New Mexico Trivia & Tidbits - Page 15

Looking for New Mexico trivia? Try our list New Mexico little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

An apple orchard said to date from the mid-1600s is in the town of Manzano, which means “apple” in Spanish. The orchard may be the country’s oldest apple orchard.

first appeared: 12/22/2002

Soldiers at Fort Union, near what is now Las Vegas (pop. 14,565), used adobe construction techniques when building the fort’s first structures. The buildings did not survive the years, and now their ruins can be seen over about 100 acres at the national monument.

first appeared: 12/15/2002

When a Texas band called The Teen Kings recorded a song called Ooby Dooby at a recording studio in Clovis (pop. 32,667) in 1956, it got only regional airplay. But it caught the attention of Sun Records—which issued a version that launched the career of the group’s lead singer, Roy Orbison.

first appeared: 12/8/2002

Roosevelt County calls itself the “Valencia Peanut Capital of the World.” The county, with its county seat in Portales (pop. 11,131), is one of the largest producers of Valencia peanuts west of the Mississippi.

first appeared: 12/8/2002

The record rainfall in New Mexico, usually an arid state, was set on May 19, 1955, when 11.28 inches of rain fell on Lake Maloya in Sugarite Canyon State Park in one day.

first appeared: 12/1/2002

Las Vegas (pop. 14,565) residents were the first in New Mexico to enjoy the benefits of a telephone system, operated by the Las Vegas Telephone and Telegraph System. The Las Vegas City Museum has a display on the history of the system that includes old switchboards and telephones.

first appeared: 11/24/2002

Roswell has a museum dedicated to Unidentified Flying Objects. The International UFO Museum and Research Center opened in 1991 with exhibits focusing on UFOs and related subjects such as crop circles. The crash of an object near Roswell in 1947 generated considerable interest in UFOs and is the subject of several of the museum’s exhibits.

first appeared: 11/24/2002

A world-class collection of rocks is on display in Socorro (pop. 8,877). The Mineral Museum at the Institute of Mining and Technology has more than 12,000 specimens of minerals from around the region and the world.

first appeared: 11/17/2002

Clovis (pop. 32,667) takes its name from the first Christian king of France. According to one account, the daughter of a railroad official who had been studying French history named the town.

first appeared: 11/10/2002

The Valley of Fires Recreation Area near Carrizozo (pop. 1,036) is the site of buckled, twisted lava flows up to 165 feet thick, left behind by several volcanoes more than 1,000 years ago.

first appeared: 11/3/2002

In his book, Innkeeper to the World, Conrad Hilton relates how the governor of Texas was once about to honor him as a famous native Texan, until Hilton explained that he was born in San Antonio, a town in New Mexico, not Texas.

first appeared: 11/3/2002

Bless Me, Ultima, considered the classic novel about a Hispanic child growing up, was written by Rudolph Anaya of Albuquerque.

first appeared: 11/3/2002

Bill Mauldin, whose cartoons often featured two infantrymen called Willie and Joe, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1945 and again in 1959 for his cartoons about soldiers. Mauldin, who was born in New Mexico in 1921, was a full-time cartoonist for The Stars and Stripes, the U.S. Army newspaper. His cartoons were later syndicated. He said he drew pictures for and about soldiers because he wanted to “make something out of the humorous situations which come up even when you don’t think life could be any more miserable.” Mauldin now lives in a nursing home in Orange County, Calif.

first appeared: 10/27/2002

Nature and time have combined to create what looks like a nun kneeling in prayer in the skyline near Silver City (pop. 10,545). The “Kneeling Nun” is a 90-foot monolith carved out of volcanic rock by natural forces.

first appeared: 10/20/2002

Each of the 20 rooms at The Lundeen Inn of the Arts in Las Cruces is named after a different artist from New Mexico or an American Indian artist. The rooms named for Georgia O’Keefe, Frederick Remington, Henrietta Wyeth, and others are then decorated according to the style of that artist. For instance, the Georgia O’Keefe room is black, white, and gray, with calla lilies on the mantel.

first appeared: 10/13/2002

Zebulon Pike, who discovered what is now Colorado’s Pike’s Peak during an expedition in 1806, inadvertently strayed into what was then Spanish territory after leaving the mountain. Spanish officials arrested Pike and his men in 1807 and jailed them briefly before escorting them through Texas into Louisiana.

first appeared: 10/6/2002

Carlsbad (pop. 25,625) started its life as “Eddy” in 1888, but the town was re-named after a famous European health resort (Karlsbad) in 1899 because of the reported healing properties of a nearby mineral spring. Carlsbad Spring still flows today.

first appeared: 10/6/2002

Waite Phillips, an Oklahoma oilman, donated two parcels of land in 1938 and 1941 to the Boy Scouts of America. That land, about 215 square miles, became The Philmont Scout Ranch near Cimarron (pop. 917). The ranch is a national camping area for the Boy Scouts.

first appeared: 9/29/2002

The Armand Hammer United World College near Las Vegas (pop. 14,565) promotes interaction between students from around the world. The only college of its kind in the United States, the school mixes 50 American students with 150 students from other countries in its effort to promote international understanding. Nine other United World Colleges exist outside the United States.

first appeared: 9/22/2002

Albuquerque residents appreciated the talent of aspiring local actress Vivian Jones so much that in 1931 they raised the money she needed to get to New York for a shot at Broadway. Jones—better known as Vivian Vance—never achieved Broadway stardom, but the trip helped a career that would lead her to a place in television history as Ethel Mertz, the sidekick to comic actress Lucille Ball.

first appeared: 9/15/2002

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