number in any state or Territory except Montana and Wyoming; and in April 1909 there were 3,200,000 sheep of shearing age in New Mexico, but this number was less than that in Montana or Wyoming at that time.
Except in a few mountain valleys in the N., agriculture was long entirely dependent upon irrigation, which has been practised in New Mexico by the Pueblo Indians since prehistoric times. In 1899 the total irrigated area outside of Indian reservations amounted to 203,893 acres (67·2% of all improved land)—an increase of 122·2% in the preceding decade. Of the total land in crops in that year 89·2% was irrigated. After the passage of the Federal Reclamation Act in 1902, a number of extensive irrigation works in New Mexico were undertaken by the Federal government. The Carlsbad reservoir and diverting dam in Eddy county and the Rio Hondo canals and reservoir in Chaves county were completed in 1907 and are capable of supplying water to tracts of 20,000 and 10,000 acres respectively. In 1908 an irrigation reservoir in McKinley county for the use of the Zuñi Indians and the Leasburg project (Dona Ana county; 20,000 acres) were completed. The Rio Grande project was planned in 1907 for the storage of the flood waters of the Rio Grande near Engle, New Mexico, in order to reclaim about 155,000 acres of land in New Mexico and Texas, and to deliver to Mexico above the city of Juarez 60,000 acre-feet of water per year, as provided by a treaty (proclaimed on the 16th of January 1907) between that republic and the United States. Other systems contemplated by the government were the Las Vegas project for reclaiming 10,000 acres near Las Vegas, the Urton Lake project for reclaiming 60,000 acres in the Pecos Valley, and the La Plata Valley project for irrigating about 40,000 acres in the north-western part of New Mexico, 35 m. S.W. of Durango, Colorado. A special irrigation commission was appointed in 1897, and in 1905 the legislature created the office of Territorial irrigation engineer. Irrigation by private companies is of some importance, especially in the San Juan Valley, the Rio Grande Valley and the Pecos Valley. In 1909 it was estimated that about 500,000 acres were irrigated. Dry farming has proved a great success in New Mexico, as elsewhere in the South-West, especially since 1900; and in 1907 it was estimated that 2,000,000 acres were cultivated without irrigation.
Manufactures.—As New Mexico is primarily a mining and stock-raising region, its manufacturing industries are of comparatively small importance. The value of the manufactured products in 1880 was $1,284,846; in 1890 $1,516,195; and in 1900 $5,605,795, an increase in the latter decade of 269·7%. In 1905 there were 199 establishments under the factory system (an increase of 14·4% over the number in 1900); the amount of capital invested was $4,638,248, and the value of “factory” products was $5,705,880 (an increase of 40·5% over the value of the “factory” products in 1900). The leading industries in 1905 were the construction of cars and general railway shop and repair work by steam railway companies (value of product, $2,509,845), the manufacture of lumber and timber products (value $1,315,364) and of flour and grist mill products (value $388,124), and the printing and publishing of newspapers and periodicals (value $279,858). In 1900 the manufactures of Albuquerque, Santa Fé and Socorro were valued at 39·4% of the total value of New Mexico’s products.
Minerals.—The existence of valuable mineral deposits was early known to the Spaniards. There was some production of gold by the Mexicans, but the silver mining was unimportant until 1881, when the Lake Valley silver mines in Sierra county began to yield. Between that year and 1884 the coining value of the silver product increased from $275,000 to $3,000,000. After 1885 there was a gradual decline in the output, whose bullion value in 1908 was $250,986. The production of gold has shown a somewhat similar movement; the output in 1881 was valued at $185,000; in 1889, at $1,000,000, and in 1908 at $298,757. The leading gold- and silver-producing counties are Socorro, Grant, Sierra and Dona Ana. Only silver is mined in the last-named county. Copper has been mined for many years, and in 1906 and 1908 constituted New Mexico’s most valuable metallic product, the value of the yield in these years being $1,356,533 and $658,858 respectively. Nearly all the product comes from Grant county, and in 1908 nearly 98% of the output was from Grant and Otero counties. In 1905–1908 the decrease in output was large. In the same years there was an increase in the output of zinc, which in 1906 was valued at $67,710 and in 1908 at $168,096. Most of the zinc comes from Socorro county, where the mines of the Magdalena District in 1908 yielded 93% of the entire product. A small amount of lead is produced incidentally to the mining of zinc, being derived from mixed lead and zinc ores. Far the most important mineral product, however, is coal, which is found in all forms—lignite to anthracite—and in widely distributed areas. The chief centres of production are the Raton field, in Colfax county; the Durango-Gallup field, in McKinley and Rio Arriba counties; the Whiteoaks field, in Lincoln county; and the Los Cerillos and Tejon areas, in Santa Fé county. Much of the coal is suitable for coke, of which a considerable amount is manufactured. The value of the coal product in 1902 was $1,500,230; in 1904, $1,904,499; and in 1908, $3,368,753. Iron ores are widely distributed, but have not been developed; graphite is mined in Colfax county; mica in Taos county, and to a small extent in Rio Arriba county; marble is quarried in Otero county and sandstone in Bernalillo, Colfax and San Miguel counties. Gypsum beds are widely distributed, and the supply is inexhaustible, but their great distance from centres of consumption has prevented their profitable working. In New Mexico are found turquoises and a few garnets; it seems probable that turquoises were mined by the Aztecs. The largest of the old Spanish turquoise mines in the Cerillos District, 18 m. S. of Santa Fé, furnished a turquoise product between 1890 and 1900 valued at more than $2,000,000. Other mines are in Grant and Otero counties. The New Mexican garnets are found in McKinley county. The output of precious stones in 1902 was valued at $51,100, in 1908 at $72,100.
Transportation.—The total railway mileage on the 31st of December 1908 was 2,918·02, more than twice as much as that of 1890. The length of railway per inhabitant in New Mexico in 1907 was about five times as great as that for the whole country, but the amount of line per square mile of territory was only about one-third as great as the average for the United States. New Mexico is traversed by two transcontinental lines, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé, from Chicago to San Francisco and the Southern Pacific, from New Orleans to San Francisco. The main line of the former enters New Mexico near Raton, extends S.W. to Albuquerque and thence westward into Arizona. A southward extension taps the Southern Pacific at El Paso, Texas, and Deming, New Mexico, and there are numerous shorter branches. This system also controls the Pecos Valley & North-Eastern railway, which serves the south-western part of New Mexico. The Southern Pacific crosses New Mexico westward from El Paso, Texas. The western division of the El Paso & South-Western system, connecting El Paso and Benson, Arizona, crosses New Mexico just N. of the Mexican boundary. Its eastern division (including the El Paso & North-Eastern, the El Paso & Rock Island, the Alamogordo & Sacramento Mountain and the Dawson railways) connects with the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific at Tucumcari; thus forming a connecting link between that system and the Southern Pacific. The Santa Fé Central, extending southward from Santa Fé to Torrance, is a connecting link between the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé and the El Paso & South-Western systems. Branches of the Denver & Rio Grande serve the northern parts of New Mexico.
Population.—The population of New Mexico consists of three distinct classes—Indians; Spanish-Americans, locally known as “Mexicans”; and the English-speaking class called, in distinction from the others, “Americans.” Of the Indians there are two types, both of the Athapascan family; in one are the Pueblos, and in the other the Navahos, in the N.W. part of the state, and their near kinsmen, the Apaches, to the south. The Pueblo Indians live in adobe houses, are quiet and usually self-sustaining, and have been converted to the forms of Christianity. They had irrigated farms and dwelt in six-storey communal houses long before the advent of the white man. By the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, in 1848, the United States government recognized them as citizens. They lived in 19 villages of pueblos, the largest of which, Zuñi, is more properly called a reservation, as it has been enlarged from time to time by grants from the Federal government. The 18 pueblos and the Zuñi reservation contained in 1900 a population of 8127, and a total area of 1417 sq. m. The pueblos are held under Spanish grants which were confirmed by the United States. The terraced architecture of the villages is very remarkable. Originally the Pueblo Indians lived in many-storeyed communal houses, built sometimes of stone, sometimes of adobe, and occasionally chiselled into the sides of a stone cliff, as best suited the convenience of the builders. At present there is a tendency among them to copy the one-storey huts of the Mexicans. Taos (pop. in 1900, 419) is one of the most imposing of the pueblos, consisting of two six-storeyed pyramidal tenements, separated by a brook. Zuñi (pop. 1525) has a five-storeyed dwelling surrounded by detached huts; Acoma (pop. 492 in 1900; 566 in 1902), standing on a cliff 357 ft. high (Acoma means “people of the white rock” and Aco, the Indian name for the pueblo, means “white rock”), contains three blocks of three-storeyed terraced buildings,[1] and Laguna also contains some three-storeyed
- ↑ About 3 m. N.E. of Acoma stands the Enchanted Mesa (Mesa Encantada; Katzimo in Keresan), rising 430 ft. above the plain, and being 2050 ft. long and 100 to 350 ft. wide. Upon its summit, according to Indian tradition, once stood the village of Acoma, but while the inhabitants were tending their crops in the plains a powerful earth movement threw down the rocky ladder by which alone the summit could be reached. According to the story, three women had been left in the village and these perished. The Mesa was first climbed by white men in 1896 by Prof. William Libbey (b. 1855), of Princeton University; it was climbed again in 1897 by a party led by F. W. Hodge; and pottery and stone implements were found here.
