The Story of Clayton's Dragon
THERE’S A DRAGON in Clayton. The seven-foot-long red metal beast slithers in and out of the exterior of a long-vacant building in the center of town. The four-piece dragon was designed, fabricated…
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Category: History
First Person, Airborne
THE GRIZZLE-ALLISON FAMILY FARMS, where the three sons grew up, were situated in eastern New Mexico, about 30 miles south of Roswell, a city of about 40,000 people in the 1940s, near the small town of…
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A Tribute to the Flying Paperboy
CHARLES “PAPPY” HARRIS WAS 10 years old when Frank Kindel’s two-seater Piper Cub took flight on May 31, 1964, near Queen, in southeastern New Mexico’s Guadalupe Mountains. “We knew what way he took…
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Written on the Landscape
IN ENCOUNTERING ROCK ART, the initial impact is the image itself. How do we understand the meaning behind the diverse life forms and abstract designs painted and carved throughout the arid landscapes…
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On the Lookout
A STATUE OF LUCIEN B. MAXWELL—seated, rifle across his legs—keeps watch over the northwest corner of Cimarrón Park. One of the largest contiguous landowners in United States history, Maxwell once…
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How Roswell Got a Moon Rock
A SMALL HUNK OF ROCK from the moon’s Taurus–Littrow Valley sits on display at the Roswell Museum as a tribute to Robert H. Goddard’s early work in rocket propulsion. A New England native, Goddard…
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Route 66 Motels Lost to History
THEIR NEON SIGNS BLAZED a trail for weary Route 66 travelers for decades, promising a clean room in an auto court with modern amenities like air-conditioning and hot and cold running water. While many…
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The Story Behind the Magic Mural
ELLIS TANNER WANTED TO INSPIRE the generations of Navajo youth who have been coming into his Gallup store since it opened in 1967. “I wanted to put positive role models around my entire trading…
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Branded with History
ON THE SOUTH AND WEST DOORS of the 1892 Eddy County Courthouse, in Carlsbad, 211 cattle brands recognize ranches across southeast New Mexico and other parts of the U.S. Southwest. “They’re definitely…
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What We're Reading: The Lost Tomb
IN 1986, DOUGLAS PRESTON drove from New York City to Santa Fe. There, he settled into a writing career that included contributions to New Mexico Magazine. His 1995 New Yorker article, “The Mystery of…
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