Plans are under way for Ben Brown — CARTA’s International Liaison Officer — and me to meet with various historians and INAH representatives in Chihuahua in February for joint ventures along El Camino Real in Chihuahua. We also hope to do this in other Mexican states in the coming year. We have already found some private individuals who have donated CARTA memberships for some Mexican institutions.
Under editor Jay W. Sharp, our quarterly “Chronicles of the Trail” has given us increased visibility to the public. One of our priorities should now be to upgrade the design, layout and print quality and increase the distribution of the journal. Jay would welcome contributions from both members and non-members.
The new CARTA officers were elected and installed at our scheduled meeting at Las Golindrinas, near Santa Fe, on October 1, 2005. A short board meeting followed. Newly elected Vice-President John Bloom and I were in Socorro, New Mexico, on October 6, as the CARTA representatives for the organizational meeting of the Camino colloquium scheduled for April, 2006. CARTA will hold it’s annual meeting in conjunction with the Camino colloquium, in Socorro. We will be looking for a few papers to be presented at this joint venture.
Your new president gave a presentation on CARTA and Juan E. Lucero’s exploits on the El Camino Real. I also chaired both sessions of the Gran Quivira Conference on Spanish Colonial history, architecture, art history and archaeology held in Tucson, October 7 and 8.
On October 14 and 15, I attended the Jornada Mogollon archaeological conference in El Paso, spoke and passed out fliers on CARTA. On November 11 and 12, I attended and passed out fliers at the Center for Big Bend Studies in Alpine, Texas. Ben Brown presented a paper on El Camino Real cutoff trail from Chihuahua City to San Antonio, Texas.
On November 3, a number of CARTA members met with Michael Taylor, our new National Park Service representative, for a supper at La Hacienda restaurant as an informal get together. The following day, Michael Taylor, Ben Brown and I toured the lower historic Mission Trail south of El Paso. Pat Taylor, Mike’s brother, gave us a personal tour of the Socorro Mission, which he has been active in restoring for a number of years. On November 19, 2005, John Bloom, Ben Brown and I along with a number of CARTA members were present at the grand opening of the El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro International Heritage Center between Truth or Consequences and Socorro, New Mexico (see article, page 8). CARTA had a table with membership fliers and past journals for sale. We gained a number of new members.
On December 8, I attended the planning meeting at the National Park Service office in Santa Fe for the 10th International Colloquium on the El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro to be held in Socorro at the end of April 2006. We will be responsible for two or three papers at the end of one of the sessions.
Patrick H. Beckett, CARTA President
COAS: My Bookstore
317 North Main
Las Cruces, NM 88001
Phone: 1-505-644-0868
e-mail: pat@coasbooks.com
Trail Planning Goals
A Comprehensive Management Plan (CMP) for the trail was adopted in 2004. It outlines general goals for trail administration. In January 2005, BLM and NPS staff, Gary Werner of the Partnership for the National Trails System (PNTS), the Board of Directors for El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro Trail Association (CARTA), and Luis Urias, a heritage specialist from Chihuahua, took part in a strategic planning session that worked from the CMP to identify seven “highest priority” goals. Sarah Schlanger (BLM) and Michael Taylor (NPS), designated leads for Camino Real NHT administration, have been working with trail partners to address the Strategic Plan goals and to further trail resource protection and heighten trail awareness.
The priority goals are:
What the Trail Administration is Working On Now
The trail administrative staff is making headway as well on the goals identified during the strategic planning session and in the CMP. NPS has been able to provide funds to offset CARTA’s administrative costs for items such as mailings, travel, brochures and newsletters (such as the one you are holding in your hand). Sarah Schlanger and the geographic information specialists at BLM have developed a draft, “interactive” map for the trail thatallows trail resources and information to be plotted on base maps of various scales, and she would like feedback on the mapping project from CARTA members. Please contact her if you have time to help evaluate this approach to sharing information about trail resources. In addition, Sarah and Mike will be working with CARTA and other partners to pull together a regional meeting for land managers, agency decision-makers and heritage tourism interests in 2006; this meeting will serve as the foundation for an interagency committee that will share project information and assist in project coordination and planning. Following CARTA’s suggestion, Mike and Sarah are also developing a trail marker survey and condition assessment project that will be carried out by an independent scholar. The survey will concentrate on state historic markers associated with the trail in New Mexico and Texas, and will result in a report on current condition, potential new marker locations, suggestions for additions or changes in marker text, and a web-based system for tracking and reporting marker condition to the appropriate authorities in each state. Both the regional meeting and the trail marker condition survey need volunteer support. Please contact Sarah or Mike to volunteer.
Grant-supported Projects
Many of the projects now in development along the trail are taking advantage of funding opportunities offered by NPS and BLM to qualified partners along the corridor in New Mexico and Texas. NPS CCSP funds projects further the National Historic Trail goals and the partners’ programs that are carried out jointly with the NPS. The CCSP program requires a one-to-one match of NPS grant funds; the match can be in in-kind contributions, in dollars, or a combination of the two. The NPS share of any one CCSP project cannot exceed $30,000. Applications can be downloaded from the NPS Santa Fe Trail site at www.nps.gov/elca/pphtml/documents.html.
CARTA has been awarded the first NPS CCSP Grant for the Camino Real NHT. This grant will support the design and production of approximately 10 wayside exhibits to be installed along a 10-mile section of the Rio Grande River Park and Trail System in El Paso, Texas. This exciting project will tell the story of El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro and its role in the history of El Paso. Interpretive panels will be researched in consultation with local authorities and historians. Highlighted will be the major impact the Rio Grande had on travelers and settlers at the Pass of the North. The BLM has named CARTA a principal partner in its CCSP as well, and has made an annual grant of $15,000 to the association to develop projects that promote the identification of trail resources, trail preservation and site certification. These funds will support the trail marker survey described above, as well as the development of a site steward program to monitor environmental impacts and visitor use at archaeological sites along the trail.
The site steward program will build on a site study that the NPS Spanish Colonial Research Center at the University of New Mexico is conducting through a separate BLM partnership. Renowned archaeologist Mike Marshall has teamed up with NPS historian Joseph Sanchez to assess archaeological site conditions and the feasibility of monitoring site conditions with volunteer site stewards. BLM anticipates putting a number of “trail riders” into the field to act as site stewards for remote archaeological sites in 2006. The site steward training program requires a day of classroom instruction and a day of general fieldwork that stresses archaeological and site visitation ethics, safety and monitoring methods. Additional field days will be required to complete orientation to particular sites and to qualify as certified site stewards. Site steward training will be carried out in late spring and early summer. Contact Sarah Schlanger if you would like to participate in the steward program. In another collaborative effort, internal funds have supported a joint project between the NPS National Trails System office at Santa Fe, the NPS Regional Office in Denver and the Pueblo of Ohkay Owingeh (formerly known as San Juan Pueblo) to develop alternatives for visitors to the site of the first Spanish colonial capitol in what is now northern New Mexico. The “First Capitol Site,” as it is called by Ohkay Owingeh officials, lies near the confluence of the Chama and the Rio Grande, on a patchwork of lands held by Pueblo members and others. The 16th-century pueblo occupied by the colonists fell into disuse after the Spanish moved their capitol to the site of modern Santa Fe at about 1610. The NPS landscape architects, planners and consultants are working to help Ohkay Owingeh design tour routes that will highlight the role of this site in the history of the Americas, yet provide protection to the historic resources and privacy for the landowners who have acted as stewards to the site since the Spanish withdrawal.
A joint project among BLM, NPS and CARTA members, in consultation with our Mexican colleagues, is the organization and implementation of the 10th International Colloquium on the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro, which will be held April 27 through the 30, 2006 in Socorro, New Mexico. The themes will be historical research, management/administration and heritage tourism. The colloquium is held every other year, alternating between Mexico and the United States.
Professionals and advocates at this colloquium will assess what has been accomplished over the past ten years, what actions are taking place today, and what the plans are for the future in protecting the historic properties along the corridor, and telling the story of the trail. The four-day event, including one day of field trips, is open to the public. There is no registration fee. Prior registration, however, is required for our planning purposes. For more information, or to register, please contact Michael Taylor.
Projects on the Horizon
The best trail projects grow out of local needs, concerns and interests. We are working with George Paloheimo and his staff at Las Golondrinas, the living museum at the old paraje south of Santa Fe, to help design a wayside exhibit that will describe parajes and trail travel in the area. We are talking with the residents of La Cienega about preserving heritage resources in their community, and to the city and county of Santa Fe about a river trail through Santa Fe and “open space” parks in the Galisteo Basin and on the growing southside. In El Paso, the city and county share an interest in health, education and public enjoyment of the river corridor, and that is giving us a chance to talk about the Río Grande and the Camino Real then and now. Albuquerque’s Martineztown preservation community has invited us to help tell the story of the Camino in its neighborhood. We have worked with the exhibit designers for the new Camino Real International Heritage Center near Socorro on exhibit design, content and visitor “friendliness,” and we’ve talked to Ysleta Pueblo and Ohkay Owingeh about helping visitors learn about their communities.
We would like to do more to bring out Camino Real stories in every community along the trail and to perpetuate its legacy. If you have a place in your community that has a story to tell, or a site related to the Camino Real in need of preservation, please contact us:
Sarah Schlanger, BLM
Phone: 1-505-438-7454
e-mail: sarah_schlanger@blm.gov
Michael Taylor, NPS
Phone: 1-505-988-6742
e-mail: michael_taylor@nps.gov