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Roswell, New Mexico - UFO Capital of the World!
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About Roswell
1947 UFO Crash
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Roswell, New Mexico—West and Northwest
Some of Our Attractions:
Car Tunes and Tint (former Joe Bauman Texaco Service Station (1200 West 2nd Street). After playing first base for the Roswell Rockets Minor League Baseball Team in the 1950s—and setting the professional baseball record for most homeruns in a season that stood until 2001 (72 in 1954)—Oklahoman Joe Bauman (1922-2005) lived the remainder of his life in Roswell (at 1700 N. Pontiac Drive) working for a beer distributor and operating his gas station here in the building currently occupied a car stereo business until his retirement in 1984. The City named the baseball stadium at Coke Field adjacent to the fairgrounds “Joe Bauman Stadium” in 2005. Bauman spoke at the dedication, but died later that year. Every year the Minor League Baseball Association still presents the Joe Bauman Trophy (and $2,000 for each homerun) to the top Minor League home-run hitter.
Six Mile Hill (Six miles—9 km—west of Main Street; guess how it got its name). Upthrusting of the eastern edge of a north-south fault created this ten-mile (16 km) ridge that forms Roswell’s western horizon. Its layered sedimentary rock, called San Andres Limestone, is visible on the south side of the road cut at the crest of the hill, as is a little cave of the type common in this formation. The gray limestone here is honeycombed with fissures and small caves that are home to truly gigantic rattlers, or so the tall tales claim. What looks like a 10’ wide plug interrupts the limestone layers in the road cut. Here a sinkhole dissolved in the limestone then filled with dust and sand over the centuries forming the plug. Limestone for some of the houses in Roswell and all the rockwork in Cahoon Park, de Bremond Stadium, and the sloping sides of the Spring River came from an old quarry a little south of the highway.
This ridge figured in a potentially extraordinary happening as it became a refuge from possible cataclysm one summer night in 1936: a woman claiming to be a prophet had spent the day walking the streets proclaiming that Roswell was doomed to sink into the ground that very night. Many residents left town to camp overnight on Six Mile Hill—not that they believed the prediction, it just seemed like a lovely evening for an outing. . . . Years later in 1947 this elevation figured in another extraordinary happening: Dan Wilmot reported that the flying saucer he and his wife watched on July 3rd had disappeared over Six Mile Hill.
Today Six Mile Hill is the location for some of the nicer homes in Roswell. Houses perched on the crest have a lovely view to the west of Capitan Mountain, Sierra Blanca Peak, and the Cloudcroft peaks silhouetted against brilliant sunsets in the evening, and of twinkling lights of “The Pearl of the Pecos” to the east after dark.
Two Rivers Dam and Reservoir (Turnoff to the south, fourteen miles—23 km—west of Main Street). From the founding of Roswell on into the mid-Twentieth Century, water from the Hondo River stood several feet deep along Main Street and throughout the business and residential sections of Roswell every few years—as pictured in a photo in the Roswell Public Library lobby and another in the Wells Fargo Bank lobby. In 1963 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers finally completed the Two Rivers Dam and Reservoir project at a cost of five mil-lion dollars to protect Roswell from devastating Hondo River floods. Two separate earthen dams, one on the Hondo River and one on adjacent Rocky Arroyo, route occasional flood waters into the reservoir area. There some of the water disappears into the underlying porous limestone and the rest is released gradually downstream. In this instance, disappearing water is a good thing, unlike other occasions when Roswell developers have tried—unsuccessfully—to create reservoirs full of water. The large earthen dam does look a little strange if you are expecting to see a lake behind it, but then “strange” is a relative concept in Roswell. Picnic shelters are available at the dam and pronghorn often frequent the prairie along the seven-mile (11 km) entry road, especially in the fall. A little up-stream of the dam—but on inaccessible private property—are the ruins of Plaza de Missouri, one of the earliest settlements in the Roswell area.
Congregation B’nai Israel (712 North Washington Avenue). In 1903, even though there were only 36 Jews in Roswell and most of them belonged to his ex-tended family, Roswell merchant and banker Nathan Jaffa organized Congregation B’nai Israel, today the oldest active Jewish congregation in New Mexico. Jaffa led the congregation in Friday services and Sabbath School in the home of his business partner, William Prager, which stood on the current site of the Petroleum Building. The tradition he began has continued for more than 100 years: a layperson has always led Congregation B’nai Israel with Rabbis coming to Roswell only rarely for special occasions.
Later, B’nai Israel held its services in the Masonic Temple, the Odd Fellows Hall, and other locations around town. Congregation membership grew when the RAAF and Walker Air Force Base brought more Jews to Roswell, and in 1949 members purchased this current building from the Church of the Nazarene. After Walker Air Force Base closed in 1967 the congregation dwindled. Today, even though the synagogue easily seats 100 people, regular attendance is only about twenty for of the twice monthly Sabbath services, although holiday celebrations and the occasional Bar or Bat Mitzvah draw more worshipers. Members come from Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstruction branches of Judaism but B’nai Israel generally follows Reform practice, reading from a beautiful handwritten lambskin Torah. Plaques commemorating congregation leaders and deceased members, as well as artworks donated by WPA artist Joseph Vogel (1911-1995), hang in the sanctuary. The illuminated stained-glass window depicts the Ten Commandments and a seven-branched menorah, one of the oldest sym-bols of the Jewish faith.
Cielo Grande Recreation Area (former Roswell Municipal Airport) (1500 West College Street). Cielo Grande (“see-EL-o GRAHN-day,” meaning “big sky”) includes soccer fields, a walking track, a skateboard park, a UFO-themed play structure, and a marvelous view of Capitan Mountain. Roswell’s annual 4th of July Celebration and fireworks display takes place here. The Unity Center for Teens in the old Terminal building provides a place to play pool and hosts concerts presented by local bands. Over the next few years the City plans to add additional recreational facilities here, eventually including a swimming pool. The current debate centers on whether it will be an indoor or outdoor pool.
Open spaces here give a magnificent view of 10,083’ (3,073 m) Capitan Mountain, a volcanic laccolith formed by lava squeezing up through a crack in the rocks, that appears in the backgrounds of many Peter Hurd paintings. The birth-place and final resting place of Smokey Bear is in the Capitan Mountains just to the left of the peak, while one of the 1947 UFO Crash sites is on Boy Scout Mountain just to the right of the peak.
Roswell businessmen provided financing to build the Roswell Airport here in 1929—which mainly involved setting up a hangar and fencing a circular area of prairie 3,100 feet (945 m) in diameter to keep out pronghorn. There were no runways so private pilots who used the airport, including Charles Lindbergh who landed here in 1934 and 1935 on visits to Dr. Robert Goddard, could land and take off in any direction. By the time Lindbergh returned for his final visit in 1939 the City had bought the airport and built runways. Continental Airlines even initiated limited service to Roswell that same year.
Unfortunately, the only building present when Lindbergh landed here, a large corrugated metal hangar and airport office with “Roswell” painted on the roof, was demolished several years ago because of its deteriorated condition. The remaining tan brick Terminal completed in 1948 with its large, glass-enclosed tower and outside observation decks represents buildings typical of regional airports during that era.
Roswell Municipal Airport moved to the RIAC after Walker Air Force Base closed in 1967. The Roswell Police Department was occupying the former Terminal in 1980 when the last airplane to use the airfield, a single engine Mooney, landed here during a snowstorm. Its disoriented and probably rather surprised pilot had to dodge barricades constructed on the runway for police training exercises.
Boy Scout Office: S.P. Yates Scout Service Center (2703 North Aspen Avenue). Roswell lawyer Harold Hurd, father of artist Peter Hurd, organized Boy Scout Troop 1 in Roswell in 1915 and the Scouting Program has been strong here ever since. Roswell Boy Scout offices were first located in the Courthouse, then the First National Bank building, a Clubhouse on North Pennsylvania Avenue, and the rock Boy’s Hut by the swimming pool in Cahoon Park. In 1963 they moved into a previous building on this site. This current building, completed in 2002 with a time capsule buried in the entry area to be opened January 8, 2052, is named in honor of S.P. Yates, a Roswell oilman and longtime supporter of Scouting. Out front the Roswell Rotary Club placed the Minor Huffman Memorial Flag Pole honoring an early Roswell Scout, Scouting historian, and civic leader.
This building houses the offices of the Conquistador Council that covers all of Southeastern New Mexico. (The Apache Boy Scouts in Mescalero may have mixed feelings about being a part of the “Conquistador” Council but participate enthusiastically anyway.) Bricks in the Eagle Scout Patio on the north side of the building list the names of every Roswell Eagle Scout since 1920.
In the lobby, aficionados of Peter Hurd can view his original 1954 design for the Conquistador Council patch: the silhouette of a Conquistador with the silhouette of a Scout—actually his son Michael, now an artist himself—imposed over it. Beside it hangs a small Hurd watercolor entitled Boy Scout Campfire donated to the Conquistador Council in 1958 by the artist. His son Michael again served as the model for this painting of a Scout watching over a campfire as dinner cooks. Prints of other Peter Hurd paintings hang throughout the Center, in addition to a Michael Hurd print signed by the artist and inscribed “Once a Scout, always a Scout.” 622-3461. Open M-F 8:30-5, closed SS and holidays.
Pecan Orchards (Country Club Road west of Montana Avenue). In 1963 oilman Olen Featherstone began planting pecan orchards in northwest Roswell, choosing mainly the thin-shelled “Schley” variety. The established pecan orchards in Roswell today are concentrated in the West Country Club Road area where new, heavily irrigated pecan trees cover more acres every season. Dairy farmers along the Old Dexter Highway southeast of Roswell have begun putting in similar orchards and pecans are rapidly becoming a major crop in the Roswell area.
Armies of workers prune, spray, and fertilize the orchards carefully through-out the year. Huge clouds of choking dust signal the harvest in December and January when large mechanical shakers grab the tree trunks and tumble the nuts to the ground. Giant brushes sweep them into bins, creating enough dust in the process to make the orchards appear to be on fire from a distance. The pecans are then sorted from the debris, packed, and shipped to processing plants out of state. It is no longer possible to purchase locally grown pecans in Roswell, except at the Nuthouse (429 East 2nd Street) where small producers still bring nuts for processing.
Some pecan growers run sheep through their orchards to keep down the weeds, and do a little fertilizing. Mule deer and pronghorn often take it upon themselves to serve the same function, and can become a serious hazard when they cross the road, especially at dawn and dusk. The New Mexico Game and Fish Department holds periodic roundups to remove them to other areas because they also chew on pecan bark and damage trees.
An interesting visual effect results from riding along West Country Club Road and staring down the rows. The patterns created at various angles by perfectly spaced trees change in an almost psychedelic array. Some people have also reported seeing a ghostly little boy who runs across the road between the pecan orchards crying, but only after midnight around Halloween.
In the 3600 block of West Country Club Road stands a local Field of Dreams. One middle-school teacher enjoyed coaching youth baseball so much that he built a practice field for his team in his own back yard. Most of the year it stands empty but in spring it swarms with young players.
For more complete information about touring Roswell . . .
BUY the paperback version
(single copies or in bulk) of Lynn Michelsohn's guidebook
Roswell,
Your Travel Guide to the UFO Capital of the World!
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Also available . . .
Roswell, NM: The Ten Best FREE Things To Do (Plus a Few More)
Your Brief Travel Guide to Fun in the UFO Capital of the World!
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