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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Clovis Cranks Up the Volume
WITH 90 MINUTES UNTIL SHOWTIME, parking is already scarce at the Curry County Events Center. I hurry toward the front gates, passing out-of-towners as they help their children down from dusty pickups…
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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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El Rancho Lights Up the Mother Road
THE LETTERS ON THE NEON SIGNS framing the route into Gallup follow a familiar pattern. A large blocky word beside one or two tilted script words—all written in gas-filled phosphorescent tubes—proclaim…
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Go Retro on Route 66
WEARY MOTORISTS TRAVELING the Southwest might feel a sudden onset of déjà vu when they glance up at the Sands Motel sign written in neon light, as though the hotel had been duplicated at every exit…
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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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Get Ready to Rock
KEN PETERSON THINKS of Bands of Enchantment as a New Mexico postcard to the world. Set to begin its third season on January 27, the Albuquerque-based TV show features local, national, and…
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True Heroes 2023: Richard Sturgeon
RICHARD STURGEON BEGAN RIDING motorcycles when he moved to New Mexico, where a Los Alamos National Laboratory coworker encouraged him to learn. An environmental science technician, he now rides his…
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True Heroes 2023: Nancy De Santis
A VETERAN AND A HORSE STAND inside a round pen in a quiet ranch near Santa Fe. At first, they are unsure of how to approach each other. Then something amazing happens. “This is not a cowboy program,”…
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Close Encounters of the Space Kind
NO, WE’RE NOT CLOSE to having Scotty beam us up in the Enterprise transporter system like on Star Trek, but some of the otherworldly objects of science fiction aren’t so alien in the real world today…
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