Wagon Mound, named after the “Conestoga wagon” looking butte, was a landmark for wagon trains and traders going up and down the Santa Fe Trail in Northern New Mexico…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
Originally it was isolated ranch that housed four families, but presently the village has a population of three hundred and fourteen people…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
On May 31, 1930, a deadly tornado struck the town, killing two men at an auto repair garage…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
There was another EF2 tornado in March 23, 2007. This tornado and the one in 1930 are the deadliest tornados (to date) in New Mexico State history…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
In the late 1870s the settlement at the foot of the present-day Santa Clara Hill was renamed Pinkerton…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
The Pinkerton name only lasted a year when the towns “Father’s” renamed it Wagon Mound, and built a downtown around where the railroad was going to be constructed…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
Wagon Mound was first named Santa Clara, after “Los Ojos de Santa Clara”, a name given by the poblanos due to the meadows and abundant waters…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
In 1879 the railroad was completed and the Village became a hub for European settlers coming out West to “seek fortunes,” or “go broke!”
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
The Village boomed with the influx of people including scientists, geologists, paleontologists and archaeologists looking for fossils, oil, gold or anything of value that could make their fortune…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
Wagon Mound was a more civil stopping point before the notorious New Mexican Town of Las Vegas…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
In May of 1850, “The Wagon Mound Massacre” was discovered at Santa Clara Spring northwest of the Village…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
A U.S. Express Stagecoach joined a settler caravan on the Santa Fe trail when they encountered a band of Jicarilla Apache and Mouache Ute led by a man named White Wolf…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
Ten Americans were dead after the fight - highlighting the tension between natives and settlers despite the Indian Trade and Intercourse Act of 1834, which recognized the area between the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains as a permanent Indian country…
Because of the Wagon Mound Massacre, and the White Massacre - Fort Union, New Mexico, was established to engage aggressive campaigns against the Comanche, Jicarilla Apache, Navajo, and Ute people…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
Wagon Mound was finally incorporated in 1918, eight years after the birth of the Harvest Jubilee, which is now called Bean Day…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler
In 2018, the community celebrated its Centennial. To this day Wagon Mound is a Historic Stop off I-25 traveling North from Santa Fe to the Front Range Urban Corridor of Colorado…
Film Photograph by Adam Chrysler