When as a young boy I was living in Japan, my father was stationed at Yokota Air Force Base. I saw the Japanese growing their rice crops both in the flat lands and on the sides of hills. Here in New Mexico, our farmers do flat land agriculture. Judging by the enthusiasm people for Hatch Valley chile, I would say that flat land growing of Hatch Valley chile is a winner. Looking at Southern New Mexico agriculture

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In 1987 I moved from Las Cruces, New Mexico to Ventura, California. Imagine my surprise to find not many mile away a Las Cruces, California. But there are several towns where I have lived that are unique to New Mexico. Consider Albuquerque. Don’t need to say New Mexico. Another one that has lots of history and stories is the quaint New Mexico town of Carrizozo. 

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In this second of three podcasts about Albert Fountain, his life and mysterious death, I want to point out the issue of salt. In today’s world salt doesn’t rise to the level of something to fight over or get in a gunfight or have say 30 to 50 people get killed. You can buy salt at the store cheaply. We are talking about the varied life of Albert Fountain, and he did get involved in this conflict in the history of our area. It had several names: The Great Salt War or The El Paso Salt War or even The San Elizario Salt War. Yes, we are talking about salt which is essential today as it was essential 150 years ago. Let me give you one data point. In this so-called war it involved at least 700 armed men who were angry. Another data point: it was a national story not just regional or local. People on the East Coast were following the issue of salt as being someone’s personal asset or a community asset. 

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Rudyard Kipling said: The first condition of understanding a country is to smell it. Quite true. It applies to New Mexico. We have an official smell which I will talk about. More importantly, we have an official food. You don’t just smell the official smell of New Mexico, you have the official food for breakfast, lunch, dinner and a snack. Stand by for Green and Red Chile.
While the pleasant smells of Fire-Roasting Chile are mildly interesting to me, it is the tasting and eating of Green and Red Chile that matters. There are certainly less calories for you to just sniff the air and comment on the texture and suitability of the Chile smell. However great the smell is, it is not satisfying. The pleasure of Southwestern cuisine and the delight of New Mexico is a plate of Red or Green enchiladas with tortillas. That is what spins my happy meter.

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New Mexico is the Land of Enchantment and Mystery as was said by writer Eugene Rhodes 110 years ago. As to mystery in New Mexico, there is none greater than the disappearance and obvious death of Colonel Albert Jennings Fountain and his 8-year-old son in 1896. The story has so many angles this is the first of three podcasts about Albert Fountain, a man who had enough adventures for three lifetimes fighting for law and order but ultimately was killed.

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Someone asked me about the history of Las Cruces. I could talk for hours, but in the next 15 minutes I will mention some stories, good and bad that locals know and some that they do not. Certainly, Las Cruces has quite a history. When the Sun is rising or setting, it often looks like a picture in an art gallery. Las Cruces is a City of Enchantment and Mystery. Let’s talk about it.

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Today I want to tell you how I learned to have a terrific day every day. It came from knowing Ed Foreman who served as a congressman twice, once from Texas and once from New Mexico. After politics he became a motivational speaker helping people live the good life. He grew up in Portales and maybe that is the secret of his success. He always started his seminars and speeches by saying I know you are thinking that this guy has been in politics. He would smile and say No, I’ve gone straight and work for a living now. Stay tuned for the story of Ed Foreman.

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Every February the 8th we in Southern New Mexico specifically and all of New Mexico in general celebrate the establishment of the White Sands Missile Range which took a huge amount of cattle grazing area and taxes out of the local coffers but provided several interesting attributes including spreading the taste for Hatch Green and Red Chile over our nation. I will tell you why White Sands Missile Range was created and let you in on a few secrets. Stand by.

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Let us talk about Mining and Mining towns of New Mexico. Let us look at the effect of mining in New Mexico from single miners to big operations. First off, mining is a completely different activity than agriculture. Let me give an example: I love Green Chile and can grow it and onions in my backyard. But I cannot grab a shovel and dig in my backyard for gold or silver. Might be some there but I am sure that trying to find gold in my back yard isn’t going to pan out. But there were some interesting mining operations in New Mexico’s past.

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Today I’m going to talk about a strange New Mexico story that happened forty some years ago involving two very popular politicians. One, Harold Runnels, died suddenly, and the other Joe Skeen had to run for the U. S. Congress in New Mexico’s Second Congressional District as a write-in against the replacement for Runnels, David King. Then the incredible happened.

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Today I want to do several stories about New Mexico. First up is about the company Kodak and New Mexico in 1945. Leaders of the company, Kodak, were not at the first Atomic explosion in New Mexico at Trinity Site July 16, 1945. The Kodak organization had to find out about the Trinity atomic explosion in an unusual way. Also here is a question: what part did Green Chile play in New Mexico becoming a state? Finally today let us talk about the White Sands which on a snowy day will be light brown with the snow being white.

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Today is the Federal Memorial Day 2024, the designated federal holiday to honor those who died in defense of our nation. We should honor those who died and honor those who were left behind by the death of a loved one. Example: if you are driving in Las Cruces near Picacho Hills there’s Quesenberry Lane. For most people it is just a place name, but it is more than that.  As to Quesenberry Lane, it honors two soldiers from Las Cruces who died for our country though their deaths were 25 years apart. On Madrid Avenue, just east of Solano Drive in Las Cruces there is a Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3242 which is named in honor of Captain Joe Quesenberry who was the first New Mexico Aggie to die in World War One. Joe Quesenberry, who died in 1918, had a brother George Robinson Quesenberry who had a son, Second Lieutenant James Slaughter Quesenberry, who died in World War Two. The Quesenberry family gave two young men in the defense of our nation. For the Quesenberry family Memorial Day has a real meaning. I will also talk today about Jesse Mechem who died in 1943 in WWII and his nephew Jesse Mechem who died in Vietnam. All four men left family to grieve.

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In Southern New Mexico, up on the Sacramento Mountains Southeastern slope is a small town or rather a hamlet called Weed, New Mexico. Founded in 1884, I think of it when I catch reruns of the television series Gunsmoke. Weed today has less than a hundred people. And there isn’t a monument to Gunsmoke, the twenty-year television series starring James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillion but there is in a connection to the small hamlet of Weed, New Mexico. It is Glenn Strange who played Sam, the Bartender on Gunsmoke and was born in Weed, New Mexico in 1899 when it was a territory rather than a state.

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I want to talk today about Fabián García. I think of him usually with a mouthful of Hatch Valley Green or Red Chile. He is often given the title, The founder of New Mexico Commercial Food Production. While we think of him for his work on Chiles Peppers, he was instrumental in the research on Pecans, Onions, Alfalfa, and Cotton. Importantly, he was a very good researchers along with being a kind and gentle scientist who inspired generations of Horticultural Scientists all over the world. Talk about being born at the right time and the right place. That was Fabián García. It was a special synchronicity that brought Fabián García and his leadership in scientific horticulture research to Southern New Mexico just as the Rio Grande Project produced Elephant Butte Reservoir so that farmers of this area had abundant water for their commercial growing fields along with the at the same time building of the railroads and surface roads so that Southern New Mexico produce could be shipped all over the United States. The agricultural potential of Southern New Mexico was realized by these three areas coming together.

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After the Mexican-American War ended in 1848 Congress wrestled with the slavery issue. The compromise addressed slavery in the newly established territories. President Millard Fillmore signed five bills that first allowed California to enter the United States as a state without slavery. The state of Texas had its northern and western borders defined giving back to New Mexico what is now Eastern New Mexico. Utah was established as a territory as was New Mexico which didn’t have a restriction on being free or a slave state. It is hard to realize that at the time New Mexico was established as a United States territory there was not what we now call Arizona. New Mexico all the way went from Texas to California. If you lived in Yuma, when it was in, New Mexico and needed to go to the capital of New Mexico, that was a 660-mile trip by buckboard, walking or horseback. No trains yet and paved highways wasn’t even dreamt yet. It would be a month or more of travel. Twelve years later the Confederate soldiers took over southern New Mexico and they went west and designated a state they called Arizona. California volunteers for the Union pushed the Confederates out of New Mexico but Abraham Lincoln like it being two states so the territory of Arizona was voted in Congress. New Mexico had some of what is now Colorado, and it was restored to Colorado. The first thing New Mexico needed was well defined boundaries, but it took a while for that. 

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This last weekend I was thinking about an interesting surprise in the history of New Mexico. Saturday, May 4th, the Kentucky Derby was run. There was a surprising Kentucky Derby fifteen years ago. New Mexico was front and center of that surprise. Let us look back 15 years to a tough little gelding named Mine That Bird that oddsmakers had at 50 to 1, meaning they thought the horse had very little chance at winning. A two-dollar bet on Mine That Bird would get you $103.20 if he won, which shows the oddsmakers thought little of the horse.  He won in dramatic fashion after falling back at the start of the race and then he caught up and passed all the other horses to win by a good margin. It is quite a story.

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The Fresh Chile Company in Las Cruces, New Mexico, according to owner Randy McMillan, started from a culinary family tradition. One year it was Red Chile season in Hatch, New Mexico, and Randy’s father, Arnold McMillan, who loves food and loves to cook came up with the idea of using fresh, crisp Hatch Red Chile right off the Chile Vine instead of traditional Dried Red Chile Powder or Dried Red Chile Pods for his Sunday Red Enchilada Sauce.

Everyone loved that unique and great tasting McMillan Red Chile Sauce. But there was one problem: the fresh, crisp, Red Chile was a crop of about a month or so. That meant that if they were to enjoy these Sunday Red Chile Enchiladas, they would have to save and store some of the Red Chile for later use. And they did. They followed the western tradition of canning food. Actually, they bottled it, but then they had the delicious Red Chile Sauce even months later.

When Randy became an adult, he continued the Fresh Red Chile tradition in his house with wife Carol and they would bottle some of the Fresh Red Chile during the month of harvest for later.

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Chile and Onion Farmers in Southern New Mexico have faith in many ways. I think of this fact as I munch on the world-famous Hatch Valley Chile and Onions. Day after day the farmers get up and do what has to be done, They have faith in several things beyond traditional religion. Don’t get me wrong, they are on their knees often in prayer to the good Lord. But there is something else. Faith is not exclusive to religion since there is the religion of farming. 

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There are several stages of being a Chile and Onion farmer in the Hatch Valley, the Chile and Onion capital of the world. Many are multi-generational, so they were born into the farmer role from having a toy shovel when they were small to driving a real tractor as a teenager as part of their learning. I asked one what was the most important part of being a farmer? He said when you think about seeds, water, soil, sunlight, fertilizer, weed control, harvesting and so on it is like asking of the four tires on your car, which one of the tires is the most important. Answer: they all four are or the car doesn’t run. Likewise, all the parts of the farming process are essential, or the crops do not produce. The first part of their growing year is planning. Nothing happens on a farm that isn’t planned other than pests, weather and unexpected troubles. As one person said, the only thing I know for sure is that there are going to be things I didn’t know were going to happen. And I must be ready and able to deal with those things when they happen.

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Most people visiting New Mexico are not aware that they are walking on Gold some of the time. It is true. Because of the volcanic activity for millions of years there is Gold all over the great state of New Mexico. What’s the problem? Finding it. Let us talk about “Get rich in New Mexico with gold” efforts. I am mostly talking about the second half of the 1800s to the 20th century in New Mexico. Some people back east came here in New Mexico to get rich and did so. Mostly they were tied to the hunt for gold. Writers in the Old West put lots of attention on precious metals in the “Gold Rush” to California, Nevada, Colorado, the Black Hills and the Yukon. That is where some large deposits of gold were found and hundreds or even thousands of people came to each area hoping to strike it rich. It even happened in New Mexico.

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Today I’m talking about Sid Gutierrez, who had a dream and then did so much more afterwards. What he knew was that he wanted to go into space as an astronaut and that there were steps which must be taken. First was to be the top of his high school class at Valley High School in Albuquerque and get an appointment to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado. There he must distinguish himself and be allowed to become a fighter pilot. Then he must get assigned to the Test Pilot School and do well. Finally, when all the pieces were in place then he could compete to become an astronaut for NASA. And friends, Sidney McNeill Gutierrez did each of those steps day by day, month by month year by year so that after logging over 4,500 flying hours in about 30 different types of airplanes he was selected by NASA in May 1984. His dream from high school took 15 hard years of work, but as you will see that work paid great dividends in 1991 with him going into space and the next 33 years as he filled several roles in NASA, in the Air Force as a Colonel and after retirement when he then used that training and experience to serve in other capacities. But first, going into space as the first Hispanic Space Shuttle Pilot was the next thing on his dream list.

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For ten thousand years people have been walking in and around what is now Southern New Mexico. Paved roads are a luxury of less than a hundred years, but the improvement was great. The Interstates 10 -25 and 40 are just over 50 years and now Southern to Northern New Mexico is quick. Before that it was travel New Mexico on dirt trails. Some trips took weeks. We are not the first people to go down the streets of our town. 400 years earlier there were people. The first to travel on our first street. What is the first street in our area? 

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There are some people who you know not so much individually but as both of them. Like my Mom and Dad. People referred to them as George and Joan. Or Randy and Carol McMillan, the owners of the Fresh Chile Company. They sponsor these podcasts and many Fresh Chile Company videos have both of them or Randy and daughter Jenna. In that manner I say former New Mexico Governor Bruce and Alice King when I talk about Governor Bruce King.

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Think of how far growing Chile has come over the years. Today it is a major crop in New Mexico with thousands of acres. A long time ago it was a family garden staple that most families in Southern New Mexico grew, one family at a time. Long ago each family who year after year grew Chile in their garden did so by keeping some of the seeds from the last Chile harvest. Those seeds were kept safe over the winter. When it seemed that winter was over, these seeds were hand planted and carefully tended, each one by hand. The only mechanical device was a shovel or hoe that worked fine for the couple dozen seeds that were to be planted. When the plants produced Chile pods there was rejoicing and at the right time those pods were picked depending upon wanting green or red and then over the family stove the wax skin was roasted off. The Green Chile was eaten immediately. The Red Chile was dried and ground into a powder. Some of the seeds were kept in a safe place for the next year’s crop. When the Dried Red Chile was applied to food there was great satisfaction since it enhanced the flavor. 

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Here it is, my friends, April fifth and as you are listening to this Podcast, Chile Plants are going into the ground in the Hatch Valley Chile growing areas. In the growing areas, some of the Chile plants are started as seeds. That is happening right now and some Chile Plants were planted some weeks earlier in greenhouses since Chile (how should I say this?) well now Chile Plants just doesn’t like cold weather. So those young Chile Plants are being planted right now. You know what Chile Plants like? They like the Hatch Valley Chile Fields. How do you know Michael? According to some Agricultural people, the happiest Chile Plants produce the very best, the World-Famous Hatch Valley Green and Red Chile. It is delicious.

A little trivia: where are the happiest dairy cows in our country? Why they are in Southern New Mexico. That’s a mighty bold statement from a podcaster, can you back that up, Michael? Yes, I can. The measure of dairy cow happiness goes like this. For the same dairy cow breed and weight, the cows that produce the most milk every day as computed with how much they eat are the happiest. It involves the dairy cows being stressed or not. When the snow is a foot deep the cows don’t enjoy it and therefore can be said to be stressed and produce less milk. I got that from an Ag Professor at New Mexico State University, so you know it is true.

Back to happy Chile. So, the same is somewhat the same for plants. Those of a certain variety with equal amounts of water and nutrients that produce the best produce can be said to be the happiest since like the cows nothing is stressing them. When I have mentioned this people talk about how they make their plants feel better by talking to them or singing to them. Could be but the proof is at harvest. I will have to ask if the Chile farmers in the Hatch Valley have some Good Chile Songs. I will bring out my six string guitar and do my part to insure a great Chile harvest. 

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