MY
CITY
DIFFERENT
MY
CITY
DIFFERENT
A HALF-CENTURY IN SANTA FE
BETTY E. BAUER
On the cover:Watercolor of East DeVargas Street, Santa Fe, by Carulo 1981
© 2004 by Betty E. Bauer.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer whomay quote brief passages in a review.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Bauer, Betty E., 1928–
My city different: a half-century in Santa Fe / by Betty E. Bauer.
p. cm.
ISBN: 0-86534-421-3 (pbk.)
1. Bauer, Betty E., 1928– 2. Santa Fe (N.M.)—Biography.
3. Journalists—New Mexico—Santa Fe—Biography.
I. Title.
F804.S253B38 2004
978.9′56053′092—dc22
2004000893
SUNSTONE PRESS / POST OFFICE BOX 2321 / SANTA FE, NM 87504-2321 / USA
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DEDICATED TO ALL THOSE WHO CONTRIBUTED TO MY LIFE AND TIMES IN SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO
This is a glimpse of Santa Fe,
New Mexico as I knew it—
and a few of the people who made it so
INTRODUCTION
The first Spaniard to travel the long, hard journey from Mexicointo the land that became New Mexico was Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, a gentleman adventurer in search of gold. He made the trip in 1540-42 and found only primitive Indian adobe dwellings which, in the sun’s reflection, may have resembled the golden Cities of Cibola to a more imaginative fellow, but generated only profound disappointment in Coronado.
Half a century later, Don Juan de Oñate set forth from the district of Chihuahua, Mexico in New Spain and founded the first settlement slightly north of present-day Santa Fe on the Rio Grande. He was Governor of this new land until 1608, when the Viceroy in Mexico City, displeased with Oñate’s performance, forced him to resign and sent Don Pedro de Peralta to replace him.
Peralta founded the city of Santa Fe in 1610 as the capital of New Mexico, and proceeded to lay the town out in accordance with established Spanish custom.
Laid out in a Roman grid pattern, the plaza was the center or hub with all streets emanating from it. The streets, having been laid out in the first part of the 17th century, are narrow but straight. They form boxes of ever-increasing size, fanning out with regularly-spaced, parallel streets going north and south, intersecting similarly-laid streets flowing east to west, so that there is a uniformity to the center of town which is lacking in the outlying areas. Added later, the early residential streets were formed haphazardly and are inclined to wind and weave around every which way, making it easy for a newcomer to get very lost.
