Counting Steps To Measure The Distance.

The following quote comes from page 137 of Volume I of the book titled "Great River, The Rio Grande in North American History" written by Paul Horgan and published  in 1954 by Rinehart & Company, Inc. from New York and Toronto. Volume I of the book is about Indians and Spain and in Chapter II dealing with the Eastern Plains (el Llano Estacado or Staked Plains) and the early 1540's journey of Francisco Vasquez de Coronado on page 137 there is a curious paragraph that states ;

"But still they marched, seeing in one place a white woman with a painted chin, and in another a wild hailstorm. The stones, as big as oranges, dented armor and killed animals. Trembling, the people wept and prayed and made vows. Each day they heard how far they had gone according to the soldier whose duty it was to count steps by which the leagues could be computed. In all that wilderness they were appalled at how little mark so great a throng of men and women and beasts made on the grass upon the plain. They left no trail, for the grass in the wind waved over their path like the sea in a galleon's wake."

Imagine, if you will, that being your job, to compute the passing leagues by counting steps. Then imagine that the leagues had to be computed from the time you left Mexico City until the Llano Estacado had been explored and maybe all of the way back again. Would the General, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, have one man do this, or alternate the tedious and boring job? It had to be done, there was no easier way at the time of measuring distance on flat land. But you had to do it if you wanted to get back. They realized they would die of thirst if they got lost.

No pedometer, no odometer, no GPS to mark the distance in a flat and grass covered land. It had to be done by some other method. The counter could not often lose count or he literally would have lost not only those who he was with, but eventually he would lose his head.

History is not always kind to you and I

History is not always kind to you and I. Sometimes it can be downright cruel. It can be glossed over for sure, but if the truth comes out it is most likely painful for those wishing to know and somewhat understand the truth. The history of the world, the country, the region, state, city or family is most likely not what everyone imagines. The truth may not be every ones cup of tea.

Sometimes the truth does hurt, it hurts us as individuals, as a group, whatever the group may be and it hurts as a nation. Especially if you begin to understand what it took, what was done to get to where we are today. It is not always pretty, not what we thought it was. But is is history, however much we want to buy into it or avoid it. And the knowledge of history is liberating in many ways.

Then there are the rose colored glasses. If you want to use them they filter history to allow us to see what we want to see.

For folks doing genealogy the glasses eventually come off, they will eventually come off if the research is done right, if the research is correct. It is interesting to the nth degree, no doubt about it. But, and this is  a big but, you have to have the stomach for it.

Te Deum By The Conquistadores

Before battle, the Conquistadors prayed the Te Deum. In New Mexico the prayer was heard during battles with the Indians from the time of Coronado thru the reconquest with don Diego de Vargas. The Indians had no idea what the words meant much less that the prayer was used before an attack by the Spanish.

Read about the prayer here.

En Espanol

Te alabamos, oh Dios: reconocemos ti para ser el Señor.
Toda la tierra adoración doth de ti: el eterno Padre.
A ti todos los ángeles lloran en voz alta: los cielos, y todos los poderes en el mismo.
A ti Querubines y Serafines: continuamente llores,
Santo, Santo, Santo, Señor Dios de los ejércitos;
El cielo y la tierra están llenos de la majestad: de tu gloria.
La compañía gloriosa de los Apóstoles: te alabamos.
La beca buena cantidad de los Profetas: te alabamos.
El noble ejército de mártires: te alabamos.
La santa Iglesia por todo el mundo: doth te reconoce;
El Padre: de un infinito Majestad;
Tu honorable, fiel: Hijo unigénito;
También el Espíritu Santo, el Consolador.
Tú eres el Rey de la gloria: oh Cristo.
Tú eres el Hijo eterno del Padre.
Cuando te tookest sobre ti para liberar al hombre: no hayas aborrecen el vientre de la Virgen.
Cuando tenías superar la nitidez de la muerte:
    hiciste abrir el Reino de los Cielos a todos los creyentes.
Ora sentado a la diestra de Dios, en la gloria del Padre.
Creemos que vendrás: para ser nuestro Juez.
Por tanto, te rogamos que ayudan a tus siervos:
    quienes redimiste con tu preciosa sangre.
Haz que sea contado entre tus santos: en la gloria eterna.

In English

We praise thee, O God : we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.
All the earth doth worship thee : the Father everlasting.
To thee all Angels cry aloud : the Heavens, and all the Powers therein.
To thee Cherubim and Seraphim : continually do cry,
Holy, Holy, Holy : Lord God of Hosts;
Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty : of thy glory.
The glorious company of the Apostles : praise thee.
The goodly fellowship of the Prophets : praise thee.
The noble army of Martyrs : praise thee.
The holy Church throughout all the world : doth acknowledge thee;
The Father : of an infinite Majesty;
Thine honourable, true : and only Son;
Also the Holy Ghost : the Comforter.
Thou art the King of Glory : O Christ.
Thou art the everlasting Son : of the Father.
When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man : thou didst not abhor the Virgin's womb.
When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death :
    thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.
Thou sittest at the right hand of God : in the glory of the Father.
We believe that thou shalt come : to be our Judge.
We therefore pray thee, help thy servants :
    whom thou hast redeemed with thy precious blood.
Make them to be numbered with thy Saints : in glory everlasting.

Different Views Of The Weblog With The Different Web Browsers

Click on the image to make it larger....

I don't know why, but the views are different with each of the browsers I have down loaded. Internet Explorer has one view, Google Chrome has another and Fire Fox has yet another. Odd, but there is nothing I can do or so it seems. I will have to look and see.

I started with Internet Explorer and it worked well until they upgraded it a few upgrades back. Then it gave me some strange results with the cut and paste function and it would not let me upload pictures. So I started using Google Chrome.

That is the one I use mostly now. I tried editing something with IE this morning and it took me 15 minutes to fix it with Google Chrome.

Seems like to me that IE is losing out to Google, not only with the browser, but with everything. At least with my desktop PC. No smart phone here yet. Falling behind the technology power curve. Sitting way on the right side of the "bell shaped curve".

I have to make a move on this technology front soon, either that or get left behind totally. Stuff if changing so rapidly that it is hard to keep up. Planned obsolescence is here to stay and the time gap between new and obsolete is shortening to the ridiculous.

Como se dice aqui en el Norte estos dias, prospero ano nuevo, yall.

UPDATE - Panocha Para La Natividad - UPDATE

27 Dec 2016 - Made  another batch.... every bit as good as the last one........ NOTE: Watch out with step No. 2, when you add the water to the golden brown sugar....

Note: I made a batch using the recipe above. Excellent panocha, it is just a bit thin so next time I will reduce the water by a couple of cups. The panocha is as good as I have ever tasted.

Historical New Mexican Hispanic Women - 1540 - 2015

From the book "Great River, The Rio Grande in North American History" written by Paul Horgan we learn that on February 23, 1540 don Francisco Vasquez de Coronado left Mexico City for New Mexico.

 "Three of the soldiers brought their wives. One of these men was a tailor. His wife served as a nurse and seamstress and rode the seven thousand miles with the expedition on a horse. The military company were served by close to a thousand Mexican Indians, many of whom were accompanied by their wives and children. With the main body of the army came the flocks of sheep - over five thousand rams, ewes and lambs. The pace and the distance of the daily marches of the army were determined by how steadily and at what pace those grazing little animals could move. The army brought five hundred head of cattle. Six hundred pack mules carried supplies and equipment. Five hundred and fifty two horses belonged to the soldiers."

New Mexican Hispanic women have been here since 1598. In all reality some were here with Francisco Coronado in 1540. They, like the rest of Coronados people,  did not stay, but they were here. The point being that they have been here doing what needed to be done since then. They have been here at every historic and non historic event. In the background of written history, but they were always there.

A few unusual Hispanic women and their more "famous" American, or otherwise, husbands;

Maria Josefa Jaramillo who was married and the third wife of mountain man and scout Christopher "Kit" Carson. Kit's first two wives were Indian women, one of whom dumped him as soon as she could after "marrying" him. He was known to have been interested in and lived  with another Mexican woman whose name was Antonia Luna at Taos who after having lived some time with Jim Beckworth told Kit that he did not measure up and went back to Jim.

Maria Ygnacia Jaramillo who was the sister of Maria Josefa mentioned above. Maria Josefa was living, sans marriage, with Charles Bent who was appointed the first governor of New Mexico by Gen. Stephen Watts Kearny. Charles met his end on January 19, 1847 at Taos by New Mexican patriots unhappy with the American occupation of the province. Charles Bent was  an out and out racist having riled against Mexicans in his writings, he hated Mexicans and everything they stood for. Not sure why he ended up with  Maria Ygnacia and having at least five children with her. Maybe out of necessity..... who really knows.

The Jaramillo women must not have cared that their husbands detested their people, they may have had low self esteem and this was a way of addressing it. There was an underlying reason for this, maybe financial, but we really don't know.

Charles Bent had an eleven year connection with Maria Ygnacia. She was free to marry and was he, but they never did. You can't tell me that they never married because of her. Do you think she would rather live with the stigma of being unmarried and giving birth to eight children, six of them baptized under her name of "padre no conicido" (father unknown)?

Maria Ygnacia was married and or associated with three different men, one of whom was Charles Bent. She may have been an easy mark for him, for one reason or another.

Antonia Luna who was "married" or lived with several famous and not so famous men. Some were Kit Carson, Jim Beckworth, Bill Williams and finally with William Tharp. Antonia must have been something else. I am not sure this is how she would have liked to be remembered and documented in history.

Maria Elvira Estella Bergere who's  mother was Eloisa Luna, Estella was a "halfbreed" New Mexican and American. Estella married Aldo Leopold, famous in forestry circles and the father of "American Wilderness".

Maria Teodora Lopez was married to fur trapper and mountain man Manuel LeFevre.

Maria Dolores LeFevre, another halfbreed New Mexican was the daughter of Maria Teodora Lopez and Manuel LeFevre was one of several wives of Richard Lacey (Uncle Dick) Wooton of Raton Pass fame.
.......................................................................

Suffice it to say that the great majority of the New Mexican women went unnoticed by the folks who wrote the history. Probably good for them too, as history has been kind to them even if they remained unnoticed and unrecognized. We, their descendants, know better. We get bits and pieces of their lives here and there, but we must generalize.

Governor Bent Had it Coming

No man deserved his end and the ways of his end more than the first New Mexican governor after the American occupation of the province, Charles Bent. Everything that happened to him and his, he had coming.

I quote the *book, listed below:

"It was a common opinion of non Catholic Americans in New Mexico that every priest was a corrupt and vicious shepherd, leading a flock of stupid and hypocritical sheep. No one was more violent on the subject than Charles Bent, who wrote about the Mexicans three years before he became their governor."

From the same book I quote Charles Bent himself in his own words, spelling and all:

• Thare religion consistes intirely in outward show, they have no idea a sinsear devotion, they are taught to belive that thare priestes are the only medadiator betwean the supriem being and themselves, and eaven in this, you can acheave gerat benifits by a lavish present of gold, thare valler consists of Boasting and show whare  thare is no danger. The Mexican caracter is made up of Stupidity, obstinancy, Ignorance duplicity and vanity.

There is no doubt in my mind that the people who assassinated him were New Mexican patriots and New Mexican heroes. New Mexicans and their descendants need shed no tears for "Governor Bent" nor the likes of him.

More on Governor Bent from previous posts on the site, click on the URL below:

http://nuevomejicano.blogspot.com/2009/12/new-mexican-patriots-more-of-them.html

And still more information on him:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bent

*Reference pages 70 and 71 of the book titled " Pueblo, Herdscrabble, Greenhorn, Society on the High Plains, 1832 - 1856" written by Janet Lecompte and published in 1978 by the University of Oklohoma Press.

Beautiful Old Spanish Song, Used To Be Very Popular In New Mexico

Listen to the beautiful song first:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQTyW0fhj98&feature=share

Este joven a un olivo quiso subir a cortar una rama, pero con tan mala suerte que del olivo cayó. Una niña morena por allí pasó y al niño ayudo.

Al olivo, al olivo, 
al olivo subì. 
Por cortar una rama 
del olivo caí. 
Del olivo caí, 
quién me levantará? 
Una niña morena 
que la mano me da. 
Que la mano me da, 
que la mano me dio, 
una niña morena 
es la que quiero yo. 
Es la que he de querer, 
una niña morena, 
ha de ser mi mujer. 
Ha de ser y será 
esa niña morena 
que la mano me da.

New Mexico Population Numbers, Past and Present.

In 1793 the count of New Mexicans according to the viceregal archives* was 30,953. A pretty precise number without any breakdown in numbers. The figure does contain the numbers of Pueblo Indians but no numbers for the "wild tribes".

In 1810 Fernando Navarro* placed the population of New Mexico at 34,205. He broke down the total to 20 priests, 10,557 Indians (Pueblo) and 23,628 "castas" or people of mixed breeds no pure Spaniards were noted. This figure does not contain numbers associated with "los Indios Barbaros"

1846 - 45,000 Estimated at the time the Americans conquered and occupied the area. This estimate would include the Pueblo Indians.

The numbers used above include the historical pre American New Mexican population. This includes the El Paso/Juarez area.

1850 - 61,547* "The Census of 1850 was the first taken by the United States in New Mexico, and not notable for its accuracy in regards to New Mexico". These numbers do not include the El Paso area nor any area in southern New Mexico later purchased as a result of the Gadason Purchase.The breakdown here is as follows:

1. Born in New Mexico, 58,145 - Includes Pueblo Indians but not the "wild tribes".
2. Born elsewhere in the United States, 722
3. Foreign born, 2,151
4. Place of birth unknown, 209

**"Despite the fact that the state usually leads the country in birth rate, The recent large growth must be attributed to migration into New Mexico. This influx has lessened the relative importance of the Spanish and the Indian populations, the distinct ethnic groups within the state."

The population trends 1498 - 1846, the year of the coming of the Americans, a period of 248 years show or would otherwise indicate a rise in the number of Hispanos, a decline in the Pueblos and a sharp rise in the wild tribes. The Hispanos would have risen from zero to whatever was here when the Americans annexed the province. The Pueblos were decimated by European disease, the Spanish themselvs and the constant harassment and warfare with the wild tribes. The wild tribes benefited  from new technologies, new food sources and most of all, the introduction of the horse.

The population trends 1846 - 2010, The American period has seen an overall population increase for each of the groups. Hispanos have increased but became less, percentage wise, the same goes for the Pueblos and the "wild tribes". The non Hispanic non Indian (Anglo) population has increased dramatically, from near zero to what it is today at 40.5% of the total. The state was denied statehood until it was ascertained that the Anglo's were in the majority or able to ensure victory at elections.

* Refer to the book titled "New Mexico in 1850: A Military View written by Colonel George Archibald McCall and published by the University of Oklahoma Press at Norman, Oklahoma.

** Refer to the book "New Mexico, A History of Four Centuries," authored by Warren A. Beck and published by the University of Oklahoma Press in 1962.

Que Descanse en Paz

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La Sra. Ida Garcia was a true heroine of all New Mexicans. May she rest in peace.