked as a blacksmith, built their home on Blueberry Hill. Paula said lumber and hardware is the best business for the family because it is providing something people need. “What’s more important than sound housing?” she asked. Randall Lumber has survived during economic downturns by being conservative. “We don’t owe money,” Paula said. “We make do. We have a forklift that is 25 years old that’s still working. We’re proud in this downturn we didn’t lay anybody off. We managed with some attrition, not replacing anybody. Everybody pitched in and cut our hours and did what we could.” Plus Randall Lumber has generations of loyal

customers. “I remember their grandmothers coming in and my grandfather would give them credit to repair their roof,” Paula said. “These sweet little old ladies would come in with their $5 or $10 to pay on their account. We knew they had a roof that didn’t leak or windows that were secure.” Randall Lumber has 39 employees; the average stay is 15 years. Many of their employees are related, an arrangement Paula says works very well. Frank Concha retired in August after 56 years. Six generations of the Concha family have worked at Randall Lumber. Contribution to Taos Being a part of the community means more than selling what it needs. Elisha set that example as Taos’ first fire chief. He was a “firefighter for life.” During World War II, he spent evenings and weekends fixing roofs and tackling other repairs for women whose husbands were in the service. Charles has been involved with the Taos Historic Museums starting back in the ’50s, including serving as chairman for 20 years and on its board. He has his workshop, where he built the “Broken Wheel” float commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Taos Society of Artists for this year’s Fiestas parade. He and Dorothy helped start the Sangre de Cristo Church in 1991. Charles worked on the church’s construction. Dorothy is its treasurer. As for Randall Lumber, one of its favorite causes is Habitat for Humanity of Taos. Besides donating construction materials, it presents a toolbox to the new homeowner. And at the Taos County Fair 4-H livestock auction, Paula stays until the end to bid on the animals the youngest children show. “I love our business and I love what we doing for our community,” she said.

As for Randall Lumber, one of its favorite causes is Habitat for Humanity of Taos. Besides donating construction materials, it presents a toolbox to the new homeowner.

Heroes

Courtesy photo

The Randall Family gathered to celebrate the 65th Anniversary of their lumber business in Taos.

Congratulations Randall Family from our family to yours. We appreciate all you have done for our community. Congratulations to the Unsung Heroes.

ANDREA SUAZO, AGENCY 1010B PASEO DEL PUEBLO SUR TAOS, NEW MEXICO

575.751.9500

Heroes

Serving Northern New Mexico for over 40 years

223 PASEO DEL PUEBLO SUR #1 575-751-2061

1381 PASEO DEL PUEBLO SUR 575-758-4268

www.riograndeacehardware.com

Heroes

2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;¢ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Katharine Egli

Addelina Lucero checks her blue corn fields at Taos Pueblo.

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Addelina Lucero stands in her blue corn field at Taos Pueblo, Aug. 21.

Addelina Lucero A long journey home

By Teresa Dovalpage

ddelina Lucero’s life journey took her from New Mexico to California — the latter her mother’s home state — and then back to Taos Pueblo where her roots are now firmly planted. “I was born at the Indian Hospital in Santa Fe and lived in the Pueblo until I was 8 years old,” she said. “When my dad passed away in 1979, my mother moved the family to the West Coast. Up to that moment, my understanding of society was that of a little girl whose parents made a living off their land in a tight-knit community. We knew all our neighbors, so moving to Los Angeles turned out to be a shock.” At first she felt alienated — contrary to what had happened at Taos Pueblo — because everybody “was a

stranger in Los Angeles,” she recalled. The differences, ‘I worked with former gang however, made her aware of her cultural identity. members so they could get funds “Later in life, though I worked as a brand manager for big companies like Donna Karan and Tommy Hilfiger, and had and have a place to meet, and a successful career in the clothing industry, I still longed for offer their performances. Most home,” she said. “I knew in my heart that I belonged here and that I would come back.” of them played heavy metal and Metal Momma Productions underground music.’ While she was working and raising her three children in California, Lucero found time to devote to young people — Addelina Lucero who needed help. “I worked with former gang members so they could get for those young people who, like herself, felt out of place in funds and have a place to meet, and offer their performances,” an urban environment. she said. “Most of them played heavy metal and underground music.” Lucero continues on page 14 Her company, Metal Momma Productions, was an outlet

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Addelina Lucero checks her blue corn fields at Taos Pueblo.

PHOTOGRAPH BY LENNY FOSTER

Walter Allen

LIONS CLUB MEMBER SINCE MAY 7, 2007

OUR HEROES... Honoring Walter & Thom, who have shared their spirit of being a Lion by giving through community service.Â

Thom Wheeler

LIONS CLUB MEMBER SINCE OCT.18, 2012

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Lucero holds beans picked fresh from her farm at Taos Pueblo, Aug. 21.

EDUCATION

is the development and honing of the abilities of the mind.

TRAINING

is the practical application of education to a particular art, trade or profession.

UNM-Taos salutes our own LIZ MOYA-HERRERA and all the other Unsung Heroes who devote themselves to the honorable profession of teaching.

UNM-Taos 1157 County Road 110 Ranchos de Taos, NM (575) 737-6200 | taos.unm.edu

Heroes

Lucero continues from page 12

Addelina Lucero A long journey home

‘I

t was a very rewarding experience,” she said, “which encouraged me to continue helping the youth when I came back.” Coming home Six years ago, Lucero felt it was time to return to New Mexico and go back to college

as well. “I took a sociology class at San Bernardino Valley Community College that helped me reconnect with my tribal self and motivated me to continue studying,” she said. “I began researching university programs and decided to attend (University of New Mexico), which granted me a full scholarship through Student Family Housing. It was an answer to my prayers; I could come home and learn about our language and culture.” She is still attending UNM and plans to get a bachelor’s degree in Native American Studies and Indigenous Education. “I learned how to teach, how to create a curriculum and implement learning strategies,” Lucero said. “Then I thought of applying these new skills to my community. I returned to Taos in the winter of 2012, ready to restart my life here. I dreamed of my sons hunting and being part of the tribe, of growing our own corn.” The educator: The youth programs at Red Willow Center Lucero is currently an educator at the Red Willow Center, where she just finished teaching a class through the Summer Sustainability Institute. She is also the project coordinator for a sustainable food

system at Taos Pueblo that offers nutritional training to the youth. “I fulfilled my dream of being here and working with young people,” she said. “We help them get access to different programs that are connected to the Red Willow Farmers Market, the CAMP program at UNM, the greenhouse program and the high school credit recovery program, which they can take when they are ready to graduate but need some science credits.” Students learn about irrigation, the use of solar panels and cooling systems, the agricultural traditions of American Indians and how to preserve them. “These are very hands-on, science-in-action classes,” Lucero said. “The kids also work in the garden and sell their produce in the Red Willow Market that takes place every Wednesday.” They have also partnered with community gardens at the Taos Waldorf School, the Taos Pueblo Senior Center and the Head Start program. Every semester the course has a different theme. The most recent was “Our food is our medicine” and dealt with how food can be used for healing purposes. “Whatever we put into our bodies has an effect on it,” Lucero said. “We eat every single day, so we have to be careful with what we use for nutrition.” The entrepreneur: Dancing Butterfly Naturals Lucero uses the same approach in a line of personal care items she has developed. The lotions, soaps, body scrubs, bath salts and shampoos she makes are all natural and organic. She uses ingredients

such as goat milk, aloe vera gel, sunflowers, coconut, pure vitamin E, essential oils and mineral clay. “I never put into my products anything that I wouldn’t like for me or my family to be in contact with,” she said. “And I should say that my whole family has been very supportive of this venture. My daughter helps me make the products and we have so much fun working together.” She named her business Dancing Butterfly Naturals. Dancing Butterfly is her Native name and she chose it to honor her roots. Lucero plans to develop more items soon. “My goal is to create products that are good for the skin and the planet, and that also help my clients’ beauty shine in a natural way,” she said. “That’s why my motto is ‘love yourself from the inside out.’” Reconnecting with the ancestors Besides developing her business and teaching at the Red Willow Center, Lucero is also farming her own plot of land. “My mom gave me her blue corn, red bean and pumpkin seeds,” she said. “They are very meaningful to me; symbols of how I am reconnecting with my ancestors’ traditions.” Her youngest son, Julian Alarcon, is also on a path to unite with his heritage. He went through his initiation ceremony a few months ago. “It’s called ‘traditional commitment’ and connects him directly with our language and our people,” Lucero said. “I’m very proud when I see my children integrating so well into our community. This is the main reason why I came back — we are home.”

C E L E B RAT E

Your Special Occasion in True Taos Style

Create festive memories—Host your Intimate or Grand Event at El Monte Sagrado

Call 575.737.9822

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Heroes

Katharine Egli

Bruce McIntosh and Gabrielle Sanchez do a mirroring exercise on stage at Metta Theatre, Aug. 21.

Congratulations to Our Longest Standing Member:

Randall Lumber and Hardware

Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re An Exceptional Example of Business Success!

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Heroes

Bruce McIntosh Acting is a kinship

By Cody Hooks

ruce McIntosh, a selfdescribed “skinny white guy from Connecticut,” heads up Metta Theatre and Metta Young Artists, a theater company that’s more than a place to put on plays. He describes the cadre of actors young and old as a little family. And a family, like any production, play or poetry reading that graces the tiny stage in El Prado, is a collective effort. McIntosh knows, from the actors onstage to the volunteers taking tickets, “what has been accomplished is yours alone by no means. It is the coming together of many people.” McIntosh came up professionally in the hardscrabble Los Angeles theater scene, making next to no money doing plays in a city with more than 200 little black-box theaters. “I was not a working, commercially successful artist by any means,” he said. Still, McIntosh admits his fortunes were luckier than most — he was in a play that put him on the road for several years after he and his wife, Michelle, had just moved to Taos. He sent home what money he could. A couple of plays he wrote were turned into films and he’s had plenty of professional acting gigs on films and TV, here and there. It was a chance kind of remark from a volunteer drama teacher that got McIntosh

Teaching adults was fine. But deep down, he wanted to work with emerging artists in their teens and 20s. into Taos High School in 2006. “They’d go to high school their whole classroom day, do after-school acting classes a couple days a weeks, go grab a bite to eat and be down at the theater to keep acting for a few more hours in the evening.” Teaching adults was fine. But deep down, he wanted to work with emerging artists in their teens and 20s. That trajectory was never really the plan. But McIntosh quotes a 13th century poet who said, “events and plans seldom agree.” “That’s when it solidified,” McIntosh said, and Metta Young Artists was born. “In two seconds I fell in love with all these high school guys.” “Some of these guys — when I say guys, I mean the young women and the young men — don’t have an idyllic home scene,” he said. Taking a cue from a gang rehab program in L.A., Homeboy Industries, McIntosh discovered that acting isn’t necessarily the core of Metta. It’s kinship. McIntosh continues on page 19

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Bruce McIntosh poses for a portrait on the Metta Theatre stage, July 27.

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Heroes

Katharine Egli

Bruce McIntosh leads a group in grounding Tai Chi movements as a warm-up before a young actors workshop, Aug. 22.

Congratulations, Carl!

Roberto “Bobby” J. Gonzales

State Representative District #42 Democrat

Congratulations to the 2015 Citizens of the Year and Unsung Heroes. Your hard work and commitment make Taos the special place it is. Thank you Taos County for your ongoing support.

Thumbs up to your commitment to youth development, rural vitality and conservation.

If I may assist you please call 575-770-3178.

You’re our hero!

LAND& WATER Issues

C O N F E R E N C E

October 23-24

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Heroes

McIntosh continues from page 17

Bruce McIntosh Acting is a kinship

‘W

here is kinship? Where does a kid feel welcome no matter what kind of mistakes he’s made and no matter what kind of background he’s in?” he asked. The answer has evolved over time as the little family of Metta has grown, morphed and helped emerging artists find their way to confidence, skills and the places of their dreams. “We’ve had a Cinderella story,” he said. Not only have young Metta actors ended up in the big cities (admittedly a hardscrabble route like his), but others have also been on sets and gotten their union cards right here in New Mexico where the work is heating up because the industry madly craves talented, trained young people. So in rehearsals and workshops, McIntosh brings his dedication to match the indomitable drive and passion of the multitalented artists around him. “One of the benefits of theater is you can’t fake it,” he said. “It’s going to take you some hours to memorize this and it ain’t gonna get memorized ’til it’s memorized. I’m not beating them up, I’m just saying there’s no getting around it if you’re in the last part of your last scene and the lines start to wobble.” It’s a fact of life that, “Yeah, it’s on you. You’re responsible. That’s valuable, that kind of discipline,” he said of his own life lesson, adding, “Theater saved my butt when I was a kid.”

But McIntosh thinks what he teaches the young folks pales next to what they end up teaching him — especially at the Taos County Juvenile Detention Center (JDC). Since October, he’s co-led an acting and creative writing workshop for three days a week at the detention center with Jacquelyn Cordova, a 2009 graduate of Taos High School and board member of Metta Theatre. “You’re trying to create the vibe of a theater in a detention center,” she said, “where naturally talented young people (singers, songwriters, screenwriters, and yes, actors) have to deal with a lot of isolation and unknowns.” “I have this Zen teacher who says ‘give yourself unreservedly,’” McIntosh said. “The core activity is the same in the detention center. You’re up there trying to give it your all.” When the young people at the JDC give it their all, another side of acting takes the stage. “I like to see what’s real,” he said, recalling young people’s struggles with poverty and substance abuse, hardcore gangs, sexual violence and the beginnings of what could be a long haul in the criminal justice system. “This is Taos,” he added, where the tragedies are just as important as the shiniest of successes. “They might be wondering if tomorrow they’re going home or going to an adult detention center. Maybe a family visit didn’t happen. They’ve got a lot of stuff they’ve seen and experienced. They’ve got a lot of stuff going on,” McIntosh said.

“How many emotions you got today?” he’ll ask them. One guy from Taos nailed it — “I don’t know man. Like a zillion.” The thing about acting is it’s about the right now, McIntosh said. “When I went to New York for acting school, a teacher said something to me that was a foreign concept — you have the right to your feelings. You don’t have any emotions that are incorrect. This art form requires you to express truthfully your actual emotions, not what’s wanted at home or expected at school.” “I want to know your truth,” he tells them. Because in acting just as much as in life, “it’s only when there’s genuine, true emotion that it touches somebody.” To help young people get in touch with their truths, McIntosh shares a method, not for acting, but for cleaning out their heads. A Zen mediation practitioner for about 17 years, he’s seen that something as simple as counting your breaths can chill these kids out, help them sleep and feel a little better. And hopefully, acting and a little mediation can help them accept the situation as it is, and accept themselves as they are. The situation? Not insurmountable. Themselves? Labeled as screw-ups, but talented humans with so much to contribute. Navigating the criminal justice system, putting on shows and getting young people to where they want to be comes with plenty of challenges. But for every challenge, McIntosh meets it, greets it and makes art with the little Metta family around him.

Heroes

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Heroes 2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;˘ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Katharine Egli

Mary Anne Boughton paints artists' palettes, July 7, for the Taos Historical Society's replica float for the 2015 Fiesta Historical Parade.

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Liz Moya Herrera poses for a portrait on UNM-Taos’ Klaur Campus, Aug. 10.

Liz Moya Herrera Solving for Taos

By Andrew Oxford

iz Moya Herrera did not find much encouragement in math class as a student at Taos High School. “My, we’re getting brave, aren’t we?” a teacher used to say when students would raise their hands in math class. “Let’s pretend you’re not very smart. That isn’t hard, is it?” he would sometimes say to the students. It was an era when, as Moya Herrera describes it, “you could either hack it in the classroom or you couldn’t.” “There wasn’t a lot of support,” she says. Moya Herrera’s experiences as a high school student did not turn her off math. Instead, she learned to love it. As an educator, Moya Herrera taught students to love math, too, and became an evangelist for a better way to engage youth with numbers. While she would go on to graduate from Taos High School, it was there she had her worst experiences in math. And while Moya Herrera would go on to graduate from the University of New Mexico (UNM) with one of the school’s first degrees in bilingual elementary education, it would be several years into her teaching career that she would come to

truly love the subject. Moya Herrera moved back to Taos after graduating from UNM and began teaching in 1974, but was in her seventh year of teaching when she attended a workshop that would change the way she saw math — and the way hundreds of students would learn it. The workshop taught her not to merely toss equations at students and ask them to solve for “x,” but to ask them questions that would lead them to untangle the problem on their own. “So I tried to teach my fourth-grade students things that weren’t in the fourth-grade curriculum just to see if I could,” Moya Herrera recalls. “I could.” After moving beyond her own negative experiences in math, she became an advocate not just for the love of numbers but for a more effective style of teaching the subject. “I think that’s really why we’ve developed so many people that don’t think they can do math or don’t do well in math or don’t like math,” she says. “Just because of the way it has been taught for so long.” Math should be accessible, Moya Herrera says. “Math is in music. Math is in sports. Math is in every

As an educator, Moya Herrera taught students to love math, too, and became an evangelist for a better way to engage youth with numbers. aspect of our lives and we don’t even realize that it’s one thing in life that makes things beautiful — the space and the shapes that we move around in,” she says. But Moya Herrera has come to see that her quest to improve math education is not merely a matter of instilling a love of learning in her students. It’s also about improving the quality of life for their community. This was the subject of a running argument between Moya Herrera and a former colleague. Math can be a key to economic development, as she sees it.

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Liz Moya Herrera tutors students at UNM-Taos in math at the Klaur Campus, Aug. 10.

“I tell my students they can’t have a bad attitude about math. You have to let go of those negative experiences and learn to love it. Otherwise, they’re just going to keep perpetuating what we have now,” Moya Herrera says. And if anyone has fought to change the status quo, it’s Moya Herrera. Moya Herrera grew up in Santa Rita, where her father worked in the copper industry. His work took the family to Silver Bell, Arizona. They settled in Taos when she was in high school after he landed a job at Questa’s molybdenum mine. Moya Herrera’s father only had an eighth-grade education. But he was a union man. Moya Herrera recalls her family hosting meetings with labor leaders in their home when she was a child. And she credits him with having inspired her own activism. As an elementary school teacher, Moya Herrera says she was concerned educators were too often left out when administrators made decisions that impacted their students’

learning. “The school district wasn’t listening to the teachers,” she says. Taos was home to a chapter of the National Education Association, but Moya Herrera describes it as having been ineffective. It didn’t have a contract, either. “What we decided we needed was collective bargaining. We decided we needed a say in what was going on in the education of the children in our community,” she recalls. At the time, New Mexico did not have a collective bargaining law, making it a steep uphill battle. A group of educators decided to organize a chapter of the American Federation of Teachers. But rather than organize an election, the organizers asked colleagues to sign union cards. Teachers were fearful, however, school board members

2 3 g n i 3 t 8 3 a r Y ears 015 91 Celeb ily Owned Busin Fam

Moya Herrera tutors Rachel Lujan, left, and Thomas Fernandez, Aug. 3.

ess

El Taoseño Congratulates our Unsung Heroes and Citizen of The Year

The Randall Family

would learn of their support for the union, Moya Herrera says. To assure confidentiality, she recalls the union asked a librarian and a priest to tally the union cards so administrators would not see who had signed. Most of the school district’s teachers wanted a union, she says. But the school board dismissed the union’s “hard card petition.” “We decided the only way we’d get a bargaining agreement is if we had a school board who supported us,” Moya Herrera recalls. So the union recruited a slate of candidates to run for school board. They won the election and the union won recognition. Taos Federation of United School Employees continues to represent teachers and staff at Taos Municipal Schools. Herrera continues on page 25

“Heroes are never perfect,

but they’re BRAVE, they’re AUTHENTIC, they’re COURAGEOUS, DETERMINED, DISCREET,

and

THEY’VE GOT GRIT.” - Wade Davis

I’m honored to serve Taos County’s community of heroes. Your dedication and tireless work inspires my service.

Congratulations to the Randall Family and all of the Unsung Heroes.

Jim Fambro Taos County Commissioner • District #1

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Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Moya Herrera poses for a portrait on UNM-Taos’ Klaur Campus, Aug. 10.

Congratulations to Citizens of the Year, the Randall Family And to the Unsung Heroes. BILLY J. KNIGHT, CLU Investment Advisor Representative

KNIGHT Financial Ltd. Wealth Management Group

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Heroes

Herrera continues from page 23

Liz Moya Herrera Solving for Taos

hat battle of David vs. Goliath would also characterize another one of Moya Herrera’s contributions to the district. Daniel Hedges, a teacher whose classroom neighbored Moya Herrera’s, taught chess to some students with special needs. Some of her own students learned, too, and the teachers would occasionally pair up students to play together. “Kids you wouldn’t think would play chess were learning to play chess and they were great thinkers,” Moya Herrera recalls. Hedges proposed forming a team and joining a league of Northern New Mexico schools. Moya Herrera agreed to help, but is the first to admit she does not have a particular knack for the game. “It’s not that we were such great chess players because I’m not a great chess player, but I’m a good teacher,” she says. The Knighthawks performed well, however. The team traveled to tournaments on weekends through the fall and into spring. Teams even traveled the country, from California to Florida. The Knighthawks were often smaller and younger than their competition. Moya Herrera recalls walking with an elementary school student through a hotel conference hall full of teenagers huddled around chess boards at a national tournament. When she escorted her student to the chessboard where he would play his next match, the teenager on the other side

Ever the advocate for teachers, Moya Herrera remains concerned educators have too little say in the decisions that impact their students’ learning. looked at them askance. “I’m going to play him?” she recalls the high school student asking, referring to the 7-year-old beside her. “Yes, you’re going to play him,” Moya Herrera replied, offering a lesson to her students that they should never be deterred. Moya Herrera also traveled the country mentoring and training other educators with organizations such as the American Indian Science Engineering Society, Inter-Tribal Education Coalition, Resources for Indian Education, the California State Dept. of Education, the Science Teacher Enhancement Project and the Northern New Mexico Network for Rural Education. Moya Herrera also served as principal at Enos Garcia Elementary School and as instruction and accountability director for Taos Municipal School District, working in the district for a total of 31 years before retiring.

The school district made a big impression on her personal life, too. At the school mariachi program’s practices, she met Walter Herrera, a father who would later become her husband. They were married in 2000. Today, she teaches math for elementary school teachers at UNM-Taos. Her only child, Louis Moya, followed her in working for the school, where he is now director of development and media services, as well as chair of the Digital Media Arts Program. Ever the advocate for teachers, Moya Herrera remains concerned educators have too little say in the decisions that impact their students’ learning. “I think accountability is important, but that we’ve gone a little crazy with that,” she says, referring to the current-day debate over standardized testing. “I think teachers spend too much time on that aspect of their jobs. It’s hard for them to find the time to do good teaching.” And she is concerned charter schools may be doing more harm than good — by drawing the most advantaged or promising students and undoing some of the advances in racial integration. “A lot of the kids who go in there — they’re kids who are going to make it anyway because their parents have the resources and realize the importance of education. The kids who need support are the ones who are not getting it,” she says. “I like the idea of small schools,” Moya Herrera adds, “but I really wish there was a way to do it that better represented the demographics of the community.”

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Walter Allen poses for a portrait at St. James Episcopal Church where he is an assistant minister, Aug. 3.

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Heroes

Walter Allen A compassionate spirit

By Andy Dennison

n the face of it, a young Walter Allen would hardly have been anyone’s candidate to be an Episcopal priest. After all, he spent much of his professional life as a commercial developer in his native Houston — one of the fastest growing cities of mid-century America, and home to all manner of dispassionate growth and capitalism. “Those were high times in Houston,” Allen said as he sat in his office at St. James Episcopal Church in Taos. “Those were the days when you could walk into a bank and negotiate the rate on your terms.” But, all along the way, there were hints that he would eventually heed a higher, more compassionate calling. He came from an Episcopal family. As a developer, he found that new, highly profitable construction projects didn’t interest him as much as rehabilitating distressed buildings. He realized how much he enjoyed the relationships he had with the tenants in his buildings. Consequently, he felt deeply for them when they fell on hard times and couldn’t pay the rent. “I enjoyed building so much, but I also got to see into the hardships when they hit people personally,” Allen said. “But Houston had a way of convincing you that any problems were short-lived, so I hung on longer than I should have.” In 1990, Allen felt a “calling” and enrolled in the Episcopal Church’s shortcut course to the priesthood. But the seminal moment of spiritual awakening came in 1992, when both his parents and his brother died. “I said to myself, ‘OK, it’s my turn now,’” he recalled. “Where do I want to live and what do I want to do with the rest of my life?” Walter and Elaine Allen left Houston in 1992, spent 12 years in Vail, Colorado, during which time Walter became an Episcopal priest, before they eventually landed in Taos

and at St. James Episcopal Church. The people of Taos are thankful that the Allens’ journey ended up in Northern New Mexico. Because of his work at St. James Episcopal Church and as a KidSight chairman with the Taos Lions Club, Walter Allen has been named one of the Unsung Heroes of 2015 by The Taos News. Leaving Houston, Allen’s motivations were clear: Get closer with family and join the priesthood. He and Elaine moved to Vail where their daughters and grandsons lived. Championed by Bishop Winterroad in Denver, he was soon ordained and became a priest at a Vail-area church — at the age of 65. As for why Taos, Elaine has to take credit for that. For years, she subscribed to New Mexico Magazine and had read about Taos. She was an artist, not a skier — the Colorado winters had begun to wear on her — and she knew where they were going next. “She was determined to live here,” Allen said. “We bought a house here in 2004, and we moved in 2007. But I moved kicking and screaming because I had lost my ministry in Vail. I had no idea I would get involved with St. James.” In 2003, St. James had lost its priest and The Rev. Walter Allen, new to town, filled in. For the next five years or so, he headed up religious practices at St. James. And as most anyone in Taos knows, there’s always something going on at St. James to help the community. Soon, church member Bill Waugh of the Lions Club got his hooks into Allen. Waugh took him to the Geezers Club and meetings of the Taos Lions Club, and soon Allen found a new calling. KidSight has been a staple Lions Club program since the mid-1990s, with the specific task of screening children’s eyesight before they get too far in school. The belief is that if you get a child’s eyesight corrected at an early age, the chances for success in school and beyond are greatly magnified. The Rev. Allen took to this job as he had with all others

‘You know that people, given the opportunity, can be generous with their time and treasure ... ’ — Walter Allen — with love and determination. In 2005, he became the chairman of the KidSight program for the Taos Lions and oversaw some 2,000 screenings a year in Taos County, Eagle Nest and Cimarrón. “We are now the top-screening Lions Club in New Mexico,” he said, wanting to note that the late Rich Sanders worked closely with him. “It’s a huge give-back to the community.” Soon, Allen got an adult eyecare program going with the help of local optometrist Jane Compton, the Eye Bank of Albuquerque and Eye Associates in Santa Fe. “My belief is success in life comes from the contacts you make with other people,” Allen said. “These people had no contacts because of poor eyesight, and we were helping make contact again.” Even at 82 — and now an assisting priest to Father Mike Olsen — there’s no way Allen can stay still. He’s put his devotion and dedication into preservation of the Tio Vivo Carousel, one of two known “flying jenny” carousels in America; the expansion of the Lions Club scholarship program to promote local job growth; St. James’ Food Pantry that feeds 450-500 people a week; the Empty Bowls fundraiser; and others. “You know that people, given the opportunity, can be generous with their time and treasure,” said Allen. “My life has been like chapters of a book. After my spiritual awakening, I found I had a lot of chits out there because my life has been so good. “I want to take advantage of all of them as much as I can.”

Congratulations to the 2015 Unsung Heroes and Citizen of the Year

Honoring Our Heroes, Jeﬀ Trammel and Stephen Plyler In recognition of Walking Rain Productions’ commitment to Stray Heart’s mission and success, we offer our deepest thanks and gratitude to Jeff and Stephen.

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Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Mary Anne Boughton, who is heavily involved with the Taos Historic Museums, poses for a portrait in the Hacienda de los Martinez, July 7.

Mary Ann Boughton Service through volunteering

By Cindy Brown

ary Ann Boughton has a deep love of Taos that is evident whenever she talks about its arts, culture and history. Her enthusiasm is contagious. Perhaps that is why she is such an effective educator and guide at the historic museums of Taos. Since coming here 20 years ago, Boughton has been the museum educator at the Harwood and Kit Carson Museums and given tours at the Martinez Hacienda and Millicent Rogers Museum, as well as the Blumenschein and Couse-Sharp homes, sharing her knowledge and enthusiasm. She says that she is just enough of a ham to enjoy teaching and entertaining those who attend her classes and tours. Boughton especially loves the santos that are part of the

collections of several Taos museums. These pieces were carved from wood for churches and homes in Northern New Mexico. The flat pieces are called retablos and the 3-D figures are referred to as bultos. Boughton says, “I love the santos because they were part of daily devotions and were important to the people and still are. The santos offer support and comfort, and receive our prayers. They are very beautiful and unique to Northern New Mexico.” One of her favorite spots is the Martinez Hacienda, which was built in 1804. Boughton says, “It is important to me. It reflects so much of the history of the valley.” She says it is a lot of work to keep the house maintained and plastered. The hacienda is supported through grants, along with entrance fees and funds raised during special events like the Trade Fair, held each year in late September. Before moving to Taos, Boughton was a docent, giving tours at the Dallas Museum of Art for more than 20 years.

She says that she is just enough of a ham to enjoy teaching and entertaining those who attend her classes and tours. She also worked in the education department, planning programs and tours for kids and adults. Art and history have been lifelong interests for her. She says that the docent program at the Dallas museum was outstanding, with weekly lectures from experts about items in the collection.

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE

RANDALL FAMILY A great event inspires more than just the attendees. It inspires the entire community.

Proud to support <insert organization name here> Proud to Support our Citizen of the Year and Taos’ Unsung Heroes xxxxxxxxxx

Branch Name Taos Main Office Branch Address 120 W Plaza Taos, NM 87571 Phone Number 575-737-3540

“The Randall family and their employees offer quality and service, and have a long history of supporting our community. Back in 1979, they were the very first to extend credit to me as a young builder; that has meant a lot to me over the last 36 years.”

With appreciation,

Wayne Rutherford

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Heroes

Katharine Egli

When Boughton came to Taos she didn’t know a soul, but her love of art and history led her to the Kit Carson Museum, which was part of the Taos Historic Museums at that time. She worked with the education efforts there. She says there were many stories to tell about Kit Carson, who spoke 10 languages. Skip Miller, who was the co-director of Taos Historic Museums, worked with Boughton during her time there. He says that Boughton’s knowledge and dedication made her a premier volunteer. “She is a true, consummate volunteer within the cultural institutions in the community. Without such dedicated volunteers, these landmark museums would not be able to function.” Boughton is modest about her contributions and says there are hundreds of active volunteers in Taos, and all she has done is show up when there was a need. She says she tried other forms of expression such as painting, pottery, weaving and sewing — all without success “And cooking is sketchy,” she adds. It seems that through her service to the museums, Boughton has found her true talent. Mary Ellen Ferguson, also a museum volunteer and board member, who nominated her says, “Mary Ann stands out among volunteers. She is generous with her time, contributing to the community at large

on a whole variety of levels. Mary Ann has been very involved in the arts and culture of Taos — volunteering and serving on the boards of the museums.” Hilary Stewart, membership coordinator at the Millicent Rogers Museum, adds that Boughton is one of their best volunteers. Stewart says that “if something needs to be done, Mary Ann does it willingly.” In addition to her work at the museums, Boughton is an active volunteer at the St. James Episcopal Church. She serves on the altar guild, preparing the altar for weekly services and special events such as weddings and funerals. She is also part of the pastoral care committee that responds to the needs of congregation members, providing meals when people are ill and or in need of other support. As part of that committee, Boughton has been involved in the effort to create a six-week series called “Graceful Aging, Graceful Dying.” She says it is free and open to the public and will feature an interfaith panel. For more information, go online to stjamestaos.org. Boughton’s service to Taos reflects her love of the community and her dedication to service. Without her work and the work of others like her, our cultural institutions could cease to function and the heart and history of Taos might gradually be lost.

Boughton poses for a portrait by a doorway of La Hacienda de los Martinez, July 7.

AQUÍ EN TAOS

Our Friday Motors Family— Our Everyday Heroes Serving Taos For 44 Years

Questa Mine salutes our

2015 Unsung Hero

PHIL HOWARD

J.D. Powers says

“Chevrolet wins the most of any manufacturer.”

and recognizes his many contributions to the mine, the Village of Questa and to Taos County.

After 42 years in mining, with more than 17 years at the Questa Mine, Phil will retire in December of this year.

2015 COLORADO Truck of the Year!

Beyond his role as General Manager of the mine, Phil’s service to the community includes serving on the board of Taos Habitat for Humanity, and a strong supporter of Nonviolence Works and the Food Pantry.

The Questa Mine thanks Phil for his years of service.

Congratulations on your retirement!

Heroes

OCT

SAVE THE DATE :

PATHWAYS

DINNER & AUCTION

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Heroes Heroes

2 0 15 Tr a d i c i o n e s â&#x20AC;˘ T he Ta o s Ne w s

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Melissa Larson of Wholly Rags sews a quilted bag together, July 20.

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Thom Wheeler and his cherished paintbrush holder.

Thom Wheeler Ingrained giving

By Rick Romancito

f there’s a good cause to raise money for and if a party is involved, chances are Thom Wheeler is in the middle somewhere. Wheeler is one of this year’s Unsung Heroes, selected by a focus group made up of former “heroes” and community members. Staff of The Taos News are not part of the decision process. His selection is for good reason. Wheeler is one of those people who make philanthropy a word that doesn’t exactly feel right when spoken. That’s because his sense of giving back to the community is so ingrained in his larger-than-life personality, it’s simply what he does, because it’s the right thing to do. And, it’s not just for the living either. His work to help renovate the Sierra Vista Cemetery off Paseo del Pueblo Norte where many notable Taos artists and their families are interred is laudable, especially since he and his wife, Lavinia, have a plot set aside to join them farther down the line. In a recent “10 Questions” column for Tempo magazine,

Wheeler, an internationally collected artist, talked about why he likes to work on “wall jewelry” as big as the wide open spaces of Alice, Texas, where he came from. “I have always been fascinated with how things are made and fit together,” he said. “I began making things and taking them apart as a very young child. I worked alongside my dad in his workshop for as long as I can remember. I never thought I could make a living with my art and went to college to study business with an art minor. My senior art project turned into a sale and then a commission, and the rest is history. I have always made my living with my art.” In addition to his art, another thing for which he’s known is his support for the relatively new Lilac Festival in Taos. That event, held in in the spring, brings together various art galleries, businesses and individuals in celebration of the fragrant flower that seems to pop up everywhere in Taos. “I love gardening and I love looking at beautiful things,” he said. “Taos has so much natural beauty and the extraordinary lilacs here are a part of that. I saw that many of the old plants were in need of care and rejuvenation. I am

Wheeler is one of those people who make philanthropy a word that doesn’t exactly feel right when spoken. a clean-up freak and thought celebrating our lilacs could also help clean them up.” He said other parts of the country celebrate their plants and gardens with azalea, lilac and magnolia festivals that have been going on for years. “I’m always up for a party, so I thought why not have a lilac festival here in Taos to beautify the city and bring tourists to town when it is a very quiet time of year? My wife Lavinia and I, and our good friends John and Peggy Hamilton, launched the Lilac Festival from the grassroots and it has now grown to be what I hope is a long Taos tradition.” His lust for life and helping out others has proven a

Heroes

Katharine Egli

Thom Wheeler on the steps of his home, July 28.

wellspring of hope among people less fortunate. “I have lived a very good life and enjoyed many blessings,” he said. “I don’t take that for granted. I believe we are responsible for one another. I am responsible for leaving my small part of this world a little better and hopefully through my art, more beautiful than I found it. It is how my mother and father raised me and how they have lived their lives. I hope to pass that same sense of responsibility on to my fine son, Monty, and beautiful daughter, Bailey.” After serving as a sergeant in the U.S. Army Medical Corp from 1969-1971, he attended Sam Houston University and graduated in 1975. His art career began in Houston, Texas, as a sculptor of monumental works of stone, wood and metal. The size of these pieces allowed him more canvas to interpret the feelings his clients wanted to convey. In 1985, Wheeler left the big city for Taos. His sculpture and painting turned to a very distinct New Mexican theme.

Wheeler fires a piece of metal in his welding studio, July 28.

‘I have lived a very good life and enjoyed many blessings, I don’t take that for granted ... ’ —Thom Wheeler He creates aluminum, bronze and copper wall sculptures that resemble giant pieces of jewelry, embellished with semi-precious stone. More recently he has taken to painting with the same sensibilities used in his sculpture.

Wheeler has gained much recognition for his religiousthemed art. His knowledge and fascination with history and a variety of religions has taken him on an interesting journey. He enjoys mixing Southwest or American Indian beliefs with those of other religions to cast a more modern approach on how we view religion in our lives. A Celtic cross can have a Zuni bear embedded in the middle or a butterfly might flutter onto a Star of David. Anything is possible. Wheeler’s love of his family and friends is of utmost importance to him. He is devoted to helping others and has given tirelessly of his time and his art to fundraisers for a wide variety of community and individual causes. His love of Taos and eagerness to give back to his community is evident in his service on the board and as president of the animal shelter for eight years. Visit thomwheeler.com.

Congratulations to the Randall Family and all the unsung heroes who give to our commuity. We thank you.

and team Special congratulations to our client and friend, Thom Wheeler.

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Katharine Egli

Unsung Hero Carl Colonius poses for a portrait on his mountain bike along the South Boundary Trail, July 21.

Carl Colonius

Challenging youth to work hard for their community By J.R. Logan

hen Tony Struck finished high school, he had already been a gang member for six years. His dad wasn’t around. His mom left when he was just 16. He was working at Walmart and most adults wrote

him off as a lost cause. But Struck says the encouragement of Carl Colonius helped turn his life around. “I definitely think Carl’s one of the main reasons I am where I am today,” says Struck, who is now recreation supervisor at the Taos Youth and Family Center and a group facilitator with Men Engaged in Nonviolence. “He showed me a positive direction. He showed me patience and taught me to focus on the future. Without him, my life could have gone in a whole different direction.” For more than 20 years, Colonius had a similar impact on thousands of young men and women who were taught the value of hard work and leadership through Rocky Mountain Youth Corps. A co-founder of the program in Taos, Colonius became a nationally recognized champion of the

youth corp model, which puts kids in their teens and early 20s to work on projects that benefit their communities and nearby public lands. Colonius, a self-described “farm boy from northeastern Ohio” fell in love with Taos’ landscape and culture. He’d done stints as a public school teacher, a ski instructor and an outdoor-education leader. But those jobs didn’t “feed his soul.” Then he found youth corps. In the early ’90s, Colonius and three friends — Steve Patrick, Seth Miller and Horacio Trujillo — took the existing youth corps model and created Rocky Mountain Youth Corp. Together, they mounted an aggressive campaign to drum up support. “You had to be a showman to a certain degree,” Colonius remembers. “We talked about it all the time — at town council and school board meetings. We were all pretty good at promoting the organization and the mission.” Part of the pitch was that Taos was perfectly suited to benefit from what the corps had to offer, especially to young people. “If you fall out of the public education system here, you’re

‘He showed me a positive direction. He showed me patience and taught me to focus on the future. Without him, my life could have gone in a whole different direction.’ —Tony Struck in a world of pain,” Colonius argues. “What are you going to do? Work at a hotel? Work at a ski area? That’s seasonal stuff. This was an opportunity to take a model and really apply it to an area that was on the edge of poverty, and that had some beautiful public lands that need a lot of help.” Corps co-founder Steve Patrick remembers Colonius’ sheer dedication to getting the program going. Colonius would supervise a crew and outwork everyone while teaching them skills, write grant proposals, have lunch with a potential donor and even design the logo the corps still uses today.

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35 Katharine Egli

Carl Colonius (right), a co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Youth Corps and its executive director up until last year, poses for a portrait with Tony Struck, recreation supervisor at the Taos Youth and Family Center and former member in the RMYC in front of a wall built by the Youth Corps to create a tag-safe space, July 21.

“Carl’s abilities and sheer capacity to get so much done is directly proportional to his size (he is 6 feet 6 inches tall),” Patrick says. “He has a big brain and a huge heart, but Carl also epitomizes the old saying that you should: Never ask someone else to do something that you would not be willing to do yourself.” Patrick also stresses Colonius’ devotion to the kids who get hired on. “Carl believes in young people,” Patrick says. “He trusts them, he wants desperately for them to succeed and he is fiercely loyal.” In some cases, Patrick says agencies that hired the corps for projects doubted a ragtag crew of kids were capable of doing the job. But time and time again, Colonius and the crews surprised them. “Don’t bet against the young people he has led, and never bet against Carl,” Patrick says. Colonius explains that the youth corps helps young people of all stripes by offering an experience they can’t find anywhere else, and changing the way they relate to one another. “We’ve had dozens of valedictorians on our crews right there next to the kid who got kicked out of school in the 10th grade because he was disruptive,” Colonius says. “But he was disruptive because the classroom setting didn’t work for him. And on the crew, he’s got this amazing leadership capacity. All of a sudden, the valedictorian is coming to the dropout for help restringing a Weed Eater. That’s changing the power dynamic. And that’s a really cool way to allow kids to revision themselves.” Once the corps got a few seasons under its belt, Colonius says the program spoke for itself. And in the 20 years since its inception, it’s only gotten bigger and stronger. Every year, young crew members learn valuable skills

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‘He has a big brain and a huge heart, but Carl also epitomizes the old saying that you should: Never ask someone else to do something that you would not be willing to do yourself.’ — Steve Patrick and earn certifications that make them more marketable to other employers. At the same time, projects make tangible improvements on the ground. Crews have built trails, weatherized homes, done beautification projects on public parks, and an array of other community-oriented jobs. Looking back, Colonius is especially proud of the youth

corps’ proactive efforts to recognize the increasing threat of wildfire and tackle forest-thinning projects that reduce fire risk. Last year, after two decades of living, breathing and sweating the youth corps, Colonius decided to leave the organization. It was the right time, Colonius says. Twenty years sounded poetic, and there were good people to take over the reins. His co-workers honored him with the title “director emeritus.” He’s now working as a consultant, helping to create a comprehensive trails inventory and find ways to improve trail connectivity in the Taos area. Though he says it’s challenging, Colonius has kept a promise to make a clean break from the corps and leave it in the capable hands of those now running it. “It’s not easy, but I have very strong faith in the staff that’s still there and in the momentum of the organization,” Colonius says. “They believe in the mission.”

...for over

10 years

Congratulations Randall family and Unsung heroes of Taos!!

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Unsung Hero Melissa Larson of the nonprofit Wholly Rags poses for a portrait at Wholly Rags, July 20.

Melissa Larson

Rethreading the fabric of a town By Gabriel Weinstein

hen Melissa Larson looks at a piece of cloth, she sees more than just a collection of fibers. “There’s an imprint of culture in the cloth itself. It reflects eras,” Larson says. “With good cloth you

can say there is an era to it. It really is a part of culture.” Many Taoseños know Larson for her wizardry with textiles and recycled materials. Through her nonprofit Wholly Rags, Larson organizes the annual Arte de Descartes art show, which showcases pieces made from a variety of reused material. For years Larson was part of a group that helped run the Taos Free Box, which kept tons of old clothes from rotting in landfills. In the past she worked

with the CAV Thrift Store to get old clothing to children in need. In addition to her work with Arte de Descartes and the Free Box, Larson has introduced hundreds of Taos youth to sewing and quilting through her work with the Rocky Mountain Youth Corps, Ensueños y Los Angelitos, Taos Academy, Chrysalis Alternative School and several local elementary schools.

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37 Katharine Egli

Larson stitches a quilt together, July 20.

Larson had a feeling she would end up in Taos long before she permanently moved to town in 1987. She felt a connection to Northern New Mexico as a teenager when she visited the town in the 1970s to see her older sister, who was already living in Taos. The region’s wide open skies, laidback lifestyle, strong arts community and strong ties to the land resonated with her. “I genuinely liked the place and the people here,” says Larson, who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. Growing up in San Francisco during the height of the hippie movement, Larson developed a strong belief in going back to the land and living in harmony with the natural world. She started making items out of recycled material in high school. One of her first projects was refashioning an old sheet into a dress for an oceanography class field trip to Mexico. Later trips to Mexico, Nicaragua and Guatemala gave her even more ideas of ways to use recycled material. In Central America she saw how locals used tin cans to make stoves and crafts from various recycled items. Around 1995, Larson and a group of friends worked with then town manager Gus Cordova to open the Taos Free Box

... Larson developed a strong belief in going back to the land and living in harmony with the natural world. She started making items out of recycled material ... at the Taos Recycling Center. The Free Box that Larson and her colleagues helped launch replaced an earlier free box. The group’s goal was to reduce the amount of tonnage that ended up in landfills. Over the years the Free Box grew. One summer Habitat

A Taos Tradition of Historic Proportions

for Humanity and the Rocky Mountain Youth Corps helped add another room. Eventually, the town installed a permanent free-standing building to house the Free Box. The Free Box was a treasure trove for artists looking for new and innovative materials and a trusted resource for residents with limited means to secure clothing, according to Taos artist and massage therapist Carol RippetoeZamora, a good friend of Larson’s. Larson spent countless days working to maintain the Free Box. At times, she put in as much time on the Free Box as a full-time job. But the large workload did not diminish Larson’s passion for the project.

No Time

Larson continues on page 39

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Melissa Larson works on a pictorial quilt with adults from Enseuños Y Los Angelitos, July 6.

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Larson continues from page 37

Melissa Larson Rethreading the fabric of a town

‘I

enjoyed the moments of watching people finding what they loved. There was a lot of good energy that happened over there,” Larson says. While working on the Free Box, Larson was busy launching Wholly Rags. The nonprofit began in 1998 at the Taos County Economic Development Corp. It’s mission is to “To piece together and rethread the fabric of our community by gathering the cloth of the past to conserve the culture of the future.” Once textiles land in a landfill, their chances of survival dramatically decrease, says Larson. They are not like glass and metals, which are able to withstand the harsh conditions of a landfill. “We’re trying to hold onto this old material to make way so there is always some material so people can sew. The cloth can get lost. If it goes in the landfill that’s the end of it. That’s why we have to conserve the material. It can turn into trash. We don’t want it do that. It can be made into art, and

‘Melissa has so much respect for any kind of individual that she might run into. She is very respectful towards these guys and they can tell. They love it.’ —Katharine Yamazaki beauty and fun,” Larson says. Larson has also made a name for herself as a talented artist. Her quilts have hung in the Roundhouse in Santa Fe. Her quilts, book covers, book covers and handbags fill the Wholly Rags store on Gusdorf Road. Every week a group from Ensueños y Los Angelitos

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comes to Wholly Rags to work on sewing projects. Larson has helped the group’s participants produce art that exceeded the expectations of their family and friends, says Katharine Yamazaki, a life skills trainer with Ensueños y Los Angelitos. “Melissa has so much respect for any kind of individual that she might run into. She is very respectful towards these guys and they can tell. They love it,” Yamazaki says. Rippetoe-Zamora says that Larson has helped the community understand the value of recycling and reusing older materials. Her vision, passion, drive and connections with diverse groups of people have helped bring the community together she says. But the most important piece of wisdom RippetoeZamora has learned from Larson has nothing to do with manufacturing crafts and textiles. Larson has taught Rippetoe-Zamora that “we’re not all what we seem to be. We’re all a lot deeper than what we present.” Just like a piece of old fabric.

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â&#x20AC;&#x153;To visit Taos Pueblo is to walk in a sacred place where life continues from the earliest of human existence.â&#x20AC;?

LEFT TO RIGHT:

War Chief, Robert Espinosa Lt. War Chief, Leonard Archuleta War Chief Secretary, Michael A. Martinez