May is Historic Preservation Month in New Mexico, and Las Cruces is honored to have three neighborhoods listed as Historic Districts in both the New Mexico Register of Cultural Properties and the National Register of Historic Places.
All three deserve a visit.
Mesquite Historic District
The past is almost palpable as you walk through the Mesquite Historic District, one of the few still intact neighborhoods dating from the mid-nineteenth century in the Southwest.
This birthplace of the City of Las Cruces was formally established in 1849 to ease crowded conditions in the village of Doña Ana. The area was surveyed using a braided rawhide rope to lay out parcels of land. One hundred and twelve settlers camped under a large tree in what is now Klein Park, while lots were drawn assigning ownership.
Descendants of some of these first families still live in the neighborhood.
But Mesquite has a history dating back even further. Members of the Piro, Mansa and Tiwa peoples lived in the area, and their families, too, still live here. And El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro, the Royal Road of the Interior, ran approximately down what is now Mesquite Street. Between 1598 and 1882 trade goods were carried by oxcart along the 870 miles between Mexico City and San Juan Pueblo in northern New Mexico. Although the streets are now paved and lined with sidewalks, by walking down Mesquite Street, and using a little imagination, you can sense the multiple layers of history laid down by Mexican traders, Indigenous community members, and settlers of Spanish, African, and Northern European descent.
Today the original townsite is half the size it once was, having lost the west portion to urban renewal in the 1960s and 1970s. But much of what remains is the real thing: houses, shops, and churches constructed between the 1850s and 1930s. Traditional adobe homes front directly on the streets and, in the rear, placitas, once spaces for work and livestock, are now yards and gardens. Many roofs are flat, often graced with an arched or pointed pediment, vigas protrude just under the rooflines, and canales extend through the parapets, draining rainwater away from the adobe walls. Philips Chapel CME Church was completed in 1912 to serve the neighborhood’s strong African-American community, and doubled as a school beginning in 1924, during the time of forced segregation. The serene, white-plastered adobe church was restored by a diverse group of volunteers between 2010 and 2016 and services, open to anyone, are once again held there.
Today, Klein Park invites residents and tourists alike to rest in the shade, use the playground equipment, or listen to a concert given in the small amphitheater. One of the best restaurants in the district is across the street, and a second is only a few blocks away. In recent years art galleries have moved into some historic buildings, and once a month the district sponsors a First Friday Art Ramble. Visitors can amble along Mesquite Street, or ride a free horse-drawn trolley, hopping out when they see something that catches their eye. Best of all is Christmas on El Camino Real, when the street glows with luminarias and, in Klein Park, Santa will hear a child’s wish list.
Alameda-Depot Historic District
Even before the Atcheson, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad reached Las Cruces in 1881 a land development consortium, calling itself the New Mexico Town Company, began buying up and platting residential lots in the fertile farmlands to the west of downtown. New arrivals from the eastern states brought new and trendy ideas of home building, and the railroad gratified their desires by bringing in materials largely unavailable before: milled lumber, hardware, window glass and pre-cut wooden trim. Between the end of the 19th century and into the first decades of the 20th a stylish suburb grew, boasting Queen Anne, Bungalow, Tudor Revival, Mediterranean and Pueblo Revival styles. One large adobe farmhouse, once surrounded by irrigated fields, is the only remnant of the agricultural days.
William L. Rynerson, whose lovely Queen Anne house still graces a shaded lot on Court Street, came to Las Cruces with the California Column in 1862 and stayed to become a lawyer and a member of the New Mexico Town Company. He shot New Mexico Supreme Court Justice John P. Slough dead in the billiard room of the La Fonda Hotel in Santa Fe, and who later changed the venue of Billy the Kid’s trial from Lincoln to La Mesilla, ensuring the Kid’s conviction for the murder of Lincoln County Sheriff William Brady.
On Griggs Street is the adobe Territorial Style home of Sam Bean, Jr., whose brother, Judge Roy Bean, was the infamous Law West of the Pecos. A bungalow on South Miranda housed Albert Bacon Fall, once United States Senator from New Mexico, then Secretary of the Interior, but topped this all off by being convicted of taking bribes in the infamous Teapot Dome Scandal in the 1920s.
At the heart of the district is Pioneer Woman’s Park, a tree-shaded square-block with a
charming gazebo in the center. The park was created by the Las Cruces Woman’s Improvement Association in 1896, purchased from the railroad with funds earned from renting out the town’s first hearse. Their 1927 Mission Revival meeting house still stands across from the Park on Reymond Street. The gazebo is a popular venue for concerts, rallies, and especially weddings. But on quiet afternoons the district, with its air of a late 19th century neighborhood, is ideal for a relaxed walk under the mature trees and along the avenues of eclectic period houses.
Mesilla Park Historic District
Mesilla Park began in 1887 as a planned urban development, independent of Las Cruces, with its own post office and train station. Also laid out on formerly irrigated farmland, the irrigation ditches, acequias, still provide water to the mature trees that line the streets. Non-residential portions of the town were designated near the train depot. Main Street ran along the railroad tracks, and the commercial strip ran along the east side of Main Street. For the resident’s convenience there was a grocery store, a Wells Fargo Express office, telegraph agent, icehouse, barber shop, and livery stable. Where there are still small shops, some of them are in original buildings. West of the tracks, beyond the train station, were warehouses, many owned by mail order businesses which flourished when the country was still primarily rural. Today, art galleries and entertainment venues, workshops and light industry, continue to use these buildings.
A little further west is the residential area, where houses built from 1887 to the 1960s stand on large lots. The eclectic styles vary from Queen Anne through bungalows, Craftsman, Territorial and Pueblo Revival, to mid-century Ranch Houses. St. James Episcopal Church is a classic example of Gothic Revival. After creation of New Mexico A & M College in 1890, now NMSU, proximity to the campus attracted faculty and staff. Perhaps this interest in education prompted the community to open a one-room school for its children in 1901. In 1907 a Mission Revival style schoolhouse, designed by noted architect Henry C. Trost, opened. Over the years additions kept up with the needs of the community until, eventually, a new elementary school was built. The original school was renovated and now serves as the Frank O’Brien Papen Recreation Center, a space where the community can come together for learning, sports, and socializing.
Mesilla Park was annexed by Las Cruces in 1964, but still has an elegant and peaceful ambiance, with lovely places to walk, especially along the old acequias when the oleander are in bloom.
This story first appeared in the Las Cruces Bulletin’s guide to living in Las Cruces, Life is Good, 2024.
Sandra L. Marshall is an architectural historian, has served on the Las Cruces Historic Preservation Commission and has degrees in anthropology and public history.
Editor’s note: This story appears courtesy of the authors and is a part of a series of stories honoring the historic value of Las Cruces and, during the month of May, Historic Preservation Month.
