March 2010
History Lessons
Racking Up History column by Bill Rakocy
See also: At the Museum
Menu of this month's listings, stories and columns
Camp Furlong Day — The 7th annual event is 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, March 6, at Pancho Villa State Park, off State Roads 11 and 9, Columbus, N.M. The event features folklorico dancers, music, a parade led by more than 100 Mexican cabalgata horseback riders and more. Admission is free. Information: (575) 531-2711, 1-888-NMPARKS or nmparks.com.
Camp Furlong Day is a bi-national friendship event commemorating the March 9, 1916 early-morning attack on the village of Columbus and the adjacent military camp by Mexican General Francisco “Pancho” Villa and his men. Within days of the raid, General John J. “Black Jack” Pershing began a Punitive Expedition into Mexico to root out Villa and his men.
Concordia Ghost Tours — Concordia Heritage Association and Paso Del Norte Paranormal Society host a monthly ghost tour 7 to 9 p.m. the first Saturday of the month (March 6) at historic Concordia Cemetery. Henry and Veronica Flores of the Paranormal Society conduct a walking tour of the cemetery’s haunted sites where people have reported seeing a Lady in White, and other ghostly apparitions. Bring recording equipment, cameras, extra batteries, flashlight, comfortable walking (closed toe) shoes and jacket in cooler months, and be a ghost hunter as well. Reservations required. Cost: $10 (ages 13 and older welcome; ages 13-17 must be accompanied by adult). Reservations/information: 373-1513 or ghosts915.com.
Three new routes have been added for 2010: “The Outlaw Route” about paranormal and old west history, “The Witch’s Path” about paranormal and occult sightings, and “The Ghost Hunter,” where guests go on a paranormal investigation and learn how to be a ghost hunter.
‘Outers and Unders’ — Fort Bayard Historical Preservation Society will host the historical fashion show at 2 p.m. Saturday, March 6, at the Fort Bayard Theatre, featuring fashions from 1866 to the early 1910’s such as ball gowns, visiting dresses, undies, uniforms, beach wear and children’s clothing. Includes a “wedding” under raised sabers. Period-correct refreshments served during intermission. Tickets: $12: Information/tickets: Cecilia, (575) 956.3294; Kathy, (307) 640-3012 or Donna, (575) 519-8179.
Fort Bayard, N.M., is off U.S. 180 southeast of Silver City. Sponsored by the Fort Bayard Historical Preservation Society.
The fort will be closed down and boarded up in the fall of 2010, unless enough funds and support raised to save it. Information/donations: fortbayard.org or fortbayardhistoricpreservationsociety.org.
Columbus Memorial Day Celebration — The Columbus (N.M.) Historical Society sponsors a ceremony at 10 a.m. Tuesday, March 9, to remember 18 Americans killed March 9, 1916, in the raid led by Pancho Villa from across the border. Admission is free. Information: (575) 531-2620.
This year’s guest speaker is Lt. Col. Kevin Jacoby, commander of the newly reactivated 13th Cavalry at Fort Bliss. The unit is the same that was stationed at Columbus at the time of the Villa raid.
The commemorative program begins at 10 a.m. at the replica of Gen. “Blackjack” Pershing’s reviewing stand on the grounds of the Columbus Historical Museum. Other historical presentation and refreshments are offered before and after. A walking tour is given afterward, weather permitting.
Columbus is 60 miles west of El Paso (take the Columbus Highway from Santa Teresa). The Columbus Historical Museum, at the intersection of NM Routes 9 and 11, is open daily.
“History Notes” at Branigan Cultural Center — The monthly program is 1 to 2 p.m. the second Thursday of each month at the Branigan Cultural Center, 501 N. Main, north end of the Downtown Mall in Las Cruces. Admission is free. Information: (575) 541-2154 or las-cruces.org/museums
The programs are informal discussions on local and regional history led by staff and volunteers. The Thursday, March 11, meeting focuses on newspapers, mercantiles and hotels before the 1881 arrival of the railroad in Las Cruces.
Mesquite Walking Tour — The City of Las Cruces Branigan Cultural Center will host the second part of a walking tour of Mesquite Historic District, the city’s oldest neighborhood, beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday, March 13, at Phillips Chapel, 638 N. Tornillo. Tours last about two hours. Participation is free; no registration required. Information: (575) 541-2154 or las-cruces.org/museums.
The chapel is undergoing restoration by students from Doña Ana Community College. Ron Taylor of DACC and Pat Taylor, adobe preservation specialist, will explain the process. The tour will be led by Branigan Cultural Center staff, with architectural information provided by Greg Smith. The tour will also include the Jardin de Mesquite, the Unsettled Gallery and historic homes in the district.
El Paso Corral of the Westerners — The monthly dinner program is at 6 p.m. Friday, March 19, in the Staff and Faculty Lounge, second floor, UTEP Student Union. Prestene Dehrkoop, founding member of the Twelve Travelers committee, will introduce the next “Twelve Traveler” in the series, Susan Shelby Magoffin. Cost: $20. Dinner served at 6:40 p.m. Information or reservations (before 5 p.m. March 17): Marilyn Gross, 755-7329.
El Paso Archaeological Society — The society’s monthly meeting and lecture is 3 p.m. Sunday, March 21, at El Paso Museum of Archaeology, 4301 Transmountain. This month’s lecture is “Clovis Caches: Windows into Ice Age Technology” by ENMU Department of Anthropology Assistant Professor David Kilby. Admission is free. Information: 755-4332 or epas.com.
Mexican Revolution call for teaching materials — The Center for History Teaching and Learning at UTEP is taking submissions of high quality instructional materials through March 31 for its “Teaching the Mexican Revolution” program. The best submissions will be published and shared with attendees of UTEP’s 5th Annual Summer Teachers’ Institute. Submission details: kaerekson@utep.edu.
Needed are materials suitable for K-12 educators from across the curriculum including history, reading and language arts, fine and performing arts, mathematics, economics, government, and geography.
Previously developed materials that fit the following categories are welcome:
• Complete lesson plans
• Brief instructional activities
• Community activities
• Online games, quizzes, or webquests.
Submissions will be judged by a panel of experts and top entries in each category will earn prizes in the form of books and gift certificates.
‘The Buffalo Soldiers at Fort Bliss, Texas’ — The Army Scholarship Foundation Press announces publication of the book by U.S. Army veteran Jeffrey W. Gault benefiting the Army Scholarship Fund. The book chronicles the storied history of the famous Buffalo Soldiers of the 9th and 10th U.S. Cavalry and the 24th and 25th U.S. Infantry regiments during their service on the frontier and into the 20th Century, focusing on their service at Fort Bliss, and El Paso. The Buffalo Soldiers served intermittently at and in the vicinity of Fort Bliss and El Paso for nearly 50 years. The book also explains the special significance of the location of the monument on Lee Road near the Robert E. Lee Gate of Fort Bliss. The book is available at the Fort Bliss Museum gift shop or by mail from the Army Scholarship Foundation Press, 11700 Preston Road, Suite 660-301, Dallas, Texas, 75230. Proceeds from sales donated to the Army Scholarship Foundation, which provides academic scholarships to Army family members. Information: armyscholashipfoundation.org.
Gault served at Fort Bliss from 1990 until his retirement from the Army in 1999, with two deployments to the Middle East during this period. He is a veteran of Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm, and was the first Garrison Commander of Fort Bliss. Currently, he is a business executive in North Texas.
Mexican Revolution Centennial submissions — El Paso Museum of History and Museo de la Revolucion en la Frontera in Juarez, is taking submissions of artifacts, archival materials, sheet music and oral histories related to the Mexican Revolution during a special “collection day” during regular business hours 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday, April 6, at either museum in anticipation of the 2010 Centennial of the Mexican Revolution. People are encouraged to bring in their items to be photographed and recorded. This information will then be made available to the staff of the two museums as they plan exhibits for November 2010. Information: curator Barbara Angus, 351-3588.
Items offered as permanent gifts may be left and will proceed through the normal approval process, while items offered as temporary loans will stay with their owners until they are needed for display.
El Paso Museum of History — 510 N. Santa Fe. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. Closed Mondays. Admission is free. Information: 351-3588. For exhibit and special event information, see “At the Museum” listing.
Fort Selden State Monument — The monument, in Radium Springs 13 miles north of Las Cruces, is open 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Monday (closed Tuesday). Admission is $3; (ages 16 and under free). Sunday admission for New Mexico residents is $1. Information: (575) 526-8911 or nmmonuments.org.
Fort Selden was a 19th-century adobe fort established to protect early settlers from Indian raids. The monument seeks to preserve the remaining ruins and has a visitors center with exhibits of military life at the post. From Las Cruces, take I-25 north to Exit 19.
Old Fort Bliss — Building 5051, corner of Pershing and Pleasanton Roads, Fort Bliss. The Old West days of the “Soldiers of the Pass” are relived through replicas of the original adobe fort buildings and military artifacts, Magoffinsville Post 1854 to 1868. Admission: free. Hours: Daily 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Information: 568-3137.
Chamizal National Memorial — 800 S. San Marcial. The National Park Service operates the memorial on land once claimed by Mexico as part of a decades-long dispute over the international boundary. A similar park in Juárez lies across the Rio Grande, whose shifting nature in earlier years triggered the dispute. The visitor center has an exhibit on the history of the Chamizal dispute, including a video presentation. Park grounds and picnic area open 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily; visitors center open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; closed Sunday and Monday. Admission is free. Information: 532-7273.
Free ranger guided tours and interpretive programs at are offered at 10 a.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays. The tours last 45 minutes to an hour and consist of walking short distances on the park grounds, as well as visiting various museum exhibits and displays located in the visitor center. Interpretive programs will include U.S./Mexico history and treaties, Cordova Island, the park’s mural Nuestra Herencia by Carlos Flores, the establishment of the Memorial, and a variety of other items related to the borderland community.
Storytime with Georgia Askew is 10 a.m. the third Thursday of the month. Reservations required for both programs.
Los Portales Museum and Visitor Center — 1521 San Elizario Road. The museum is operated by the San Elizario Genealogy and Historical Society, and is housed in an 1850s Territorial-style building across from the San Elizario church. It offers gifts, family trees, historical artifacts and the veterans’ room, as well as information on the “First Thanksgiving” and the Salt War of 1877. Hours are 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, noon to 4 p.m. Sunday. Admission is free. Information: 851-1682.
Mission Trail — Three historic churches lie within eight miles of each other in El Paso County’s Mission Valley.
• Mission Ysleta — Spanish and Tigua Indian refugees from northern New Mexico founded the community in the 1680s. The first mission was built in 1692 and rebuilt completely in both the 18th and 19th centuries. The current structure was built in 1851. It’s near Zaragoza and Alameda on the Tigua Reservation. Information: 851-9997 (El Paso Mission Trail Association).
• Mission Socorro — The first adobe structure in Socorro was built in 1692, and like nearby Mission Ysleta, was destroyed by floods in later centuries. The current structure dates back to 1843, with additions completed in 1873. It’s off Socorro Road two miles southeast of Ysleta.
• San Elizario Chapel — Established in 1789 as a Spanish presidio, or fort, to protect the Camino Real, San Elizario was the first county seat of El Paso. The church was built in 1877, replacing a church built about 25 years earlier. Technically, San Elizario Chapel is a presidio church, not a mission. It’s on the San Elizario plaza, off Socorro Road, 5.5 miles southeast of Socorro Mission. Nearby is the famous jail that Billy the Kid reportedly broke into to rescue a friend. Group tours are available. For San Elizario tour information, call 851-1682.
Concordia Heritage Association — Anyone interested in learning about, preserving and promoting history is invited to join the association, which meets at 7 p.m. on the third Thursday of each month, at Zion Lutheran Church, 2800 Pershing. Information: 581-7920.
The nonprofit group takes care of Concordia Cemetery, home to over 60,000 famous, infamous and other eternal residents. The association also helps people locate ancestors buried there and researches requests related to the historic burial ground that once was the home of rancher Hugh Stephenson and his wife, Doña Juana Ascarate de Stephenson.
The group also sponsors the annual Walk Through History in October at Concordia Cemetery as well as other events involving characters from El Paso’s past, particularly those buried at Concordia.
Shakespeare Ghost Town — A small pioneer settlement and mining town on the trail to California, Shakespeare, N.M., lives on thanks to a single family that has owned the townsite (2 1/2 miles from Lordsburg) since 1935. Information: (575) 542-9034 or shakespeareghostown.com.
Also on display: the Jim Emanuel Western Collection of antique and reproduction guns, custom-made holsters, saddles and tack.
To get there: From Lordsburg, take the Main Street exit (Exit 22) from Interstate 10 and turn south. Follow signs to Shakespeare.
Racking Up History column by Bill RakocyExhibit highlights
Da Vinci’s genius
To be sure, in writing about the art and the person of Leonardo da Vinci, one cannot be overly creative or expressive of the man — beyond what has been written and told a dozen times down through the paths of art, history, science and word of mouth.
Who was he? We know Leonardo was born in 1452 as an illegitimate son, his mother being a peasant girl of 16. Da Vinci had a powerful frame, good bearing and a zest for life. One writer reported the observation powers of da Vinci: As he walked through a field, he noted a hundred things from different plants, trees, the color of bark, sky, earth and water. His furtive eyes and mind missed nothing.
His youth was spent in the Vinci hills in his home near Florence.
His half brothers and half sisters teased him about his nonofficial birth in a jealous manner. By virtue of all his talents for observation in science and nature and his other built-in attributes, he became the butt of many unkind acts by his siblings. He was precocious in many areas: math, music, art and design, creating music and modeling human figures in clay.
At age 13, in the custom of the era, he was apprenticed to the master Verrocchio, an important artist and sculptor with wide recognition. The world of Florence lay near, and the Tuscan city was made known to Leonardo and to fast-excelling artists and politicians.
Leonardo grew by virtue of his strong awareness and personal desire to excel. His mind was constantly at work, thinking and experimenting not only with the arts — but also with fascinating aspects of science, government and life.
He employed a strong intellect and applied it to every nuance of his being and life.
In painting and drawing, he explored all media — spiritual and technical problems — and in a great sense, he became a “first modern man of science and arts.”
His inward goals seemed to try to find and create a marriage of science and the arts. Being a strong Christian, he felt a spontaneous connection between God and himself.
He continued to paint the religious themes — “St Jerome,” which hangs in the Vatican; “Adoration of the Magi” in the Uffizi; and “The Virgin of the Rocks” at the Louvre.
Florence to him was not congenial — despite the aspect of a place to grow.
He wrote at age 30, “The place is festering with power brokers, tanners, bankers, and conspirators and too provincial for me.”
Writing to the Duke of Milan, he gave a glowing self-lifting letter telling of all his talents as a creator of fearsome engines of warfare plus a sculptor and painter second to none. Thus his practical talents drove his life and times. He became a military, civil and sanitary engineer; an inventor of all sorts of ballistic and fearsome items of war — engines of war that to Leonardo were great works of art.
Benvinuto Cellini said that da Vinci wrote of his war creations:
• “I can construct light and portable bridges — proof against fire and easy to fix and remove.”
• “I have also most convenient and portable bombs: for throwing showers of small missiles and thereby causing terror in the enemy.”
• “I can make mortars and field pieces of beautiful and useful shapes.”
• “In time of peace I could design and equip other architectural structures.”
The El Paso da Vinci Experience
The current da Vinci exhibit at the El Paso Museum of History is an important one — in that most of the da Vinci models are ones that can be worked (gently, of course) to show how he could lift, move or maim the enemy. More than 60 replicas are displayed, covering his lifetime of creative engines, often using leverage and gearing down to make things move or operate.
Da Vinci used a mix of artistic-observation and scientific hands-on methods — he understood nature better than many contemporaries. In short, he was so observing and intuitive that he did not have time and/or the mechanics to see many of his ideas to completion. The Da Vinci Experience is one of the most important exhibits ever compiled, and certainly director Julia Bussinger and staff, and the board of trustees, are to be complimented in staging such a fascinating and informative show. The exhibit runs until July 10. The admission fee ranges from $7 to $14.
For information, call 351-3588. The museum is at 510 North Santa Fe Street.
Bill Rakocy is an El Paso artist and
historian. Information: 584-9716.
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