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The Nation's Pulse
Mountains, Sky, Writers
A cultural mecca in America’s Southwest.
“The sun had set now, the yellow rocks were turning
grey, down in the pueblo the light of the cook fires made red
patches of the glassless windows, and the smell of pinon smoke came
softly through the still air. The whole western sky was the color
of golden ashes….”
— Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop
(1927)
The Santa Fe-Taos region of New Mexico is an upscale enclave and playground for celebrities. It’s one of the more scenic parts of the “Land of Enchantment,” and is the epicenter of the history of the Southwest. The 400-year-old “Palace of the Governors” is still a tourist attraction. But other than the Hispanic tradition, scenery, and great weather (300 days of sunshine per year), it epitomizes the artistic culture of the Southwest, from its “Santa Fe style” earth-tone adobe architecture to its renowned Native American silver and turquoise jewelry work.
Santa Fe was founded in 1608 (Spain’s colony started within a year of both Jamestown and Quebec, interestingly enough), New Mexico being Old Mexico’s northernmost province. It was also the land of the pueblos, those ancient Indian communities so interesting in their cultural and archeological aspects. The Mexican War (1846-48) ceded the Southwest to the United States.
In the late 19th century the place began to attract artists, writers and assorted eccentric bohemians. Nineteen-seventeen saw the arrival of Mabel Dodge, a New York socialite and radical-chic arts patron (and linked to such writers as Max Eastman, Walter Lippmann and John Reed), who married an Indian named Tony Luhan. Word spread among her circle in New York about New Mexico’s landscape and quality of light, so interesting to painters. Both Santa Fe and nearby Taos soon had thriving arts colonies.
At Mabel Dodge Luhan’s behest, D.H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda arrived in 1922. They stayed for two years, eventually buying a ranch near Taos (now owned by the University of New Mexico and where the English writer’s ashes are buried), using it as a base for more extensive travels in Mexico, resulting in the novel The Plumed Serpent (1926) and the travel book Mornings in Mexico (1927). These wanderings also brought on the tuberculosis that killed Lawrence in 1930. Today a memorial attracts scholars and aficionados to the “D.H. Lawrence Ranch”.
Another New Mexico habitué was Willa Cather. She had first visited the region in 1912, and spent much of 1925-‘26 in residence at Santa Fe’s La Fonda Hotel, researching and writing Death Comes for the Archbishop, considered by many critics her finest novel. Her archbishop is Jean Marie Latour, based on the real-life Jean Baptiste Lamy (1814-1888). Lamy was a noteworthy figure in Southwestern history. He built Santa Fe’s first hospital and the cathedral that is one of the city’s prominent landmarks. The archbishop was a close friend of Kit Carson and his family, who were his parishioners.
California author and Jack London confidante Mary Austin moved to Santa Fe in 1924, living there the last decade of her life. She was famous for The Land of Little Rain (1903) a work California natural history. While in New Mexico she published — among other things — The Land of Journey’s Ending (1924), a book of Southwest travel sketches focusing on Native American culture. She also helped found Santa Fe’s Community Theater. We find her chronicled in Oliver LaFarge’s Santa Fe (1959), as a woman with “…that mark of distinction which make her a fine interpreter of the Indian spirit and so great a writer.”
Santa Fe is a chronological collection of news items and fragments gleaned from Santa Fe’s newspaper, the New Mexican, where LaFarge — author of a score of books —was a columnist. The entries date back to the paper’s founding in 1849 and cover a century of Santa Fe history. LaFarge also wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning Laughing Boy (1929), a novel of Navajo life and the first book to treat American Indians as a serious subject for fiction.
Paul Horgan lived most of his life in Albuquerque, setting his best novel A Distant Trumpet (1951) on an army post in 19th century New Mexico. Author of 37 books, Horgan set a number of his novels in Santa Fe. He’s was also a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, being the author of the two volume Great River: The Rio Grande in North American History (1954), a history of the region as drained by the Rio Grande. His second Pulitzer was for the biography Lamy of Santa Fe (1975). Horgan can be compared to another prolific Westerner, Wallace Stegner, in that he excelled in both fiction and nonfiction.
Georgia O’Keefe first visited in 1929, and finding Santa Fe too culturally busy, took up residence on part of the legendary “Ghost Ranch” near Abiquiu in 1940. Here she painted the strange landscapes, portraits and self-portraits that made her famous through a life lasting almost a century. Besides O’Keefe, scores of painters are associated with Santa Fe and Taos, notably Thomas Moran, Edward Borein and Joseph Henry Sharp.
Photographers loomed large, as the New Mexico landscape and its fascinating light beckoned. It was even promising at night, as Ansel Adams proved with his iconic photograph “Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico” (1941), with its moonlight illuminating the white crosses in a rural church cemetery. It’s all there in one picture: So much history; so much art; so much New Mexico.
About the Author
Bill Croke, formerly of Cody, Wyoming, is a writer in Salmon, Idaho.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (39) | Leave a comment
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Kitty| 1.14.11 @ 6:21AM
Right about now, "300 days of sunshine per year" sounds good to even me.
Occam's Tool| 1.16.11 @ 10:41PM
In Las Cruces, they have 350 days of sunshine a year. It's an OK place to live. Weather on a line with El Paso.
JAWilson| 1.14.11 @ 7:38AM
Taos is a town with more loons per square foot than any other town I have ever seen. It's truly a different planet than Chicago. Beautiful, but way strange.
And friends who work there tell me that work is strictly optional. Calling in sick is optional as well.
Alan Brooks| 1.14.11 @ 12:26PM
I took a tour of Taos in '07-- it was Heavenly.
Alan Brooks| 1.14.11 @ 12:28PM
BUT, despite what you may have heard about AZ, it is very good, or at least Scottsdale and Flagstaff are.
Being rightwingers, you would like Scottsdale.
Johnny| 1.14.11 @ 1:09PM
where should the leftwingers go?
loulou| 1.14.11 @ 4:25PM
California.
Pecos Pete| 1.14.11 @ 8:53AM
Aw shucks.... This article will only draw more looney-tunes to northern New Mexico.
It is beautiful here, but there are lots of druggies, unemployment, an anti-business group of non profit organizations ... and lots of environmental nut cases. So, come see, but don't stay unless you bring a business that employs people doing productive for-profit work.
PJ| 1.14.11 @ 9:15AM
New Mexico, like San Francisco, CA, seems like a beautiful place to visit as you write, but don't leave your heart there!
Occam's Tool| 1.14.11 @ 3:51PM
Thanks to Gary Johnson, despite all the insane people in NM, thanks to Gary Johnson, it is the WORST state in the US to set up a psychiatric practice. They have a desperate shortage of docs of all types, but treat them worse than any state I've practiced in.
owyheewine| 1.14.11 @ 9:18AM
Thanks for drawing attention to the southern part of the intermountan west.
Too bad the Axis of evil (Boston, New York and DC) doesn't have any scenic natural attractions that can attract and keep our eastern bretheren in place.
KyMouse| 1.14.11 @ 9:25AM
We packed up the Honda and drove 1,300 miles from our house to Santa Fe a few springs ago.
The half-way point was Bartlesville, Okla., site of the only skyscraper built by Frank Lloyd Wright (several floors are now a hotel, and it's well worth spending the night there -- look up The Inn at Price Tower).
We had never been to the Southwest, and loved experiencing it. We were a little short of breath because of the altitude, but the clear air was wonderful, and we loved exploring cliff dwellings, shops and excellent restaurants in and around Santa Fe.
If you go, drive toward Los Alamos and stop at White Rock Overlook Park for a magnificent view waaaay down to the Rio Grande.
Bill| 1.14.11 @ 9:25AM
Go to New Mexico; it's really nice there. Whatever you do, steer clear of Colorado; it's horrible there!
Stormzeye| 1.14.11 @ 10:06AM
I've been all over New Mexico. Once you get away from the people it's such a mystical place. From Shiprock down to Alamagordo there's so much you'll never see anywhere else. Up north on the Chama River is real special. Equal part white, Spanish and Indian. A Pueblo Indian's wife once asked me: "People come out here to heal or to be healed...which are you." Too bad the Caliphonies have taken over.
Butterfly| 1.14.11 @ 2:29PM
Yeah Stromzeye, the Caliphones seem to take over those states near by. Oregon and Washington are prime examples of California takeovers. What's sad is that it used to be such a beautiful place. Sacramento was a great place to live, close to the mountains for skiing, close to Tahoe and of course a day in the "city" SF, was always fun. But it is now a dump. Glad I moved to VA.
Granite Sentry | 1.14.11 @ 10:35AM
May be nice, but some new (quirky) research shows high altitude life seems to increase suicide rates. Or maybe it's just the high count of loons and Caliphonies in the area. (See JAWilson & Stormzeye above.) Link at www.granitesentry.com.
UFO UFOS| 3.2.12 @ 4:34AM
May be nice, but some new (quirky) UFO
Hank| 1.14.11 @ 12:13PM
Santa Fe-Taos is the Berkley of New Mexico. I would recommend against any conservative tarrying there more than a few days.
Gabe| 1.14.11 @ 2:33PM
I go to a conference in Santa Fe every year at St. John's and much enjoy it...but I find Santa Fe proper very lefty, new age. Also the usual contrast between all the "seekers" (often monied) who have moved there and the people who have hundreds of years of history in the area. I've found it helpful to educate myself about the area's history and arts through the great museum of New Mexico History downtown and the ones on Museum Hill. (I'm not a huge fan of O'Keefe, but if you are, that museum is usually jammed). I'd like to get out an explore more rural NM though--I've come to love the desert.
Margot| 1.15.11 @ 7:32AM
I was on business several years ago in Albuquerque and took a day trip over to Santa Fe. I found it charming, but decidedly "beautiful people" oriented. We went to the Georgia O'Keeffe (proper spelling of her last name, btw-article author take note!) Museum, and though small, I did get to bring home some hard to find prints.
Deborah D | 1.17.11 @ 5:27AM
My husband and I along with my sister and her husband spent about a week in Santa Fe and driving up into Taos, stopping along the way. We found a beautiful, old Catholic Church known for its miracles. Besides all the great art, we thrilled at the mystic sense all around us in the great outdoors. Funny though, in some of the snooty (and way too expensive) art galleries people seemed almost scared of us -- we were living at the time in Georgia, my sister and her husband in NC. Apparently those hipsters think if you're from the old South then there must be something wrong with you. I chuckle to think of it. Methinks some of them should get out more.
Ken (Old Texican)| 1.14.11 @ 4:27PM
Since I am too crippled up to hike and fly-fish any more, I will let the "secret" out.
When one drives west out of Taos, and north into Colorado...the scenery changes instantly at the State line on the way up to Alamosa.
The VERY FIRST valley on your left is the Conejos River Canyon.
I have hiked every fishing valley of note in the Rockies south of Canada.
The Conejos valley is the most breathtaking by FAR.
And...if you enjoy mountain trout...just drop a line anywhere all the way up to the continental divide, (about a 40 mile drive). There are lodges and campsites all along the way.
Ken (old Texican)| 1.14.11 @ 4:29PM
PS: Screw Taos...unless you enjoy giggling at old hippies.
Truth to Power| 1.14.11 @ 5:41PM
Have you fished the Second Meadows on Elk Creek? I have caught some nice fish on that stream as well as all the high mountain lakes.
Ken (Old Texican)| 1.15.11 @ 9:37AM
Truth,
I believe I have. Is it over the line in Colorado?
There is one pool I found, where the stream splits into three parts, and below each riffle, there are trout holding.
The riffles are about twenty steps abrest with tall grass in between them. One afternoon I just kept working one to the next to let the fish settle down in each. size 12 Red humpies...ooh yah!
Truth to Power| 1.15.11 @ 12:53PM
Elk creek flows into the Conejos very close to where Highway 17 drops down into the Conejos canyon. It is about a 6 mile hike to the beginning of the meadows. The meadows are about 1-2 miles of a meandering stream with some nice holding water. Some clouds and some silt in the water from a rain make the fish less spooky. The South San Juan is beautiful country; thanks for reminding me of it.
gina| 1.18.11 @ 10:42AM
i So agree. The first time i drove it was in the mid 80's. i went to see Santa Fe and drove to Durango. still the most stunning drive ever. especially in the fall.
David Althouse| 1.14.11 @ 7:43PM
I'm a conservative and I love Taos, Red River, and most all of scenic northern New Mexico. It is a special place to me and my family and we try to visit that part of the country every summer. We conservatives need not let kooky lefties keep us from those very special places on this earth. If you like it there, then visit and do so often. If they don't like our presence there, then they can leave.
Cabermon| 1.14.11 @ 10:35PM
As a conservative who loves Santa Fe, I arrive ready to ignore the politics. Even conservatives can love Maria's: Any 60-year-old Mexican restaurant with great food, great service, a genuinely funky ambiance, and a 100-item Margarita menu makes my "A" list.
John B| 1.15.11 @ 2:45AM
Great article. One point of correction: In Ansel Adams' "Moonrise" it's the dying light of the sun, not that of the moon, illuminating the crosses and the clouds on the horizon. The author, however, has ably shed light on the Land of Enchantment.
Rich| 1.15.11 @ 4:30AM
If you've been to new Mexico , and not felt the spirits past surrounding you as you viewed it, then you have not truly experienced the majesty of that land. No wonder so many artists were led to the muse of that place. The spirits still walk that land and will take any ernest artist by the hand and lead them to view their perspective through those long gone eyes.
RJ| 1.15.11 @ 9:03AM
41 years ago, I left New Jersey for New Mexico. Have tried to leave this state a few times, but can't. I am a very lucky person to have found such beauty and wonders in New Mexico. Very lucky indeed!
John II| 1.15.11 @ 8:31PM
ATTENTION COPYEDITORS AND AUTHOR!
Nice piece. I could use it in one of my classes. But can someone at TAS please go in and repair all the typos and syntactic gaps, including the O'Keeffe gaffe (so to speak) already alluded to by one of the posters above? PLEASE?
Mr. Croke--are you there? Could you add your own protest? I can't share your piece with my students when it's in this condition, not after browbeating them about sloppy mechanics and spelling.
I don't know what the hell's going on--TAS used to be of the letter-perfect school of editing. . . .
Michael| 1.17.11 @ 1:40PM
Grew up in Albuquerque -- moved away in 1996 at the age of 32. By then the charms of Enchantment -- had worn off. The upper Rio Grande Valley is a typical liberal dichotomy of Trust Fund Beautiful People (living either the Eco-Earth Ship Illusion or the store-bought Santa Fe Style) alongside unchecked urban sprawl, relentless gang-drug crime and rampant poverty. I will say, however, I do miss the Big Sunsets.
John II| 1.18.11 @ 5:24PM
Interesting points, and they fit the New Age style of some relative who live in Albuquerque. Gives me second thoughts about using the piece for a class. The editors aren't going to repair it anyhow.
Adidas | 8.11.11 @ 5:37AM
is good
العاب | 4.10.12 @ 12:47PM
New Mexico, like San Francisco, CA, seems like a beautiful place to visit as you write, but don't leave your heart there!
thank you