valencia county news-bulletin: locals 2009

News-BulletinVALENCIA COUNTY

Lo a sc lOctober 31, 2009

&Unsung HeroesCit izen of the Year

Louis Lusero

LOCALS 2009: CITIZEN OF THE YEAR/UNSUNG HEROES Valencia County News-Bulletin2 October 31, 2009

2009 Citizen of the YearLouis Lusero: Always helping those in need

By Julia M. DenDingerNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Las MaraviLLasEveryone knows that one

person. The one that, no matter what the request, what the job, he will get it done. Not in shady, illegal ways, but just through sheer force of will and a good dose of charisma.

In short, “the man.”For the kids of Gil Sanchez

Elementary School, Louis Lusero is “the man.” After mov-ing to Valencia County in 2002, Lusero applied for his substitute teaching license. He got an assignment at Gil Sanchez at Christmas time in 2006.

While there, he sponsored a family through the school to help for the holiday season.

“I took on another family just before Christmas,” Lusero said. “I also took another family that was staying at the domestic vio-lence shelter to (a local store), and bought them about $300 worth of clothes.”

Some might assume that he and wife, Barbara, had grand-children at the elementary school, or a long-standing con-nection to the institution. But that’s not the case. Giving is just what Lusero does.

And he gives in a way that could be unmatched.

“I don’t know. I just don’t get embarrassed. I go into it know-ing people who own businesses get asked for help a lot, so I know I’m going to get a lot of ‘nos.’ When someone says no, that is just an opening bargain-ing position for me,” Lusero laughs. “It means I have to rephrase the question. That’s what I do ― I rephrase a lot of questions. It doesn’t matter where I am, before I leave I’ll probably ask you, ‘Oh, by the way...”

That rephrasing began in the early 1970s while he was work-ing for the city of Carson,Calif. One day, his boss walked in with two large bags.

“I said, ‘What’s that? They look like mail bags,’” Lusero recalls. Well he was right on the money. The bags contained letters to Santa from kids in Compton, and they were now his project.

“Those bags sat there for two days. I just looked at them thinking, ‘What am I going to do?,’” he said.

Then he remembered a friend. “She owned a bar I used to go to, and her daughter and son-in-law worked for Mattel, so I gave her a call,” Lusero said.

The next week, the boss came back and the mail bags were in the same place.

“He asked me what I’d been doing on the project. I told him I was done. He didn’t really believe me. It was just before 11 a.m., so I told him to come with me,” Lusero remembers. “I couldn’t have timed it better.”

As they walked into the park-ing lot, a semi truck pulled up. Opening up the truck, the men discovered it was full of bikes and Barbies.

Lusero continued his work with the Christmas program in Carson, expanding it and

branching out to help local schools.

“I tried to do two things. I tried to do things in an easier, better way, and I wanted to help kids have something for Christmas,” he said. “So do I ask 1,000 people for a dollar, or do I ask 100 people for $10?”

But even before he began substituting at the elementary school, a need for help found him one day while out shop-ping.

Not long after they moved to their Las Maravillas home, one July afternoon, while at Belen Bargain Square, one of the special needs employees approached Lusero.

“She asked me, ‘Are you Santa?’ I said, ‘No, but I can get him a letter.’”

Within a month, nearly 30 employees had given Lusero their letters to Santa with their Christmas wishes.

The requests ranged from a simple necklace to a new televi-sion to a Backstreet Boys video.

“Now that one was tough,”

Lusero says of the video. “That was the hard one.”

The big items like the TVs, those were easy.

One day while down at the Becker Street Pub, Lusero saw a group of men at a table. He knew five of the six and planned to ask one of them for a donation of a television.

Lusero bought them a round and went over to ask the man to donate one of the two requested televisions.

“Well, he picks up his phone.” Lusero can’t tell the story with-out acting it out, so he whips out his own phone and the drama begins. “So he picks up his phone and makes a call. ‘Maria,’ he says. ‘Maria where are you? Walmart? Well go over to the electronics section and pick up one of those 19-inch televisions. OK, done.’

“So I asked him, well where should I pick it up? He pulls out his phone and boop-boop-boop dials. ‘Maria? Bring that TV by Becker Street.’ Bang, done.”

The sixth man, who Lusero

didn’t know, asked how they could know Lusero was on a legitimate mission and could be trusted.

“I told him that when I bought the round of drinks, I didn’t exclude him even though I didn’t know him,” Lusero said. “He nodded and pulled five 20 dollar bills out of his overall pocket, and told me to go buy the other TV.”

As the holiday approached, and it was time to shop for the final gifts, Lusero found he was close to $300 short of his goal for buying the gifts. “I called Sud Chemie, and the next day I had $280 cash in my hands,” he says with a laugh.

His wife, Barbara, expresses amazement for his ability to get money from total strangers.

“They don’t know him,” Barbara said. “He didn’t even have a letter explaining what he was doing, and who he was with.”

Lusero is meticulous in his record keeping, assigning each fundraising effort a separate

folder and keeping all his dona-tion logs and receipts for three years.

“That way, if people ask about the money, I can pull out the folder and show them where everything went,” he said.

After that, Lusero was on a roll. With the help of some friends from California, Joe and Elaine Flynn, he was able to establish a checking account to deposit donations.

“And the money they give is still being used for the kids,” he said.

He does little things like hand out brightly colored pencils for good behavior that were donated to him by a local credit union. Lusero tries to give the kids experiences they might not normally have.

Last year, he brought two bands to two local elemen-tary schools ― the students at Gil Sanchez and Rio Grande elementaries were entertained for an afternoon just because Lusero asked the musicians to come.

“Every year, I take one or two classes from Gil Sanchez out to lunch, but they have to earn it,” he said. “Some of these kids have never been to a restau-rant.”

Whenever he sees a need, Lusero jumps in and asks for help. Last year he substituted for the physical elementary teacher at Gil Sanchez, and got involved with Coach Becky Ballard’s shoe project. A pro-gram she began in 1989, Ballard believes that proper footwear is needed in order to perform, not only well but safely, in physical education.

This past year, Lusero helped raise $2,300 for the shoe proj-ect, which amounts to about 120 pairs of shoes, 130 pair of socks and 50 packs of shoelaces.

Going to town to run the sim-plest errand usually results in a helping hand for someone.

“He’ll come home from going to the bank and say, ‘Oh, we need to make a pot of chile for so-and-so, and I’m going to take it down to them tomorrow for supper,’” Barbara said. “He always finds something to do.”

One thing he found to do for five years was to make and give away hand carved walking sticks at Tomé Hill during the Good Friday pilgrimage.

Because of health issues, Lusero made 2008 his last year for the walking stick project, but he still hopes to be at the foot of the hill handing out fruit and water ― donated by a local retailer, of course. It is estimat-ed that more than 1,500 of his sticks now roam the countryside in the hands of hikers.

“A lot of the artwork we have here, I traded for walk-ing sticks,” he says, pointing to the walls covered in traditional Spanish colonial artwork by the likes of Charlie Sanchez and Nicholas Otero. “I don’t know. I guess they liked the sticks.”

Lusero has enough stories to tell about the people he’s helped to talk the sun out of the sky. They are always told with a drop of laughter and a great dose of humor.

But they are never told to make himself look superior, or like he is the master of his destiny.

They are told with a tone of, ‘Can you believe that happened? And then we...,’ as one great coincidence after another col-lides with Lusero’s life.

“We all have something we are supposed to do,” he says. “I’m not sure if this is what He planned for me, but it is some-thing He lets me do.”

To prove his point, he hunts up an engraved plaque entitled “My Creed.” It’s several para-graphs long, but the last part is the bit that matters.

Lusero’s voice cracks as he reads, “...The purpose of life is to matter ― to count, to stand for something, to have it make some difference that we lived at all.”

Everyone looks away and pre-tends not to see the tears.

“There is so much we can do,” he says. “As a people, as flawed as we may be, there is so much we can do to help this world.”

Julia M. Dendinger-News-Bulletin photos

EVERY DAY, Louis Lusero tries to live by the words of his creed, “. . . to have it make some difference that we lived at all.” According to his wife Barbara, Lusero lends a helping hand where ever he goes — from a pot of chile for a neighbor to raising thousands of dollars to make sure kids have safe gym shoes to playing Santa for those with special needs.

HELPING THE STUDENTS at Gil Sanchez Elementary play safe during physical education class, Louis Lusero, center, helped principal Jennifer Brown, left, and Coach Becky Ballard, right, raise more than $2,300 to buy gym shoes, socks and shoe laces for kids without the proper footwear.

AFTER FIVE YEARS of carving walking sticks and giving them away to people making the yearly pil-grimage up Tomé Hill, Louis Lusero decided last year was his final year. Although his health doesn’t allow him to carve the sticks anymore, he finds many, many other ways to give to his community.

LOCALS 2009: CITIZEN OF THE YEAR/UNSUNG HEROES October 31, 2009 3Valencia County News-Bulletin

UnsUng heroesSusan Cordova: Making Jarales a better place for all


JaraLesThere is an almost inde-

finable quality about Susan Cordova. The Jarales native has the kind of serenity and unshakable faith that most monks would envy. But she also has a very pragmatic view of the world, and humor enough to laugh at the absurdities.

She will tell you her birthday in on March 30, but isn’t as forth coming about the year. It is a birthday that has seen its share of joy, and more than its fair share of sorrow.

“My younger sister, Mary, shares that birth date with me,” Cordova says. “It’s also the same date my father was in a fatal car accident, and later my mother died on that date.”

Her smile tells you she still celebrates the day every year for both herself and her sister, and in honor of their parents.

This faith, this joy has washed over her community as Cordova has worked quietly behind the scenes to make the rural, farming community a better place.

In addition to holding a full-time teaching position at Belen High School, Cordova and her brother, Nick, serve as the Mayordomos de la Iglesia in Jarales.

It is a duty they took up with great joy and pride.

As one of the mayordomos, Cordova cleans the church inside and out, helps set up for Sunday Mass, opens the church every Friday for people coming to pray novenas and makes sure the building is available for dif-ferent groups that meet there.

“I wear many hats for what-ever needs to be done. It has been a joy. I think of it as tak-ing over where our parents left off,” she said. “They were the last ones in the old church, and we were the first ones in the

new church.”And getting to the new

church is a tale in itself.“The old chapel was water

damaged. The foundation crumbling and the walls were melting,” Cordova said. “My parents motivated people to help save it, and they held fund-raisers for the cost of repairs.”

They even moved the church and its services into their house for nine months.

“The living room was set up for Mass. I think it scared the boys who came to pick us up on dates,” Cordova laughs. “You could see them looking at all the statues of the saints and thinking, ‘Guess he really means hands off!’”

But what may have driven most teens to distraction, Cordova took in stride.

“The more you give, the more you get back,” she says. “Growing up here, the women of the valley showed me how to can and freeze the vegetables from our garden and so many things. The more you ask the more you learn. The more giv-ing and asking there is, the more getting and enjoying life there is.”

Even after the church was moved back to its proper place, Cordova and her family contin-ued to have it as a touchstone in their lives.

“After my sister’s husband died, she fell into a depression. We finally took her down to the church while I cleaned with my other sister,” she said. “You could pray, scream, cry. It’s good to give to God.”

And that little church has experienced at least one mira-cle, Cordova said. Last spring, a car hit a nearby electric pole. The subsequent power surge started a fire in the breaker box inside the church.

“Not long before this hap-pened, we had brought a case of water to the church, just to have in case people got thirsty,” she said. The water was sit-

ting on a shelf close to where the fire started. The small fire melted the water bottles and extinguished the fire.

“If that’s not a miracle, I don’t know what is,” Cordova said.

One of her other commit-ments is to the continued use and enjoyment of the Don Jose Dolores Cordova Cultural Center ― the building that

started life as a schoolhouse established by her great grand-father Jose Cordova.

Two years ago, the renova-tions on the historic building were completed, and the public was welcomed with the ringing of the same bell that summoned children to their studies for decades.

“This has really been some-thing that we’ve been work-

ing on one way or another for almost 20 years,” Cordova said. “We are trying to get this to be something that is easy for people to use and take care of.

“We want this to be used by the community, and part of the community. County adminis-trations come and go, and we’re still here. We want people to use it as neighbors, and not damage it so it’s around for a long time.”

Meeting at the cultural cen-ter, the residents of Jarales have begun organizing a neighbor-hood watch.

“We want to stop crime in a peaceful way. We want people to know we’re watching,” she said. “Then maybe some of these people who are doing the wrong thing, well maybe we can lead by example.”

And Cordova, along with the board of directors for the cul-tural center, has taken the lead in a project to help local kids further their education with the hopes that they will return to their community and bring their new-found expertise with them.

Last year, the group was able to raise $1,500 for three schol-arships for recent high school graduates from the Jarales area.

“We have so many bright wonderful kids here, and they just need a little help,” she said.

Cordova was also involved with organizing a recent appre-ciation dinner for the officers in the sheriff’s department.

“They don’t get a lot of acco-lades for doing their jobs, so it was good to break bread with them,” she said. “But there

weren’t a lot of them there that night because there was some kind of incident. So we packed up the food and took it up to their offices so they could enjoy it later.”

Opening her heart and home to the community is something Cordova isn’t shy about.

“If the community center isn’t available, well they can just come to my house for their meeting ― if there’s not too many,” she says with a laugh. “I’ll make some coffee, and they can sit around the kitchen table. That’s how we used to do things.”

Cordova waives off praise for her dedication and hard work on behalf of her community.

“It’s fun, so it’s hard to say no. I guess I see something in people’s hearts, a need, and I want to help,” she says. “There are so many beautiful souls in my life, and I think how many people helped me. And now they need help, so why not?”

She sits quietly for a moment, contemplating.

“Our veterans put their life on the line. Some of them walked in the Bataan Death March, so I can walk as far as I can go.

“I guess I grew up with too many good role models. My parents and grandparents ― I can’t even begin to put my feet in their shoes.

“God blessed me with good health, and my brothers and sis-ters through the good, bad and ugly. And there are such good men and women in this com-munity, they feel like brothers and sisters.”

Julia M. Dendinger-News-Bulletin photo

STANDING IN THE BUILDING that she used to go to school in, Jarales native Susan Cordova has worked quietly, and not-so-quietly, for decades to make her rural community a place of peace and neighborly love.

“If the community center isn’t available, well they can just come to my house for the meeting — if

there’s not too many.”SUSAN PERALTA

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UnsUng heroesRichard Ditrich: Using his free time to offer his services

By Brent ruffnerNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Los LunasRichard Ditrich loves people.Ditrich, a Los Lunas resident,

has volunteered his time since his high school days, whether it was during his time with the Junior Red Cross or when he was a girl’s recreation league coach in Sartell, Minn.

Ditrich, 67, left his winter home for New Mexico after retiring from a corporate busi-ness about eight years ago.

But his retirement didn’t mean that Ditrich didn’t stay busy.

The volunteer took odd jobs after leaving his primary job, and has learned about different subjects from guns to golf in his golden years.

Now, Ditrich spends his free time volunteering at the Belen Food Pantry, the Belen Public Library and the Harvey House Museum. He also is on the advisory council for the city’s Retired Senior Volunteer Program, and on the board of directors for the Valencia County Historical Society.

“It has just been my way of doing things,” Ditrich said of his volunteer work. “I enjoy people. Everything I do involves people. I enjoy talking to them, and see-ing what their needs are.”

Ditrich said he has gained sat-isfaction from donating his time, and takes pride in his com-munity efforts. He volunteers three times a week with the Belen Food Pantry, and has seen a growing need for volunteers. He said he would see about 100 families a month when he first started ― a number that has grown exponentially over the last five years.

The Belen Food Pantry is located in the south annex of Belen’s First Baptist Church, uses three small rooms to house produce, canned goods and fro-zen and dry foods. Volunteers distribute food to families every

Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The pantry is open on those days from 1 to 2:30 p.m.

“We see about 90 families a week,” Ditrich said. “You hope that people can find a job, and go on with their lives.”

Ditrich said the volunteers are in the process of finding a bigger, more efficient building to store perishable items and serve more families in need. Currently, families can get food from the pantry every other month, unless they are 65 and over. Those people can come to the pantry every month.

“We haven’t been too success-ful,” Ditrich said of the group’s

inability to get a large grant. “We have gotten smaller dona-tions. We are happy to get any donations we can. But what we really need is a large sum of money, or someone to donate a building we could use. We have had some people offer us build-ings for “x” number of dollars a month in rent. We didn’t want to do that because then, we are taking money away from people that we have to give food to. But we will keep going. We will keep pursuing it.”

The longtime volunteer said he found most of his work from advertisements in the classified section of the newspaper to keep

him busy with work in the com-munity.

“Any time you can help peo-ple ― it’s a wonderful feeling,” he said. “It’s better than getting paid.”

But Ditrich said he has learned a lot along the way.

At the museum, Ditrich said he has established a well-round-ed knowledge of the Harvey House, and its long history in a town that was once a bustling railroad destination. He said he has met people from California to England helping people find their way around the museum that once housed everything from Harvey Girls to U.S. sol-

diers in the 1940s. These days, the museum is

home to community volunteers that help share Belen’s history a few times a week.

“I have never worked for a museum in my life,” Ditrich said. “It took me a long time to learn everything.

“But it’s great to be able to understand people,” he said. “It doesn’t matter if they are from a foreign country or if they are from here. I like all types of people. To me, it’s great. You always get to learn from people.”

Ditrich works about 15 to 20 hours a week with his volunteer work, but said his schedules sometimes conflict with one another. But he said his com-munity work has been worth it since he has donated his time in the Hub City.

Amidst all of his challenges with volunteer work, satisfac-tion has often peeked through to thank Ditrich for a job well done. He said he has had fami-lies approach him to volunteer with the pantry after they told him he had helped them years earlier.

Still, Ditrich realizes his

efforts aren’t enough to help satisfy every need. He said he often takes paperwork home, and stays later when more work has to be done. On a recent Friday, he assured hungry residents that they would be fed after the center was short vol-unteers.

He knows local organizations need more help, and encourages residents to chip in and help out in their free time. He said most groups need men, because most of the volunteers around town are women that could use a helping hand.

Ditrich said youths that vol-unteer at an early age are more likely to realize the importance of community work, and give back to their neighborhood later in life. He commended the volunteers with groups such as RSVP and other organizations that give their time to make Belen a better place, and said he couldn’t do his work without the help of others around him.

“There are many volunteers (in Valencia County),” Ditrich said. “It’s not just me. We are all a part of something bigger. Without the others, we probably wouldn’t get anything done.”

VOLUNTEER RICHARD DITRICH stands in front of a sign at the Harvey House Museum. Ditrich volun-teers 15 to 20 hours at local organizations, and gets satisfaction in interacting with people and help-ing needy residents.

RICHARD DITRICH helps a client at the Belen Food Pantry. Ditrich, a Los Lunas resident, helps out local organizations around the community including the Belen Food Pantry, the Belen Public Library and the Harvey House Museum.

Citizen of the Year, UnsUng heroes, a reviewMore than a decade ago, in 1995,

the News-Bulletin began choosing a Citizen of the Year and honoring Unsung Heroes.

They’re all people who do things out of the goodness of their hearts, folks who are volunteers and are not paid for their activism.

Each year, we like to review the names of the people we’ve honored as sort of a continuing tribute.

Here’s an update of those who have been honored:

• 1995: Dolph Schlies, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Jim Foley, Kevin Kronk, musical group Los Originales, Don McConnell, Jeremy Nicholas Padilla and Joanne Romero.

• 1996: Edwin Berry, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Luz Chavez, Glenn Oliver, John Pope, Yvonne and Richard Riley, David and Susan Sloan, Sara Storey, Janet Tooker, Diane Urtiage and Sandy Wayne.

• 1997: Ronnie Torres, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Terry Baber, Mary Cate, Pam Davis, Chris Franzoy, George Hobbs, Dolores Padilla, the Herman Sanchez family and Ernie and Isabel Salazar.

• 1998: Pam Etre Perez, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Harvey House volunteers, Lee Henson, Desiree Hoogerhais, Henry Jaramillo, Elizabeth Mason, John McDonald and Tom and Ruth Vincent.

• 1999: Charlie Peña, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Ruperto Baldanado, Lupe and Willie Ferguson, Russell Griego, Vernon Honeyfield, Bill Pearman, Dorothy Raether, Dorothy Riley, Bob Sanders and Pat Torrez.

• 2000: Maurine McMillan, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Fred Gallegos, Wayne Gallegos, Juli Hutchins, Cortes and Mabel Kibble, Rita Gallegos Logan, Ron McDevitt, Christian Rodriguez, Boni and Eloisa Tabet and Gail Wall.

• 2001: Cindy Valenzuela, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Ramon Baca, Eddie Benevidez, Duane Fritz, Pete Gallegos, Veda Marrow, Mike and Kathy Mechenbier and Leo Mendoza.

• 2002: Margaret Espinosa

McDonald and Richard Melzer, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: John Michael Baca, Sharon Eastman, Bernadette Gallegos, Floyd Montoya and Carole Rowe, Corky Morrison, Pavlos Panagopoulos, Ruth Prater and Bea Sanchez.

• 2003: Luz Chavez, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Regina Elkins, Steven Gonzales, Pat Hoxsie, Billie Jones Sr., Marilyn Kaneshiro, Joe Padilla, Alana Robbins, L.E. Rubin, George Silva, Adele Thompson and Barbara Torres.

• 2004: Cristina Jaramillo, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Robert Auge, Judy Babcock, Louise Baca Ortega, Reina Barela, Lorraine Doty, Monte and Lana Fastnacht, Dale Jones, Jim Lardner, Yvonne Maushund, Marcel Reynolds and Martha Trujillo.

• 2005: Lillie McNabb, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Paul and Loretta Baca, Irene Dockery Wendall Doty, John Gonzales, Amador Griego, Frank Gurule, Bryan Mascareña, Sally Milavec and Gloria Sanchez.

• 2006: Filomena Baca, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Sylvia Aragon, DeLaHunt family, Dolores Garcia, Karen Jarratt, Steve Kuenzler, Mike and Mary Merrell, Geneva Nixon, Mark Rosenblum and David Velenzuela.

• 2007: George and Diana Trujeque, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Bill Brown, Manuel Gallegos, Sandra Gonzales, Jackie Jaramillo, Stacey Johnston, Tone E. Padilla, Joe Saiz, Mary T. Sanchez, Lydia and Nicole Trujillo and Richard Walker.

• 2008: James and Rosie Garley, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Mary Andersen, Laura Avila, the Branch Coffee Shop Gang, Lisa Chavez, David Gabaldon, Therese Hidalgo, Maria Marez, Joe Marquez, Richard Tafoya and Doris Vesel.

• 2009: Louis Lusero, Citizen of the Year; Unsung Heroes: Susan Cordova, Richard Ditrich, Jose Hernandez, Janice Knowlton, Robert Miller, Jan Pacifico, Ashley Rechkemmer, Hiltrud Ridenour, Arturo Saiz, Ronnie Tabet and Carolyn Taylor.

By Jason W. BrooksNews-Bulletin Staff Writer

[email protected]

Los LunasAs the cold dark of the night

gives way to the crisp autumn mornings known to Los Lunas, some are getting ready for the day, some are still snug in their beds, and some are already hard at work. Jose Hernandez is that last category.

Hernandez’s shift begins before dawn this time of year, and he’s the Los Lunas Police Department’s sole bicycle-mounted officer right now. He’s patrolling the village’s parks and streets as the sun comes up, and chances are good that on any given day, he’ll be doing something related to a children’s charity cause at some point.

“Our biggest event of the year is Christmas, so these are very busy months,” said Hernandez. “There’s a lot of joy in putting on events for kids, for everyone involved, and you get adults say-ing they want to do those events again.”

Since 2003, Hernandez has been involved with the Cops and Kids program, an LLPD project that is geared partly around arranging a special day of fun and shopping in December for underprivileged and economi-cally disadvantaged children.

The program is a lot of extra work in addition to Hernandez’s duties as a patrol officer on the street, but it helps put a differ-ent face on law enforcement officials than the negative view some children are left with.

Hernandez is the LLPD’s community policing officer, performing tasks on his own that used to be done by a staff

of four. A veteran of more than

10 years in the department, Hernandez has earned praise not

only for being an outstanding employee, but also for helping foster a climate of giving and being an exceptional citizen.

Assistant Police Chief David Gurule said it isn’t just that Hernandez is a reliable police officer. The father of three children is someone Gurule describes as willing to help out with any community issue ― no matter how busy he already might be. “At any moment, I might get a call from a teacher, asking if we can send an officer out to make a presentation about an issue, and that’s my man for those kinds of things,” said Gurule. “And he says, ‘Just tell me when,’ even if it’s on the spur of the moment. He’s a great orga-nizer, and he loves doing what he does.”

Hernandez will also take the time to speak with a child that’s gotten in trouble, Gurule said. Hernandez served as a school resource officer in the early part of his LLPD career, giving him an important background in working with troubled youth and in getting to know thousands of Los Lunas-area families.

The bulk of his work involves the Cops and Kids program ― something that seems to be a year-round, full-time job in itself. The program requires funding that requires a lot of work to generate through fund-raising events.

Hernandez conducts a fun run in the spring, one with 5K and 10K races, and the event is typi-cally one of the larger annual events of its type in Los Lunas. It has raised about $11,000 for

Cops and Kids in years past, but Hernandez said tough economic times have forced him to get creative in finding sponsors for the run.

“Some businesses, like Comcast, have always been sup-portive,” said Hernandez. “But in other cases, I’ve had to get new sponsors, like the Main St. Gym. It isn’t even limited to Valencia County business-es. Some Bernalillo County ones have chipped in as well with cash or T-shirts or some-thing.”

Gurule said the Cops and Kids pro-gram, begun before Hernandez joined the force, kind of feeds on itself. He has notes on file complimenting Hernandez’s hard work, and the Tomé resi-dent has been named the Los Lunas Officer of the Year twice, and DWI Officer of the Year once.

He also agreed to attend train-ing to become a certified fire-arms instructor for the depart-ment.

Gurule said the image of police as positive role models, and not simply people who make arrests, is important to the LLPD, and Hernandez does a lot to show youth the different functions of police in society.

“He helps us teach kids not to be afraid of police,” said Gurule. “He’ll do anything from taking the time to talk to a kid who’s in trouble to making presenta-tions at schools. And all that is in addition to being out on the street as a regular patrol officer when we need him there.”

Hernandez said former chief Nick Balido gave him the go-ahead to “make the Cops and Kids program bigger” a few years back. A lot of what Hernandez must do to keep the pro-

gram going, he does on his own time. Hernandez doesn’t put in for overtime for all of the hard work that goes into helping kids, Gurule says.

Hernandez is also involved with Neighborhood Watch pro-grams, National Night Out and has helped with everything from coaching youth soccer to aiding in setting up a Halloween event for the Youth Development, Inc.

“Some kids are neglected, and will turn to crime to survive if they don’t get the attention all children crave,” said Hernandez.

“If we can get just one or two kids here and there to cross the line and become great citizens, then we’ve done what we can do.”


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UnsUng heroesJose Hernandez: Badge on the outside, heart of gold on the inside

Jason W. Brooks-News-Bulletin photo

JOSE HERNANDEZ stands in front of his patrol car after a recent shift. The 10-year veteran of the Los Lunas Police Department says that helping out underprivileged chil-dren is the least he can do.

Julia Dendinger-News-Bulletin photo

JOSE HERNANDEZ prepares to hand a T-shirt to a registrant at a recent poker run fundraiser for the Cops and Kids program. Hernandez is involved with so many things related to Cops for Kids and other charities, he’s barely ever home, he says.

“There’s a lot of joy in putting on events for kids, for every-

one involved, and you get adults saying they want to do

those events again.”JOSE HERNANDEZ

Unsung Hero


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UnsUng heroesJanice Knowlton: Has been feeding those in need


PeraLtaJanice Knowlton has always

put others first.Knowlton, 72, has helped

people for more than 40 years, and brought her thoughtful-ness and caring to Valencia County in 1990 to try to regain her health after suffering from severe asthma while at her for-mer home in Meriden, Conn.

The wife and mother of five liked the New Mexico landscape after a few visits to Socorro when her son was attending college.

Knowlton spends her time volunteering at the Peralta Methodist Church as the cen-ter’s mission outreach chair-man, where they feed 25 to 50 families a week at the church’s food pantry. In Connecticut, she held a similar position, and gave food to families in need.

“I like to help people who are in need,” Knowlton said. “It could be me someday. There’s a lot of people out there who need help.”

Knowlton said the church feeds families once a week, and uses two small rooms to store items such as flour, sugar, pea-nut butter and canned goods for people who need the service. Families who live in Valencia County can visit the food pan-try once every other month. It is open from 9 a.m. to noon on Mondays.

The Valencia County resi-dent took over the position at the Peralta church when anoth-er member stepped down due to poor health.

“There was another lady running program, and they kept asking if I would take over temporarily,” Knowlton said. “I didn’t really know if I wanted to do it.”

But Knowlton took charge of the program, and has been involved in helping obtain

grants to keep the program run-ning through the tough times. Last year, the church received a $7,500 grant, and Knowlton has applied for a $900 grant that she hopes can get the pro-gram through to the new year.

She said this year the church will collect food for Thanksgiving in hopes of brightening the holidays for residents of Valencia County.

“The hard part is finding out how to pay for all of the food we need,” Knowlton said. “I used to worry a lot about it, but our pastor said the Lord will provide it to you. You have to pray about it.”

Knowlton is also involved in the Samaritan’s Purse

Organization, which has a fund set up to help buy toys and other items for children during Christmas time. She said she helps collect about 100 boxes of shoes for needy kids across the world, and takes them to Albuquerque where the items are distributed.

“A lot of those children never have gotten a Christmas gift before,” Knowlton said. “It’s a wonderful program.”

The community volun-teer works at the church on a weekly basis, and doesn’t com-plain despite being hampered with her asthma condition. She regularly takes medication in between keeping track of paperwork and giving out food.

“I sit a lot,” Knowlton said. “I sign people in, and I do a little bit and I sit down.”

But during her time back east, Knowlton had severe attacks that landed her in the emergency room at least once a month.

She made the journey out west after her sister, Dorothy, succumbed to the condition while in Connecticut.

On several instances, the volunteer would be going home from a day of volunteering and end up in the hospital.

“Many times, I would be on my way home from work and I would have to drive to the emergency room because I couldn’t make it home.”

But the Valencia County volunteer admits there is a lot of work to do at her church. The church feeds every qualifying person $25 worth of food each time, but can only store a lim-ited amount in a small space at the church. She said the church plans to convert another room to give the pantry more than double its current space.

She said the church plans to use the Roadrunner Food Bank of Albuquerque once the room is equipped with shelves to store the pantry’s food. The food bank will cut down food costs since the food is bought in bulk, so hopefully the church can help more people who need the service.

“Some of these families are elderly,” Knowlton said. “You know darn well when they come do the door they need it. They aren’t trying to scam you. I’m just so happy we are here to help them. Otherwise, where are they are going to go?”

Knowlton said she will con-tinue keeping up the church’s programs as long as she is able. She said she enjoys work-ing with church members and doesn’t second guess the work she does at the church.

“This is my life to be a part of the church for whatever they need me for,” Knowlton said. “It makes me feel good to help others. I do these things because I want to.”

Brent Ruffner-News-Bulletin photos

VOLUNTEER JANICE KNOWLTON stands outside the Peralta Methodist Church. Knowlton, 72, hands out food at the church’s food pantry, and is involved in the Samaritan’s Purse Organization.

JANICE KNOWLTON stands behind a basket at the Peralta Methodist Church. She is the church pan-try’s mission outreach chairman, which feeds 25 to 50 families a week at the food pantry. She has been involved in helping obtain grants to keep the program running through the tough times. Last year, the church received a $7,500 grant, and Knowlton has applied for a $900 grant.


UnsUng heroesRobert Miller: Raising more than money for Special OlympicsBy John BearNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

BeLenThe Belen Police Department

participates in the Law Enforcement Torch Run for the Special Olympics every year to help raise money for the orga-nization. But Lt. Robert Miller does it because it is his passion.

Miller’s son, Robbie, is an athlete in the Special Olympics, competing in the track and field events, and is planning on moving into other areas.

“He wants to play basketball and volleyball,” Miller said. “It’s good for him.”

He said the police depart-ment participated in the Special Olympics years before he joined up. Miller got his start in the organization coaching athletes, but decided after a while that his efforts could be better uti-lized.

“My time could be better used raising money,” he said.

And that is what he does with a good chunk of his free time. Miller is an avid weight lifter and church-going man. When he is not doing that, or working full-time as a Belen police lieu-tenant, he is raising money.

Miller will sometimes spend hours outside of local busi-nesses trying to fill the cof-fers of the Special Olympics. He sells T-shirts and pens and takes donations. Some officers volunteer to serve food at an Albuquerque restaurant for tips and donations. Walmart has donated money, and Miller said that he sometimes gets anony-mous donations.

“A good portion goes back to teams,” he said.

The money is used for travel, trophies and uniforms, among other things. He estimates that he raises somewhere between $10,000 and $12,000 each year.

“Some teams don’t fundraise at all,” he said. “It’s hard.”

He said he focuses on fund-raising because many parents with special needs children simply don’t have time. After they go to work and tend to their children, who may require doctor’s visits, physical therapy and other special needs, there simply isn’t time enough in the day.

“It is kind of hard to raise that money,” he said. “They don’t have a lot of time.”

He mentioned his wife, Gloria, as an example. She takes care of their son, Robbie, which he considers a full-time job.

He said fundraising efforts are always underway, on and off season.

“We’re constantly trying to raise as much money as we can,” he said.

Miller equates people with intellectual disabilities ― who fill the ranks of Special Olympians ― with other groups who have been subject to dis-crimination over the years, such

as religious and ethnic groups. He said a lot of the discrimina-tion the disabled face is purely a lack of understanding.

“People hate what they don’t understand,” Miller explained.

And like other maligned groups, Miller said all it took was somebody standing up and speaking out. For special Olympians, that voice came in the person of the late Eunice Kennedy Shriver. Shriver, sister of President John F. Kennedy, was one of the early champions of the organization. She died in August. Miller compares her efforts for the Special Olympics to Martin Luther King’s efforts for civil rights.

“It took somebody to go out there and educate people,” he said. “Where would we be if Ms. Shriver never came along and started this?”

He conjured up the image of the disabled kid watching other kids playing sports, not able, or not invited to play. Maybe he

won’t hit the ball, but the oppor-tunity to take a swing is all he wants.

“It’s heartbreaking to see a kid sitting on the sidelines,” he said.

He said disabled people, including his son, get depressed when they aren’t included. Special Olympics gives them that opportunity. Miller believes that Special Olympics, along with a general improvement in the public’s attitude toward the developmentally disabled, has led to an improvement in their quality of life, including a lon-ger life span.

“If someone has nothing to look forward to, they get depressed,” he said.

He said the organization also offers an opportunity for disabled people to socialize, as they have often been relegated to the shadows of life. Some athletes later become coaches, and others get to take classes in order to get over any fear of

public speaking. “They’re global messengers.

Athletes can be coaches,” he said. “There’s a lot of opportu-nities.”

Miller said the social aspect was one of the driving forces behind his son’s decision to join.

“He wants to be around peo-ple,” he said. “He’s athletic, so it’s always been a good avenue for him.”

Miller said Special Olympians often move out into other activi-ties, such as JROTC. He said his son plays the clarinet.

Miller’s fundraising duties help him talk to people, and hopefully, open their eyes.

“It’s important for people to learn about inclusiveness,” he said. “They want to be includ-ed.”

He said that society appears to be changing its tune with regard to the developmentally dis-abled, and he believes Special Olympics has played a key role in that evolution.

“It’s really cool to see how people are starting to embrace the Special Olympics, and people with intellectual disabili-ties,” he said.

Miller was chosen to run in the Law Enforcement Torch Run at the 2009 Special Olympics Games, which were held in Idaho. He also par-ticipates every year in the state games. The torch usually passes through Belen.

He said when the torch does passes through Belen again, he would like to see the entire community come out to support the athletes.

Miller said the Special Olympics in New Mexico appears to be growing in size with more people participating all the time.

Though he spends a great deal of time at it, he is humble.

“It’s never been about me,” he said. “It’s been about what we can do for the Special Olympics athletes of New Mexico.”

LT. ROBERT MILLER of the Belen Police Department spends most of his free time raising money for the Special Olympics. His son, Robbie, is a track and field athlete in the Special Olympics.

ROBERT MILLER is a volunteer coach for Special Olympics, and is a champion fundraiser for the state and national games. Miller estimates that he raises somewhere between $10,000 and $12,000 each year since he has been working with the athletes in the county.

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By curt gustafsonNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

toMéJan Pacifico’s compulsion to

be a volunteer runs as deep as her family roots. While grow-ing up in Long Island, N.Y., she observed two older family generations give of their time for the betterment of their com-munity.

“They were always involved in things in the community,” Pacifico said. “I assumed that this was something you always did.”

But it seems that Pacifico has taken the volunteerism she observed in her family to a whole new level. The line has blurred between her activities as a professional potter, and the constant volunteer projects she engages in to help her com-munity of Tomé and Valencia County at large. She simply can’t help herself. Volunteering is as natural to her as breathing in the air that surrounds her.

The common denominator between her professional life and her volunteerism, which also created a collision course with this New Yorker becom-ing a New Mexican, is the earth itself. The clay she digs from the New Mexico soil not only forms the pottery she crafts, but is the basis of the endless activities she gives back to the community.

Pacifico knew immediately she would become a potter while studying art and art edu-cation at the College of New Rochelle.

“I took a ceramics class as an art student, and that was it,” she said. “I never stopped.”

She then earned a master’s degree from Pratt Institute, and her love for pottery has endured.

“I just really enjoy the process of sitting down at a potter’s wheel and working and feel-ing that connection with the earth. I think that’s what made New Mexico so special to me,

because you live in a potter’s world here.”

Her first exposure to New Mexico came in 1989 when she took a pottery workshop at Chaco Canyon taught by storied Acoman potter Lucy Lewis and her family.

“That was it, I was smitten,” she said. “This is where I want-ed to live, because I felt like I came home when I came here.”

Her severing of ties as a ceramics teacher in New York finally came in 1994 when she bought the house she still

resides in, the former Tomé stagecoach stop, which is just a few houses up from Tomé Gallery, where Pacifico is a resi-dent artist and ceramics teacher.

Pacifico’s first experience as a volunteer came during her junior year in college. She and some classmates lived in Mexico City, and worked in the poorest section of the city train-ing people to teach residents how to read and write.

“I began to understand what it meant to develop as a com-munity,” she said. “As poor as

that community was, we were helping people make it a better place. It stuck with me all these years.”

So it was natural for her to help her Tomé and Valencia County communities through her work at the Tomé Gallery.

Her most recent project involved doing the research for a brochure that was recently pub-lished that details an arts trail in Valencia County.

She discovered through her research that the county is loaded with art history and art-

ists. The brochure details the art trail from Bosque Farms, south along the eastern side of the Rio Grande, across to Belen and on up to Los Lunas.

“For me, it’s about building community and being in a com-munity I want to be in,” she said. “It means we’re developing an economic base for artists in the community. I want to see perpetuation of the heritage of the Native American and the Hispanic heritage that is here that really grew around the arts.”

She is currently negotiating with the Rail Runner to provide shuttle buses for visitors inter-ested in taking a ride on the arts trail.

“The Rail Runner is very interested and very enthusias-tic,” she said.

Her road to volunteering her time to teach others to make pottery began when she first volunteered to read to children at Ranchito de los Niños, an orphanage in Los Lunas.

“I decided it would be more productive to do pottery work with them,” Pacifico said. “It was something I could offer that other people couldn’t.”

This activity has branched out to teach special needs students how to make pottery. In addi-tion to the fulfilling process of teaching these individuals to make pottery, Pacifico is also amazed to see their social devel-opment.

“It’s amazing to see how they change,” she said. “They can be themselves here. No one is putting a lot of rules and regu-lations on them. They can get messy and dirty, and they feel like they’re producing some-thing special.”

Last year she organized the first “Soup or Bowl” Sunday at Tome Gallery that is held on Super Bowl Sunday, and is designed to raise scholarship money for art students at the University of New Mexico-Valencia Campus.

Pacifico donated about 60 of

her own bowls that were given to those who paid $8 to use the bowls to eat food cooked and donated by other volunteers. The event, which is now annual, raised $1,800.

It was a natural for Pacifico to volunteer during the presi-dential campaign. Her activities there allowed her to help start a non-partisan organization that has become a clearinghouse for people involved volunteer activi-ties.

These activities are related to education, the environment and gardening.

From this, she has become involved in a community gar-dening group that grows veg-etables organically. The group has plans to set up a garden at a local nursing home.

She is also teaching others how to make “ollas,” non-fired clay vessels that are buried into the ground and filled with water. Vegetable plants are planted in the ground surround-ing the ollas, which slowly emit water to the plants.

“We’re not only growing veg-etables organically, we’re prac-ticing conservation. The ollas save 80 percent of water use,” she said.

Pacifico also responded to the president’s National Day of Service by helping pick up garbage along the Manzano Expressway.

When you talk to Pacifico, you get the impression that she has much more to give, that she’s just warming up.

Whatever comes in the future, it’s a safe bet that it will be con-nected with her passion.

“Pottery is something that people can enjoy with their cup of coffee, and feel connected with the world,” she said.

“This has come out of the earth, and someone has put their heart and soul into making it. It just gives you a different feeling to sit and drink out of something that feels so good in your hands and not just something off an assembly line.”


UnsUng heroesJan Pacifico: Creating a vision for Valencia County

UnsUng heroesAshley Rechkemmer: Preserving history because she cares

News-Bulletin photo by Heidi Snell

JAN PACIFICO looks into a mirror that hangs in the Tomé Gallery that reflects some of her work. Pacifico volunteers much of her time to teach children and special needs students how to make pot-tery. She is also active in spreading the word about artists and art in Valencia County.

By John BearNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Los LunasAshley Rechkemmer loves

donating her time to the Los Lunas Museum of Heritage and Arts, and volunteering in general.

“I first started volunteering in high school,” Rechkemmer said.

She comes from a family of volunteers, and often donates her time alongside them, help-ing veterans and teaching his-tory and other topics to kids.

As her mother, Carol, said, “Volunteers are the backbone of America.”

Rechkemmer said she worked in the library at Katherine Gallegos Elementary School, but soon found herself in the classroom helping out students in need. She tutored a girl from a abusive household who didn’t like coming to school. Her teacher asked Rechkemmer to come to the classroom and help the girl out.

“She started to enjoy school,” she said, referring to the girl.

Rechkemmer also taught sev-eral children how to read while volunteering at the school.

She is not sure why she volunteers other than a vague sense that she is needed.

“I don’t know,” she said, “I just felt that somebody needed me. They still need me.”

Rechkemmer is now a full-time student at the University of New Mexico. She is working on a creative writing degree, and hopes to be a published author one day. She writes fiction.

She is also minoring in history with a focus on the American Southwest. She is 32 credit hours away from earning a bachelors degree.

She volunteers at the Los Lunas Museum of Heritage and Arts, assisting people with genealogical research and conducting oral interviews with war veterans, including a

Bataan Death March survivor.She also teaches children dur-

ing the summer. She said she started trying to teach creative arts to kids because the pro-grams are disappearing from the schools.

“It makes me upset,” she said. The museum recently con-

ducted an exhibit that focused on Historic Route 66, which once passed through Valencia County.

Rechkemmer participates in most of the programs at the museum, and sits at a desk in the front to greet anyone who may come in. She has helped locate old photographs from the Great Depression showing peo-ple who lost their homes and farms during the Dust Bowl. She sits among photographs of children, who came to the

museum and drew petroglyphs based on the secret language used by depression era hobos to communicate with one another.

She also transfers old radio broadcasts and other media to disc to keep them from getting lost.

She video tapes exhibits, and jokes that her first attempt at it elicited comparisons to “The Blair Witch Project.”

“I didn’t have the tripod,” she said.

When she isn’t volunteering, she goes to college. For fun she reads and writes fiction aimed at children and teens.

Rechkemmer taught a cre-ative writing class for a handful of students this summer at the museum.

“I write just for kicks,” she said.

Her eventual goal is to write a series of fantasy books that are set in Valencia County. She hopes the writing will interest children in the area.

“Adding magic increases attention,” she said.

She enjoys reading Cornelia Funke, a German children’s writer most famous for the “Inkworld Trilogy,” and likes the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, writer of “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings,” though she isn’t as big a fan of the “Lord of the Rings” movies.

“Let’s just say I argue with the T.V.,” she said.

She paints for fun as well ― mostly abstract.

“I have no idea what I’m painting, even when it’s done,” she jokes.

Volunteer work is a family

affair for Rechkemmer. She and her father build care packages for sick veterans at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Albuquerque. She said they supply veterans with T-shirts, cards and other items to keep them comfortable. Many are at the end stage of cancer. The two have also sent out pack-ages to veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

She and her mother are plan-ning on conducting a craft class at the museum for Halloween. They will be teaching kids how to make ghosts and bats.

Rechkemmer is interested in saving an old cemetery near her house. She wants to see it restored, and possibly con-verted to a peace park honoring victims of violence and dedi-cated to the people buried there.

She wants to see the Harvey House in Belen preserved, and the Luna Mansion restored to its original luster.

“I’m not against it being a restaurant,” she said. “I’d just like to see it restored.”

Rechkemmer said she plans on hanging around Valencia County after she graduates col-lege.

“This place needs its heritage protected,” she said. “Kids don’t know their history.”

She wants to continue volun-teering as long as she can.

“People need someone there to help them,” she said.

Though she is there to help, she also finds it enjoyable.

“Volunteering is fun. History should be fun,” she said. “It shouldn’t be a laborious task. It should be fun.”

John Bear-News-Bulletin photos

THIS TEENAGER adjusts the tuxedo on a mannequin at the Los Lunas Museum of Heritage and Arts, where she volunteers. The wedding dress dates back to the Great Depression.

ASHLEY RECHKEMMER has been volunteering since high school. She wants to be a published writer after finishing her college education. Not only does she volunteer her time at the Los Lunas Museum of Heritage of Arts, she teaches children to read.


UnsUng heroesHiltrud Ridenour: Serving our troops with love

By Jason W. BrooksNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Los Lunas

Hiltrud Ridenour is a long way from her war-torn home-land of southern Germany, in so many different ways.

Born during the middle of World War II, Ridenour even-tually made her way to New Mexico, where she and Larry Ridenour would raise their offspring and helped raised a few other children. Now, she’s become known for her service to Blue Star Mothers, an orga-nization that provides comforts of home, airport welcomes and other amenities for U.S. ser-vice personnel that are serving overseas.

It’s not just a change of geog-raphy and language from where she grew up. Ridenour and her Blue Star comrades support the same U.S. military that was trying to obliterate Germany when she was a child.

The journey she found her-self on has been made possible by having lived in New Mexico since 1963, and having had her biological son and some of her surrogate children and grandchildren serve in the U.S. Armed Forces.

Known as “Oma,” or “Grandma,” to so many who know her, the Ridenours went to a Blue Star Mothers meeting more than five years ago.

“And we’ve never stopped,” Hiltrud says in her still-noticeable German accent. “I got involved in things like the arts and crafts committee, and before I knew it, we were going to the Sunport all the time and helping new chapters get started. I wear my ribbon all the time.”

Ridenour’s ribbon has a gold star on it. Gold Star Mothers are moms who have lost a child in military service, though her qualification is a little unique.

Joel Dahl stayed with the

Ridenours before joining the U.S. Army. The Los Lunas High School graduate and U.S. Army sergeant was killed on June 23, 2007, just five days before Dahl’s son, Kaiden, was born to his wife, Alia.

“Joel knew a lot of Blue Star moms,” said Ridenour. “He was in ROTC, and we all took it pretty hard when we lost him.”

Ridenour, a retired caterer, got involved with the Rio Grande Valley Chapter of Blue Star Mothers, which grew in the Albuquerque area before the Valencia County chapter was as strong and organized as it is now. In fact, though Blue Star Mothers has been around for more than 60 years, the Rio Grande chapter was just getting

organized in 2004.She’s currently the third vice

president for the Rio Grande Chapter.

“We’ve gone from a few ladies with some balloons at the airport to putting together care packages, sending out quilts and going to the airport all the time ― with a whole display ready,” she said.

Ridenour was awarded Dahl’s gold star, on behalf of the sol-dier she calls a grandson. She and Larry have two children, Robert and Heidi. Robbie Ridenour, Heidi’s son and Larry and Hiltrud’s grandson, also served in Iraq, plus two tours in South Korea.

The Ridenours also stay in touch with another soldier who once stayed with the family, Timothy Tellez, who Hiltrud says is serving in the Air National Guard.

Hiltrud Ridenour may not have been born in this coun-try, but Betty Barron, who herself lived in Germany for many years, calls Hiltrud “as American as anyone else I know.”

Even though Ridenour hasn’t had the experience of losing a biological child in combat, she still consoles mothers who have lost their children that way. She said the Blue Star Mothers need all the help they can get with their all-volunteer efforts.

And the appreciation from the soldiers, and other members of the community, she says, is something that would keep anyone involved. “We get a lot of ‘thumbs up’ from travelers at the airport,” said Ridenour. “And the sol-diers, except for a few, love it. Some say they’ve been to much bigger airports and didn’t see anything. Lots of them are sur-prised.”

Ridenour said the older sol-diers, ones who perhaps served in the Gulf War or in Vietnam, tend to easily recognize the gold star she wears, and what it means. Some of them break down crying there at the Sunport, she said.

However, many service people are young, she says. Ten other U.S. military person-nel were killed the same day as Dahl, all but one was 25 or younger, and Ridenour said there is so much left for the

Blue Star Mothers to do in the years ahead.

One asset she brings to the moms is being well-spoken. She has been quoted in the media as a spokesperson for the group, asking for donations and praising the volunteer efforts of many people. In 2007, an Albuquerque Tribune photo feature showcased some of the Ridenours’ related items in their home as a preview of a national convention. Albuquerque hosted the nation-al Blue Star convention in both 2007 and 2008.

Ridenour said she doesn’t want to take credit for her efforts, and points out the relentless work of Barron and those who participated in a massive quilting project.

“I called...and asked if any-one could make quilts to send to the troops,” said Ridenour. “The next thing I knew, (the woman) called me and asked, ‘When can you pick up the 47 quilts that were made?’”

Ridenour said she and her husband, Larry, a retired meat cutter and Air National Guardsmen, do something for the Blue Star effort nearly every day. She said Larry wrote a personal message on about 1,200 cards last year alone, and the thank-you responses from the strangers who received the notes are compelling.

The service people, seem-ing evenly divided by gender and from all over the U.S., show their appreciation for the Ridenours and the Blue Star Mothers’ effort back home. One soldier wrote “Thanks for the food, because we have some green chile eatin’, BBQ-sauce slurpin’, Girl Scout cook-ie-muchin’ people in forward areas.”

Ridenour said there’s no end to service the Blue Star Mothers will provide.

“Until the last one comes home,” she says.


HILTRUD RIDENOUR poses with a portrait given to her after her surrogate grandson, Joel Dahl, was killed in combat in Iraq in June 2007. The work of Ridenour, and other Blue Star Mothers, has helped the organization grow by leaps and bounds since its inception.


UnsUng heroesArturo Saiz: Helping the community and his neighbors


BeLenArturo Saiz was “born and

reared” in Belen, and left to get his education in California, earning a master’s degree in social work and hanging out with the likes of civil rights leader Cesar Chavez.

He came back though. He likes it here.

“I’m a product of Belen public schools,” Saiz said.

Saiz has spent his life serving the public. He has been a social worker, community organizer and administrator. He ran a psy-chiatric hospital in Santa Teresa, N.M., and retired as the head of the New Mexico Fire Academy in Socorro.

If that’s not enough, he also advocates for veterans, works with orphans ― both here and in Mexico ― gets scholarships and school supplies for students, has held public office, includ-ing a seat on the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District board of directors, and on the Mid-Region Council of Governments. He belongs to too many organizations to list. He has also worked the potato fields of California.

While he continues his work for the public’s greater good, he also takes care of his 92-year-old mother.

“I’ve always been involved with the community,” he said.

He got a taste of helping those in need early on. Growing up during The Great Depression,

he saw his parents help out people fleeing the Dust Bowl. Many of them stopped on the way to California, where they sought work.

“I saw my parents feeding people sandwiches, beans,” he said.

After graduating from high school, Saiz moved to California, and attended com-munity college for a time before matriculating to California State Universtiy at Northridge. He acquired a bachelor’s degree in Chicano Studies before trans-ferring to the University of Southern California, where he got his master’s degree in social work.

While in California, Saiz worked with Cesar Chavez, a champion of union laborers, a man Saiz has a deep admiration for.

He said Chavez was an honest person, a man who once refused a pay raise and admonished the people who voted to give him one.

“To this day, he is my hero,” Saiz said of Chavez.

After a stint in California, Saiz returned to New Mexico and held several positions throughout the state, including deputy treasurer in Bernalillo County.

He is now retired, but contin-ues his social work, something he plans on doing until “the day I die.”

He said he sticks to Valencia County, for the most, part because it is important to not “spread yourself too thin.”

Saiz has held public office,

and said that his interest in poli-tics helps him with his social work.

“I’ve run a couple of times for public office, county com-mission, city council,” he said. “Won a couple of times, lost a couple.”

Saiz is a literacy advocate. He has taught classes and individu-als, and feels that people who can communicate are less likely to be exploited.

He loves his home state and its people, everything from

its unique take on the Spanish language ― a dialect that main-tains a lot of it’s roots in Spain ― to it’s ethnically diverse, politically active residents.

“In New Mexico, people are very courteous,” he said. “We’re unique; we’re assertive; we ask questions.”

He said he is politically mod-erate, but progressive.

“I’m progressive minded,” he said. “You can’t stop growth.”

He believes the border needs to be controlled, but

welcomes the influx of people from Mexico and abroad. He considers it a positive cultural phenomenon in a state with a bilingual culture.

“It’s worked out well in this state,” he said. “There’s been no condescending attitude. People respect each other.”

Though it is racially and eth-nically diverse, he said people in New Mexico seem to have a good rapport and respect one another, whether they are named John Smith or Jose Gonzales.

As a person who left and came back, Saiz has noticed that many other people may pass through this state ― be they farmers fleeing the Dust Bowl or military people serving a tour ― but they often come back as well.

“People went to California to make a living,” he said. “When it was all said and done, they came back.”

Saiz said New Mexico spawns a great deal of community minded people who love doing volunteer work and that volun-teering begets more volunteer-ing.

“Volunteering has a snowball effect,” he said. “I do it; some-one else does it. It keeps going.”

He has made a living at it, but found the satisfaction of helping people far more rewarding than the money.

“It’s never been about the money,” he said. “It’s about the self gratification.”

Veteran advocacy has been a big part of Saiz’s work. “I’ve assisted vets getting benefits. My brother, who passed, was a

veteran,” he said. “I’ve always been vet friendly.”

Saiz assisted getting the Gene Gilbert Manor built in Albuquerque. The complex houses about 30 veterans who would otherwise be homeless. Many people helped obtain funding for the building

The Casa Colorada Community Center is another one of Saiz’s passions. He served on the board dedicated to revamping the old building that now houses the center. His father attended school there and later taught.

A grand opening for the cen-ter was held earlier this month

Saiz owns a cabin in the Manzano Mountains that dates to 1828. “It’s like a fortress,” he said, referring to the building’s massive wooden walls.

It has served, among other things, as a convent.

“It’s beautiful country,” he said.

Saiz lives with his mother, who is 92-years-old. He said he sold his house in order to move in with her. “She’s doing good,” he said.

Saiz plans on volunteering and serving the community as long as possible.

“I’m fortunate I have my health,” he said.

When asked what he does for fun, his response was simple. Other than traveling and seeing his children and grandchildren, Saiz lives to serve the commu-nity.

“This is fun,” he said. “What is more fun than people? God forbid I become a hermit.”

John Bear-News-Bulletin photo

ARTURO SAIZ has been involved with the community all his life. His parents fed migrant workers during the Great Depression, giv-ing him his start in community service.

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UnsUng heroesRonnie Tabet: Looking to the past to help the future

By curt gustafsonNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

BeLenBefore the city of Belen built

the gazebo that is now a Belen landmark known as the Heart of Belen, the area was occu-pied by a small park known as Teresa Tabet Park, honoring one of Belen’s most generous citizens.

Tabet’s son, Ronnie Tabet, ponders the influence his mother had upon him and his siblings.

“You grew up learning that my mom was involved with Catholic Daughters and Keep New Mexico Beautiful,” Tabet said. “When the Vietnam War was on, she would work through the Red Cross, and make phone calls to service-men in Vietnam if there had been an emergency in their family.

“My mom did a lot of stuff, and that’s why they named that corner Teresa Tabet Park, for all she’d done for Belen.”

A plaque containing the names of other women “stars” of Belen now occupies a corner of the gazebo in the Heart of Belen.

But Teresa wasn’t the only Tabet who possessed a gen-erous heart. Ronnie Tabet’s father, who founded Carlos’ Cantina and Grill, set another example that fueled Ronnie’s desire to contribute in his own way to Belen’s future.

“My father was one of those who if someone was stuck in town, he loaned them money to get home, and if someone was hungry, he fed them,” Tabet said. “We were lucky. We had good parents, and a good life with them, so it’s allowed us to do things we wanted to do.”

After graduation from Highlands University, Tabet returned to his beloved Belen with the intention of estab-lishing his own business and involving himself in his own philanthropic activities.

He and his sister, Elvia, established Tabet Insurance. And when his father died, Tabet purchased the Carlos’ Cantina and Grill from the family, which he now operates with his wife, Marybelle, and which is frequently the center of Tabet’s philanthropy.

About 10 years ago, when Tabet joined the Valencia County Hispano Chamber of Commerce, he was told that the Chamber had experienced a tough year, and would be unable to award any scholar-ships that year.

“I stepped in, and asked them what I could do to help,” Tabet said. “We decided at that time to do a concert at Carlos’s in the parking lot.”

Tabet found some bands to donate their time, and Tabet donated all of the proceeds at the door.

“We ended up earning $1,200 for the Hispano Chamber that year. It saved them,” he remembers

He also sponsored a fund-

raiser at the cantina that raised $240 to benefit the

Valencia Shelter for Victims of Domestic Violence.

When he recently celebrated the grand opening of the can-

tina’s new dining room, he provided a free meal to all who attended. He asked them to donate to the Food Pantry, one of Marybelle’s passions.

In 2003, he and his wife organized a fundraiser for Our Lady of Belen. He approached the Holiday Inn, which had recently opened, and asked them to provide space for a Valentine’s Day dance. Tickets were sold for $100 a plate for a dinner prepared with donated food by cooks who donated their time. The event raised almost $10,000.

Unfortunately, not every-thing Tabet has touched has turned to gold. About 30 years ago, while a member of Belen’s Chamber of Commerce, he and others were looking for an event that would become a “signature” event that would always be identified with Belen.

They thought they had found it with Belen Adobe Days, which would demonstrate to the public how to make adobe bricks, how to build adobe walls, and how to construct hornos.

“It looked like it was going to be an overwhelming suc-cess,” Tabet now says with a smile. “It rained for three days straight, and the chamber took a beating.”

Belen’s signature event would have to wait, and it would be the Hispano Chamber, of which Tabet now serves as board member, that would sponsor it. A brother of one of the chamber’s members suggested that the organization sponsor a matanza. Tabet liked

the idea, and jumped in with both feet.

“I like to think of it as one of the biggest achievements in the county, because this is going to be our tenth year,” Tabet said.

And the event turned out to be rainproof. The first matanza consisted of three pigs being prepared by three teams.

“It was an overwhelming success, even though it poured rain all morning long,” Tabet said.

The event, which attracts 10,000 people, now consists of 25 pigs and 25 teams compet-ing for top honors. Tabet is in charge of running the soft drink concession, which gen-erates $4,000 in income just by itself. The chamber now provides 30 $500 college schol-arships.

Tabet and his wife engage in other philanthropies, many involving Belen school pro-grams such as band, football, wrestling and cheerleading. They have supported the Julie Sandoval Softball Tournament, the Eagle Pride program and the Boys and Girls Club, among others.

While Tabet can’t always respond to requests for time and money, he holds a special place in his heart for Belen and its residents.

“We give back to the com-munity,” Tabet said. “But the community gives us so much in business, and when they see you do something, they really appreciate it.

“So you wonder who’s the hero, because you feel like, wow, people really appreciate what you do for them.”

BELEN BUSINESSMAN RONNIE TABET stands next to a plaque dedicated to his mother, Teresa Tabet, in the Heart of Belen. Teresa, who volunteered for many causes during her lifetime, inspired her son to make his own contributions to the Belen community.

Curt Gustafson-News-Bulletin photos

RONNIE TABET sits in front of the manger donated by him and his siblings in the Heart of Belen gazebo that honors his mother. One of Tabet’s volunteer activities has been the yearly matanza, sponsored by the Valencia County Hispano Chamber of Commerce, that Tabet considers Belen’s “signature event.” The event raises money for Valencia County student scholarships.


UnsUng heroesCarolyn Taylor: Keeping animals safe and loved


Bosque FarMsSome houses are just made

for cats. Wide open floor space with just the right amount of furniture for sneak attacks. And the windows.

The tall, broad windows that come almost to the floor, and have a sill wide enough to accommodate a cat fanny as a feline gazes out at the flowers and hummingbirds and thinks, “If only.”

Lucky for dozens and doz-ens of cats, Carolyn Taylor’s Bosque Farms home has been that house for more than a decade. Her light, bright and impeccably decorated home even has a spare bedroom for the cats in residence.

Having a dedicated play space for the cats has been a must for this Carlsbad native since she began taking in fos-ter cats and dogs 13 years ago, giving them a way station in their time of need before they find their forever home.

Taylor moved to Valencia County in 1985, but it wasn’t until 1996 that she became involved with the volun-teer animal group HART (Homeless Animal Rescue Team).

“I saw a notice in the paper asking for volunteers. They needed foster homes for large dogs,” Taylor said.

An admitted cat person, she decided her fenced-in acre lot would be the perfect place for a large dog in need. And hav-ing left the corporate world behind, now working from home as a professional orga-nizer and interior stager, Taylor puts in countless man-hours as the secretary treasurer for HART.

Most of her time is spent coordinating adoption clinics and foster care for animals.

HART holds an adoption clinic the first Saturday of every month at the PETsMART on Eubank in Albuquerque. Adoptable animals are also at PetCo for two-week stretches.

“I rotate them out so they don’t spend so much time in the cages,” Taylor said.

In preparing for both the

two-week stints on display and the monthly clinics, Taylor prepares informational cards about each animal so potential owners know as much about the animal as possible.

“I tell them how old they are, if we know. If they are good with kids or other animals,” she said. “We also have a

screening process and applica-tion.”

In addition to helping other foster families get their ani-mals adopted to loving homes, Taylor herself over the years has fostered about 15 dogs, and twice that many cats and kittens.

“I usually end up with the litters,” she said. “So that can be three to six kittens at a time.”

While HART’s name has the word “rescue” in it, the orga-nization doesn’t go out in the community to claim animals.

“People call us to surrender their animal. We’re an option, because we do not euthanize to make room for more animals,” Taylor said. “I know the shelter has made a lot of improve-ments, and they do everything they can with what they have, but ultimately when an ani-mal goes there, you know they really only have so much time.”

When people call to surren-der their animals, Taylor says, the first step is to find a foster home with one of the HART volunteers.

“But we don’t always have room because we are no-kill, and we keep the animals until they are adopted,” she said. “If we can’t take them, we refer them to Animal Humane in Albuquerque.”

When an animal goes into a HART foster home, the orga-nization helps with the cost of spaying or neutering when they can, Taylor said.

“We really need more spay-ing and neutering programs,” she said. “We end up with a lot of the animals that we do because litters keep coming.”

While HART is a 501c3, a non-profit organization that receives donations to help defray costs, Taylor says any-thing the volunteers can do on their own, they do.

“We do our own leukemia

test for the cats, which is a sali-va test,” she said. Apparently there’s a method to getting a cat to hold still long enough for an internal cheek swab.

They also do the three-combo vaccination, but rabies has to be done by a veterinar-ian because they have to be recorded. When they get dogs, they test for heart worms instead of the leukemia.

“We make sure they are healthy when we adopt them out to their forever homes,” Taylor said. But before they are adopted, potential owners are carefully screened.

“We ask them a lot of ques-tions that might seem basic, but sometimes people don’t take into consideration. If you rent, can you even have a pet? Is there an extra deposit? Do you have adequate shelter in your yard for a dog? Things like that, that people might for-get in the excitement of adopt-ing an animal,” she said.

But if one potential owner doesn’t work out, Taylor says HART keeps the animals until they can find a good home.

“We try to take adoptable animals, but sometimes they stay for a long time,” she said. “I once had a dog fostered with me for two-and-a-half years before she was finally adopted.”

And one dog accidently found her forever home with Taylor. Domino, a basset Shepherd cross with strangely curly eyebrows, tolerates the temporary interlopers who are her foster brethren with good humor.

“I don’t know why no one ever took her, but, she’s a good girl,” Taylor says while administering an ear scratch. Domino woofs in agreement.

Over the years, Taylor has been able to find foster homes in numerous area communities including Belen, Los Chavez, Los Lunas, Bosque Farms,

Peralta, Albuquerque and even reaching out to Edgewood and the East Mountains.

Finding these temporary homes involves a lot of net-working and asking, Taylor said.

“For the most part, the foster homes take on the costs of feeding the animals them-selves,” she said. “I have man-aged to find a few stores who are willing to give us their broken or open returned bags of food. The volunteers spend an awful lot out of their own pockets.”

HART and its volunteers also help transport animals to foster and permanent homes when they can.

“We get a lot of calls, from all over. I made contact with a woman in Hobbs who runs a rescue group. So when I go home to visit, I can bring some animals back up that need to be fostered,” she said. “We also have a large network to help transport animals across the country. An e-mail will go out looking for connec-tions. ‘Can someone take them another 60 miles or get them an hour further along?’”

Taylor is also a member of the committee that has been working on the animal control ordinance for Bosque Farms for the last few years.

“The goal is to get every ani-mal licensed,” she says.

Some people have been criti-cal, saying it’s an attempt to control how many animals they have, and how they breed them. Taylor says that isn’t it at all.

“This is really to benefit the animals and keep people safe,” she said. “To make sure the animals have been vaccinated for rabies and to get them back to their families if they are ever picked up.

“That’s really my main goal with all of this ― to help the animals.”


RELAXING WITH A WISP of a kitten, Carolyn Taylor has taken in dozens of animals to her Bosque Farms home over the past decade and fostered them until they were adopted by their forever home.

Lo a sc lOctober 31, 2009

E N T E R P R I S E



Los LunasAs one of the only remaining working

dairies in Valencia County, Shady Dale Farm does not sell heifers.

“No, sorry. We never sell our heif-ers,” says Janet Jarratt to an inquiry on a recent afternoon. “We will sell you a steer but no heifers.”

Janet, the daughter of Raymond and Fenella Jarratt, along with her sister Karen, will one day take on the whole responsibility of running the dairy opera-tion. The Jarratts’ sole source of income comes from the dairy farm, the home of the largest registered Ayrshire herd in the country.

Nearly 400 Ayrshires produce milk for the dairy with one lone black and white Holstein standing out amongst the glossy red and white of the hearty Scottish cows.

The herd is the largest in the United States, and very possibly the largest individually owned herd in the Western Hemisphere.

Ayrshires don’t mind leaving the shade and standing out under the hot sun and are known for thriving in harsh weather conditions in rough, cold hill country.

According to Raymond, Ayrshire cows are more hearty and convert more feed to milk than other breeds.

“These cows produce a high quality of cheese,” Raymond said. “They’re more disease resistant. They live and produce calves longer.”

The Queen of England has a herd, as well as the president of Kenya. Ayrshires are mostly found in Oklahoma, Kansas, California, Washington, Oregon and Pennsylvania.

The sandy soil at Shady Dale Farm makes the Jarratts’ land an ideal breed-ing ground. The dairy sells milk to the Co-Op Dairy Farmers of America.

Cows are fed at 7 a.m., and milking begins at 9:30 a.m. A total mix ration of hay silage, grain and protein mix is given to the Ayrshires.

In the meantime, at 10:30 a.m. a tractor trailer wheel pushes the feed back up to them. After lunch, it does it again. More feed is mixed together again at 3 p.m. and pushed up to the cows at 5 p.m. It’s time to milk again at 9:30 p.m.

“I remember when Ray was younger, he would check the irrigation and water at night,” Fenella said.

Farm life for the Jarratts is not just an eight-to-nine-hour job.

“It’s 16 hours, seven days a week. We didn’t take a vacation till the kids were all grown,” Raymond said. The farm is

now run by three generations of Jarratts.Raymond has a long history with the

Ayrshire Breeders Association and the World Federation of Ayrshire Society, and the cows have been written up in many magazines such as the Ayrshire Digest and the Canadian Ayrshire

Review. On one occasion, members at the inter-

national conference came from all over the world to the Jarratts̀ desert oasis.

Sitting on a bench made from an old tree trunk in Janet’s back yard, Raymond picks through the detritus on the ground

until he comes up with a small branch. He pulls a small, well used pocket knife from the depths of his overalls and con-centrates on whittling the wood away.

His hands, rough and worn from a life-time of hard work, turn the branch and knife ― a quiet dance that smooths the limb and sooths the nerves.

Originally from Texas, Raymond says he’s not sure why anyone wants to hear his story.

“But I’ll tell you, I suppose,” he says concentrating on the stick in his hands.

As a boy, he milked cows by hand on the family farm. When drought came to the state, he moved on to Albuquerque in 1956, where he became the manager of the Valley Gold Dairy in Albuquerque.

In 1959, the Jarratts purchased 120 acres south of Los Lunas. The day he closed the deal on the property, Raymond moved 40 head of dairy cattle from Albuquerque down to his new farm along with an additional 40 head he purchased in Socorro, doubling his herd immedi-ately.

“We milked them all that night,” he says. His tone asks for no admiration or comment on what it took to do that ― it’s just what needed to be done.

When they bought the property, it was just the milk barn, which still stands today, a small shack and a tin shed. Life consisted of feeding cows and milking cows and farming the land. The property has grown to 350 acres that they farm to feed the dairy cattle.

“I started out with the idea that if all I ever wanted to do was have 100 head then I could grow all the hay I needed,” Raymond said. “As it developed, we real-ized we could milk a few more cows and the heifers were coming on.”

To keep up with the growing herd, Raymond decided to use green chop as a main source of fodder. Green chop is when you cut the green alfalfa, and instead of baling it, he loaded it into a wagon and fed to the cattle.

“We could either grow enough green chop or buy winter hay,” he said. “It was only a few more cows, and one man could milk them. It didn’t cost a lot more.”

At that time, the farm was part of the base program through the local coopera-tive.

“That gave us the right to sell so much milk at a given price. Anything extra was sold by the cooperative at the best price it could get,” Raymond said. “We got as close to base as we could with not much over, but it got rather expensive.”

While the basic concept of the dairy has remained the same ― getting milk

2 • Locals 2009: Enterprise • Valencia County News-Bulletin • October 31, 2009

n See Jarratt, Page 3

Shady dale FarmJarratt family has largest Ayrshire herd in the country


FOR THE LAST 50 YEARS, dairy man Raymond Jarratt has made his living off his herd and land in Valencia County. He has seen changes in the industry nationwide, and helped implement some himself.

out of cows ― the implementation has evolved over the last 50 years that the Jarratt family has been at Shady Dale Farm.

Dairies began with people milking by hand, or bucket-milking, in a flat barn, which was back breaking as they crouched before cow after cow.

“When I was a kid, we put the milk into 10-gallon cans and cooled in ice water,” Raymond said.

The Jarratts started with a flat barn, but were soon able to save enough to build an elevated barn with platforms for the cattle to stand on and allowing people to stand upright as they attached the milking machines.

Now, milk goes from the milking machines into a pipeline that runs around the barn, over the cooling units and into the tanks.

It’s a rapid process that takes the liq-uid from the body temperature of a cow down to 36 degrees or less. The family also has to do a sematic cell count, which is a measurement of white blood cells that, if too high, could indicate an infec-tion in one of the cows.

Raymond says when he and his wife moved here, there were no turn-outs from

October 31, 2009 • Valencia County News-Bulletin • Locals 2009: Enterprise • 3

Jarrattfrom PAGE 2

n See Jarratt, Page 4

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Jarrattfrom PAGE 3

the irrigation ditches, so they put in turn-outs and lined the ditches with concrete. Not only did this make the property easier to water, it also used less.

Another improvement that resulted in less water being used on the crops was laser leveling. Raymond said it used to be, the water would be four inches deep one place, and you would have to use a shovel to divert the water where you needed it. After the leveling, the water rolls out in an even depth of one-inch over all of the Jarratt’s property.

“It’s that level, that true,” he says. “It’s nothing no one else isn’t doing. If we use a shovel now, it’s for leaning on.”

In years gone by, the water that ran out of the barn after the barn was hosed down after each milking was pumped into the Jarratt’s own irrigation ditches on the dairy property.

“It sat there until water came out of the MRGCD (Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District) system, and we put it back on the fields,” Raymond said. “There were no regulations then.”

Eventually, the New Mexico Environment Department mandated that dairies had to install lined holding ponds that could hold up to 60 days of water. But Raymond was ahead of the curve.

”We did that years before they asked us to so we could pump it for irrigation when we wanted to,” he laughs.

And he and his family are continuing to be on the leading edge of technology in the dairy industry.

“We are trying to improve the quality of water coming off the barn,” Raymond said. “Make it clean enough so that it can be returned to the ground.”

The system works similar to a septic system. The runoff from the barn is piped into a tank. The solids settle to the bottom and what rises to the top, the overflow, is pumped into a series of shal-low and deep ponds thick with aquatic plants to remove the phosphorous and nitrogen.

The 20-foot tower has been built and the pipes from the dairy barn laid. The first step was to plant the ponds and

establish the vegetation with ditch water. The pond plants have taken off, and are well established, along with numerous baby cottonwoods along the bank of the ponds.

Right now, the water in the ponds is covered with an unattractive green froth as it sits in the sun, but soon water will flow and in two to three years, Raymond says, they will know if the system works as anticipated.

When looking at the future of agricul-ture, Raymond says he doesn’t see much changing.

“And that’s because of the scale of economy, not that people are not capa-ble,” he said. “In order for it to be eco-nomical, you have to be large enough to mechanize. Unless the structure of agri-culture changes, I don’t see it happening. It would have to be a change in the U.S. and world wide. People want cheap food at any cost. Are people willing to live without a wide variety of foods that isn’t easily available?”

And there have been several attempts

at several different things during Raymond’s time in the valley, but none were productive, as far as the agriculture itself he says.

“Someone tried growing lettuce, there was a pickle factory in Isleta using locally grown cucumbers, artichokes. People have tried many different things to change the valley but nothing has hap-pened,” he remembers. “When I moved here, people were growing alfalfa and they are still. Each generation that fol-lows, these farms just gets smaller each generation and it’s hard to make it eco-nomically viable.”

Of course there is always the ever pres-ent question of water use.

“When push meets shove, the big thing is what you can and cannot do with agriculture,” Raymond said. “People think agriculture wastes water. If not for reclaiming water from agricultural irriga-tion, the shallow waters would dry up.”

The tip of his knife thunks into the bench beside him, indicating that’s just about enough of that.


THE ELEVATED MILKING BARN at the Shady Dale Farm is completely paid for, a situation that enables the family to stay profitable in the dairy business.

By Jason W. BrooksNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Los LunasFor George Sichler, shaking hands was

always an important part of deciding whether to hire someone.

“If they’ve got calluses on the hands, they’ll do good work on a farm,” said Sichler. “If their hands are smooth, they probably wouldn’t work hard enough.”

George Sichler, who was born in 1916, has seen about everything New Mexico farm life can dish out. As part of a family that has farmed land in the Rio Grande Valley for more than 140 years, Sichler epitomizes the work ethic that has kept the family producing despite the Dust Bowl era, the Great Depression, two World Wars and many generations of change in the areas of water rights, labor markets and government regulation.

Sichler still lives near the house he was born in back in 1916. The farm, along what is now New Mexico Highway 314 near Griego Road, is only one site of many in Valencia County that puts the Sichler stamp on the area.

“Soon after my wife and I got mar-ried, she asked me what we were going to do for a living, and I said ‘Start farm-ing,’” said Sichler. “She said that if she’d known I wanted to be a farmer, she wouldn’t have married me. I told her, ‘Well, you have to have food and water to live, and wherever we farm, we’ll have those things.’”

The first Sichler in Los LunasAdam Sichler made the trek from the

lush, green land of Germany to the dusty fields of New Mexico some time in the 1860s. When George Sichler fought in World War II many years later and saw the farmable soil and foliage of north-ern Europe, he wondered what kind of amazement his ancestors had upon their first impressions of the semi-arid desert of the American Southwest.

“Nowadays, it’s hard to find people to work,” said Sichler. “The work we did as kids, we were just happy to eat. There wasn’t a meal every single day.”

Sichler’s mother, Mary, died when George was 3 years old, and his father, George Andrew (Adam’s son), died in 1921 when George was about 5 years old. George was the youngest of 13 Sichler children, two of whom died at a young age due to the flu.

George describes how the Great Depression was merely how the rest of the country caught up to rural New Mexico ― things had always been rough here before the 1930s. In his 20s, George

found himself serving in the Army in World War II, where he earned a Purple Heart with two oak leaf clusters.

George is the brother of Ernest Sichler, whose son, Ernie Sichler, operated a farm on Sichler road. The family house, where a few generations of children were raised, was built in 1937 and still stands, though it’s now another business.

Next door is the Sichler Farms produce market, one of the most visual commu-nity reminders of the family legacy. It was built in 1958, and was recently re-stuccoed.

Though the produce is now grown on a farm near San Antonio, N.M., there are still many people who look forward to the August-through-October harvest time when the market is open.

The Sichlers todayChris Sichler, Ernie’s son, is the owner

of Ernie Sichler Farms, along with his wife Paula. Their son, Steven, is only in his early 20s, but he runs the San Antonio part of the operation, making him part of the sixth generation in his family to help farm the land of the Rio Grande Valley.

Chris wouldn’t have it any other way. All the paperwork, regulations and expenses of modern farming are chal-

lenging in a totally different way from the heat and toil of the fields.

“As long as Steven wants to do it, we’ll keep going,” said Chris. “Him wanting to do it, and being set on the farming business, makes a big difference. It’s really too much for one guy, especially so spread out like that. He tells me when it’s time for me to go to work.”

Chris, 42, jokes that he’s still in farm-ing because he’s “still dumb enough to do it.” He admits there is so much frus-tration, and so much left to chance in farming, it’s a wonder a single onion or any other item ever makes it to the din-ner table at all. However, there are some rewards.

“When it’s slow, I like it a lot,” said Chris. “There’s only a few months of the year when it’s crazy.”

Chris said the reward is in seeing peo-ple react to good produce.

“I like selling to people; it makes me feel good,” said Chris. “It’s a stressful business, but every generation works to have something a little nicer to pass along to their kids. It’s the American way, I guess.”

Paula and Chris own an operation that’s totally separate from that of his great uncle, George. In fact, Chris leases some of the land along Sichler Road to his sister, Teresa Sichler Chavez, and her

husband, David.The family has employed many

migrant workers through the decades, and Chris still has about eight workers who live seasonally in a house at the San Antonio site. George said he still has adults stop by his farm on N.M. 314, reminiscing on their childhood years and the work ethic learned at farms such as the Sichlers.

Much of George’s operation is now in the hands of others in one way or anoth-er. Some of his land has been leased out for farming or home construction, and the small house where George and his nine siblings were raised now has another owner.

George does have help with the land he still maintains, and a room in one building is filled with photos, albums and other memorabilia. As one of the oldest living Sichlers, George can still recall the early farm days and his World War II experiences in vivid detail.

He has snapshots of Adolf Hitler that he took from a deceased German soldier, along with photos and souvenirs from local Los Lunas and migrant farm work-ers.

“We learned Spanish before we learned English,” he said. “We had to.”


n See Sichler, Page 6

Sichler FarmSSichler family tree has several trunks and branches


MEGAN LANE SORTS green chile in mid-August at the Ernie Sichler Farms stand in Los Lunas. The stand on Sichler Road sells fruits and vegetables grown on Chris and Paula Sichler’s farm near San Antonio, N.M.


n See Sichler, Page 7

Sichlerfrom PAGE 5

What lies aheadThe Sichlers have seen lots of changes

in water rights and distribution, in the demographics of Los Lunas, and amaz-ing developments in the farming busi-ness. Not all of these changes have been positive ones, George says.

“Any time you trade river water out, and give farmers sewer water, that’s bad,” he said. “Politics is tough to fight, unless you have the know-how.”

George Sichler said the future of farm-ing is grim unless steps are taken to help farmers. Dams, flood control channels, diversion waterways, sewage and city reclamation are all complex issues, and are all departures from letting water naturally run where it will, unaltered.

“Farmers feed everyone,” he said. “Why should environmentalists have more power than us?”

George monitors the work Chris is doing in serving on the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District Board of Directors at Position No. 6 for Socorro County. Chris said Paula is more active than him in bureaucratic and government matters, but he hopes to spend as much time as he can in helping address farm-

Courtesy of the Sichler family

GEORGE SICHLER FARMS, on what is now NM 314 in Los Lunas, has one of the most visible symbols of family legacies in the county.


GEORGE SICHLER poses with some pumpkins grown on his farm during 1967. The wide variety of products Sichler has grown through the years indicates the versatility of agriculture in Valencia County.


Sichlerfrom PAGE 6

ers’ day-to-day issues.“The cost of farming is just one of

those things, and it’s not the same every-where,” said Chris. “For example, land near Albuquerque might sell for eight times what you could get in San Antonio. There are different situations in different places. But everyone needs water.”

George Sichler said some of today’s challenges aren’t really new. He has some torn-out metal shelves already cast aside by a local Walmart; George remembers when big chains such as Safeway and Piggly Wiggly were criticized for some of the same grocery practices that have brought Walmart under fire.

And as long as there’s farming in the Southwest, there will be water issues. Seeing how the Sichlers, and others, made a farming life out of dusty land long before modern insecticides and irri-gation, there’s reason to believe today’s challenges can be conquered.

“I don’t know what some city folks think, but being raised on a farm with all those mouths to feed was no picnic,” said George. “But we make do with what we have. We have an abundance of hay this year, but if it’s a long, cold winter, that will come in handy.”


FARM WORKERS take a break at George Sichler Farms. The picture, George Sichler says, was taken in the 1930s.


ANN SICHLER poses in front of a fall harvest display she created in the late 1960s. The Sichlers ran a vegetable stand on N.M. 314 for many years.

When everyone comes together, wonderful things can happen. Our communities’ success is the result of a lot of hard work by many talented people. The spirit of community is alive and well, right here and now.

It’s an honor to be a part of our vibrant Valencia County communities.

Belen Main • 101 S. Main St.Los Lunas • 1027 Main St. Bosque Farms • 970 Bosque Farms Blvd.

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8 • Locals 2009: Enterprise • Valencia County News-Bulletin • October 31, 2009 October 31, 2009 • Valencia County News-Bulletin • Locals 2009: Enterprise • 9


Los ChavezThe Cattlemen’s Livestock Auction in

Los Chavez has been in action for more than 30 years, and seen many changes in the cattle business.

But the more things change, the more they stay the same. Cattlemen’s Livestock is still selling cattle.

Charlie Meyers, manager of the Cattlemen’s Livestock Auction, said there have been technological advances such as workers now feed the cattle with a fork lift instead of by hand, and the auction itself is largely run by com-puter.

“The cattle have improved, but they still need to be cared for,” Meyers he said.

Meyers has operated at the present location on Highway 314 north of Belen since 1972, but has been in the cattle business since the early 1960s. It’s not a family tradition. His father was a railroad man. Meyers started working in the cattle business before starting his own. He also ran an auction in Dulce, N.M.

Meyers said Cattlemen’s sees live-stock from Arizona, Colorado, east to Santa Rosa, and as far south as Deming and Las Cruces.

“Take the Hub City and draw a 200 mile radius,” he said.

Buyers come from around New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas and even Minnesota.

Cattlemen’s take a 2.7 percent com-mission off each animal sold. He said a good 400 pound steer calf can bring about $500. A good mother cow fetches $1,000.

Buyer Matt Randall, of Veguita, who came out to a Friday auction to look at horses, said he runs a horse rescue and comes to auctions to buy underweight horses to rescue them.

“You can get them cheap, and find them a good home” he said, adding that he and his father have rescued about 20 horses this year alone.

Heather Mitchell, who runs a horse rescue in Socorro County, said she and her husband were at a recent auction to sell a horse and to look at others.

The two have rescued about eight horses this year.

“I like it,” Mitchell said about the Cattlemen’s Auction in Valencia County. “They’re beautiful animals, and I hate to see them starve.

“I’ve never had a bad experience here, except trying to buy a horse and

someone outbid me,” she said. Meyers said the business is good

for the overall economy in Valenica County. He said buyers and sellers pump money into the local economy when they come to auction.

“They buy gas, diesel, tires, grocer-ies, equipment to take back home; they buy feed,” he said. “What we do here ― a good bit of it goes to the commu-nity.”

He added that most of the cattle bought for slaughter will leave New Mexico. The state has been without a major slaughterhouse for many years.

“We have four packer buyers that send cattle to slaughter,” he said.

He said many of the cattle bought at Cattlemen’s will eventually go to San Angelo, Texas, where there is a large slaughterhouse.

“With the population in Albuquerque, you’d think we’d have a slaughter-house,” he said.

Rancher John Benton was at the auc-tion to sell two cows.

“They were old, and I had to get rid of them,” Benton said.

He said he didn’t know what he would get for them, but wanted to sell them before the fall.

“I wanted to get them in before the runs start,” he said. “In September and October, it will get real heavy in here.”

Meyers said the cattle business will


n See Cattlemen’s, Page 11

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cattlemen’S liveStock auctionCharlie Meyers has been in operation for nearly 40 years

John Bear- News-Bulletin photo

CATTLEMEN’S LIVESTOCK AUCTION Manager Charlie Meyers hopes to see the business, which serves as a valuable asset to many local and state ranchers, continue for at least 30 more years.


Cattlemen’sfrom PAGE 10

most likely increase in the fall. “In the fall, we’ll sell 2,000 consis-

tently because that is market time,” he said

The numbers can go even higher. “They average anywhere from 1,200

to 1,500 head of cattle a week, but that can go as high as 3,000,” said Phyllis Meyers, office manager and Charlie’s wife.

She added that they can move 200 sheep and goats and 20 horses per week, an occasional llama and even the odd buffalo.

“There’s not many in this part of the country, but we have a few,” she said, referring to buffalo.

While business is steady at the Cattlemen’s Livestock Auction, there has been a decline in the number of livestock auctions in recent years.

“There were seven other auctions in this area. Now there’s only two,” Meyers said. “The overall cattle num-bers are in decline, have been for the last eight years.”

Myers said there are many reasons for the decline, including droughts, the parcelling of large ranches into what he calls “ranchettes” and a shift from land being used for ranching to strictly hunting.

He said beef consumption has not decreased, but an increased population will probably lead to higher beef prices.

“It stands to reason that one day our beef will be a high-er commodity,” he said.

Meyers said the recent recession has affected rural agriculture, but not to the extent of other industries, such as the automo-tive industry.

“It has, but not catastrophically like other industries,” he said. “People still have to eat, regardless.”

Rancher Kevin Sweazea said the market has suffered because of the downturn in the economy.

“Costs are high all around,” Sweazea said. “The cattle market is down.”

He said drought conditions through-out much of New Mexico pose a prob-lem for ranchers as well.

“We don’t have much grass going into the winter,” he added.

Randall said high feed prices are a major problem for people with live-stock.

Sweazea is from Mountainair, but

was in town to sell some cattle. He said he likes Cattlemen’s.

“This is a good market, one of the best places to market cattle in New

Mexico,” he said.

In addition to ranchers, inspectors from the New Mexico Livestock Board could be seen lurk-ing around the pens at a recent Friday auction.

Livestock inspector Johnny Mares said he comes to auctions to check the health and ownership of each animal sold. He said cattle theft is still a problem in New Mexico.

“We have cases on cattle theft,” Mares said. “It keeps us busy.”

Meyers expects to keep at what he’s been doing as long as his health allows. At 69 years old, he figures he still has about five productive years left in him.

“As long as you deal with custom-ers honestly, and do the best you can with what you have,” Myers said, “ and as long as we do our thing, I don’t see why we can’t be around another 30 years.”

John Bear- News-Bulletin photo

A CALF LICKS its lips at a weekly auction at the Cattlemen’s Livestock Auction located north of Belen. Cattlemen’s has been auctioning livestock at it’s current location since 1972.

“As long as you deal with customers honestly, and do the best you can

with what you have, and as long as we do our thing, I don’t see why we can’t be around another 30 years.”

CHARLIE MEYERSCattlemen’s Livestock Auction


old mill Farm and ranch SupplyCorkey Morrison meets the needs, demands of community

Curt Gustafson-News-Bulletin photo

CORKY MORRISON stands in front of Old Mill Farm and Ranch Supply, a business he helped found 27 years ago. Morrison has seen his business change during those years, catering more now to the “gentleman farmer,” rather than to large farms.

By Curt gustafsonNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

Los ChavezLinda Deveraux strolled into Old Mill

Farm and Ranch Supply with her husband, Lyle, one morning and declared to no one in particular, “This is like a walk down memory lane to me.”

Deveraux moved away from Valencia County several years ago, but returned on this day to buy a western belt for her grandson.

“My kids, they were raised around the Old Mill,” Deveraux said.

Her fond memories have deep roots. “You didn’t have an old ranch hand, and

herd cows and not be associated with Old Mill,” she said. “They’ve tried real hard to accommodate the people in this valley.”

It appears from this heartfelt testimonial that the Old Mill owner, Corky Morrison, has achieved what he and two former part-ners set out to do when they founded the feed store in 1982.

“We try to have what people want for this type of lifestyle,” Morrison said. “Anything to do with the western, rural way of life, we feel that we’ve got it at a fair price, and we’ve got the knowledge for the people who come in. That’s our biggest thing. We want to help preserve the rural way of life.”

How that objective is defined today is certainly different from what it was when the business, located 19549 Highway 314 in Los Chavez, was established 27 years ago.

Morrison and his partners, who eventu-ally left the Old Mill to establish businesses on their own elsewhere, purchased an aban-doned feed mill, known as Gibson Mill.

“We took it over, cleaned it out and started in just a real small space,” Morrison said.

“So we started with Purina feeds, a little bit of health products, a small amount of tack, and then seed and fertilizer,” he explained

The business catered in the early days to the large farms that inhabited Valencia County.

“Our fertilizer and seed business really grew into a big business,” he said. “And then, it seemed like every year we would add something else that people would want, and that is what grew us into the clothing.”

Under the direction of Purina, Morrison designed and built the distinctive retail por-tion of the store, which was wrapped into the original building that had once been occupied by Gibson Mill.

So the bright red edifice, adorned by the Old Mill sign, bordered on each side by the quickly recognizable Purina red-and-white checkerboard, can safely be called a Valencia County landmark.

So while Morrison was establishing a business that the community could easily identify with, the needs and demands of that community have changed drastically through the years.

What was once a business that responded to the demands of the large farmer, has changed to meet the needs of the gentleman farmer.

“We still have a lot of the large acreage that we do business with,” Morrison said. “But you look here in Los Chavez, or in the Tomé area, a lot of that acreage has got houses on it, so you’re dealing more with the weekend-type farmers and weekend ranchers.”

What also came with this big change was an influx of a far greater number of women into the store.

“At least half of our customers are ladies, so we have established a consumer-friendly look, rather than a feed-store look,” he said.

Morrison prepared himself well for his venture. He secured a degree in agricul-tural business and economics from New Mexico State University, where he com-peted as a bull and bronc rider.

His wife, Kim, who used to keep the books at the Old Mill, was also a member of the rodeo team as a roper and barrel rider.

After opening the business, Morrison acquired 12 acres of land in the Los Lunas area, where he grows alfalfa and maintains 12 roping horses and about 40 head of cattle.

This is the base of operation for his fam-ily’s continued interest in rodeo. His wife and two daughters, Stephanie and Amy, and his son-in-law David Chavez, are all ropers. David and Amy both work at the Old Mill, with David serving as manager.

As for Morrison, after retiring from bull riding when he began to have a family, he is now an observer.

But this lifestyle is intimately connected with the Old Mill.

“We’re helping people enjoy the things we like to do,” he said. “We have a good relationship with the people who come in here. We know their families, we know their animals and their children, so it’s not just a business, it’s a way of life.”

That proved evident with another set of customers who came into Old Mill on this day, Phil Romero and his girlfriend, Elizabeth Ladd.

Romero owns 200 acres of land near San Antonio, and is a regular shopper at the Old Mill.

“I do my shopping here,” Romero said. “It’s too expensive in Socorro, about double the price. I know Corky, and every now and then I ask him, ‘Are you going to give me a deal,’ and he says, ‘yep.’”


Are you looking for an extracurricular activity for your children?

Valencia County 4-H clubs might be your answer.

Youths can reap the benefits of a num-ber of activities in the county and gain essential leadership qualities in their community without any experience in agriculture.

Participation includes kids from ages 9 to 19, and has about 370 clubs in New Mexico with more than 200 projects for kids to participate in statewide.

Programs include traditional activi-ties such as baking, sewing and raising animals. But kids don’t have to live on a farm or spend all day milking cows to participate.

There is also a program for children ages 5 to 8.

“Everybody thinks that in 4-H, you have to have a pig or cow,” said 4-H Extension Agent Vera Gibson. “That is a very small part of what the 4-H program does. You don’t necessarily have to live

in the agriculture setting to do the proj-ects.”

Gibson said participants can pick from specialized packets and do projects that interest them no matter which projects their particular group is doing.

The 4-H Program started in the early 1900s after the U.S. Congress created an extension service at the United States Department of Agriculture, which includ-ed girl’s and boy’s club work.

This year, about 330 children will par-ticipate in the free program in Valencia County, which promotes leadership and community service. Projects range from home vegetable gardening and veterinary science to wildlife and woodworking. Each group meets at least once every two months. The 4-H year starts October 1 and ends September 30.

“4-H has so much to offer youth,” Gibson said. “We try to promote and instill a sense of belonging in kids. A lot of people commute to Albuquerque for work, and there are kids that get left home in the afternoon. Hopefully, those kids will get involved and have some-thing to belong to. We try to promote to kids that they can better the community

they live in.” The local organization, which is fund-

ing by both the state and the county, gives kids a chance to give back through

donations and volunteering through the Adopt-A-Highway Program through the New Mexico Department of


n See 4-H, Page 14


SHELBY HERERRA, 14, poses with her miniature Australian Shepard, Lily, at an obstacle course in Bosque. Shelby trains and enters her two dogs Taj and Lily in county and state fairs as part of her 4-H project.

valencia county 4-hLong-standing organization has made in difference


4-H: Program promotes leadershipfrom PAGE 13Transportation.

Gibson, who is a former 4-Her from Torrance County, encourages parents to involve their kids, and said she wants to expand the program by about 200 kids in the next two years. She said she wants her group to expand to local schools in the organization that gave her essential skills and confidence to accomplish her goals.

“I believe so strongly in this organi-zation,” Gibson said. “I know what it does for a child to excel and help build life skills. I really feel like it helped me become who I am today. It really opened doors for me.”

Linda Herrera’s daughter, Shelby, 14, started in the program at age 8.

Shelby has two miniature Australian shepherds that she trains and competes in a dog school and state and county fairs as part of her 4-H projects.

In one competition, she directs the dogs through an obstacle course with about 20 obstacles in the timed event.

The dog that competes must finish the course in less than two minutes. Contestants win awards such as buckles and ribbons for the contests.

But Herrera’s daughter has learned more than just training her animals dur-ing her time with the organization.

“One time, our car got broken into,” Hererra said. “Shelby said, ‘If they were in 4-H, they wouldn’t have time to break into our car.’

“It’s pretty cool,” Hererra said.” “It’s beneficial, and teaches kids to care for others, and it’s a great way to share what they learn with other people.”

Linda Sedillo shares Hererra’s passion for 4-H.

Sedillo’s daughters Natalia, 15, and Nora, 13, participate in 4-H and raise meat and dairy goats. Both girls show their animals at the county and state fairs.

“It’s work,” Sedillo said. “Farm ani-mals act nutty in public. They train them to walk next to you.”

Nora also has entered pie and cake con-tests. Nora won first place at the Valencia County Community Expo a few months ago for her strawberry cake.

The girls, who are home-schooled part-time, learned to bake and sew as part of their curriculum, and have donated to organizations such as the Belen Food Pantry.

“They have fun,” Sedillo said. “I really like that it promotes leadership skills. It gives them a chance to work with other people and be organized. 4-H has a great group of parents and kids.”

Sedillo reflected on how much prog-ress her daughters have made, and said Natalia is in a leadership role with the group as a state diplomat and has learned to communicate more effectively. She said she hopes 4-H will lead to a bright

future for her daughters. “I want them to be able to do anything

they want,” Sedillo said. “It may take work, but they are learning that. This can point them in a direction toward college. I think they are well on their way.”

NATALIA SEDILLO, 15, carries a block of hay to feed her dairy and meat goats. Natalia and her sister, Nora, both participate in the Valencia County 4-H program, and show the animals at county and state fairs.


The National FFA Organization isn’t just about farming anymore.

In fact, FFA members learn much more about the agriculture field as a whole and some springboard into careers such as veterinarians, soil conservation-ists and inspectors for the United States Department of Agriculture.

FFA, which changed its name from Future Farmers of America in 1988, has a lot of bright spots locally in Valencia County with about 70 to 75 active mem-bers for each program in Belen and Los Lunas.

Daniel Mathews, a Los Lunas FFA advisor for the past 13 years, said only about 2 percent make up the production farmers in agriculture, but said students can still learn to raise livestock, bale fields, and work in feed stores as part of the supervised agricultural experience program.

About 27 percent of FFA members live in rural, farm areas; 39 percent in rural non-farm, and 34 percent live in urban and suburban areas, according to the FFA’s Web site.

Mathews said students learn by doing, and learn to translate concepts and prin-ciples into applications they can use in everyday life.

“I tell all kids that you get out what you put in,” Mathews said. “If they don’t get involved, they aren’t going to get any-thing out of it. But I have some kids that don’t even come from a farm, and some of those kids could become our leaders.”

Mathews, who also teaches agricul-ture mechanics and welding, said he has taught groups that have won state championships and groups that have been nationally ranked in FFA programs. He also taught a student who became the 2008-09 National FFA President.

Paul Moya, a 2006 Los Lunas High School graduate, was chosen as president from a field of 38 people, and is among six individuals who were selected to national office at the 81st National FFA Convention in Indianapolis last October. Moya, who leads the organization and its more than 500,000 members nationwide, has said he wants to inspire students to believe in themselves.

Los Lunas student Mariah King said she started in the group after having fam-ily members who own ranches.

King said she likes the FFA land and home site classes, where students learn about slopes of land to soil textures and erosion runoff to determine what uses are best fitted for each plot of individual land.

“It was an opportunity to get more involved (in agriculture),” King said. “I didn’t think I would like it at first. But I got involved, and now I love it.”

Los Lunas senior Britney Benavides said she likes to judge horses at different invitationals across the state, and said she has learned more about their body parts.

“It’s really fun,” Benavides said. “It teaches you a lot. I liked horses before, but now I like them a lot.”

But students have responsibilities that go along with getting a taste for agri-culture life. Students must wear official dress, and be dedicated to service when holding a rank as an FFA officer.

“Agriculture is the backbone of our nation,” Mathews said. “Without it, we wouldn’t be here. It gives kids core val-ues from filling out applications for job interviews and public speaking in front of a group of people.”

Belen FFA Advisor Justin Brown stressed those values and leadership qualities to his group at an FFA meeting earlier this year. Brown, who is in his second year with the group, spoke to his kids about the importance of profession-alism while at local and state competi-

tions. “We can have fun all over the state, all

over the nation,” Brown said. “But we have to take care of business first.”

Brown said the group is close knit, and he said students come together to sup-port one another while competing in each competition.

“There are a lot of kids that take this very seriously,” Brown said. “It’s a way of life to them. They take the skills they learn here and carry it on throughout the rest of their lives.”

Scott Hanks’ said he thinks FFA can do a lot for his son, Ethan.

Ethan, a graduate of Belen High School, is currently a state officer, and his father said he encourages his son to use his knowledge to ensure a bright future. He said his time in the organiza-tion could lead to a career in the New Mexico Game and Fish Department.

“I was amazed at how well he took to it,” Hanks said. “He is so well received by his teachers and classmates.”

Blake Matheson’s father, Mark, says FFA has played a big role in making his son who he is today.

“It keeps him out of trouble, and makes

him be a leader,” said Matheson. “It teaches him the agricultural skills that he needs.”

The Valencia County groups are put-ting those much-needed skills into prac-tice.

Brown said Belen High School will house livestock at the Career Academy for students to research the digestive sys-tems in animals such as goats, pigs and chickens. The group will also study soils to best market and advertise products.

Los Lunas students will have an actual farm that will grow food and house live-stock.

Last year, FFA members presented details of a $50,000 start-up budget for the Ag Farm, which is located just east of Daniel Fernandez Elementary in Los Lunas. Students’ will farm the 10 to 12-acre parcel of land in an effort to supplement the students classroom edu-cation.

Mathews thinks that experience could help shape their lives no matter their background.

“Who knows?” he said, “It might be something they like.”


Future FarmerS oF americaStudents learn from doing, applications in everyday life


BELEN HIGH STUDENTS listen during an FFA meeting earlier this year. Valencia County currently has about 150 active mem-bers in its program.


L o a sc lOctober 31, 2009

GROWTH&COMMUNITY

1. Between 1540-1542, explores New Mexico for Spain.

2. Don Juan de conquers and settles New Mexico in 1598.

3. In 1610, is founded as New Mexico’s capital.

4. Franciscan Mission Church was built in in 1613.

5. In the mid 1600s Tomé Dominguez de settles the area that now bears his name.

6. Between 1692-93 Don Diego de Vargas reconquers for the Spanish Empire.

7. In 1793, is build on old town plaza in Belen.

8. Father coffin rises for the first of several times in 1819 in the St. Augustine’s Catholic Church in Isleta.

9. In 1846, begins; New Mexico and the Southwest is conquered by the United States.

10. Father Jean Baptiste Ralliere arrives in 1858 to begin his 55 year career as pastor of the Catholic Church in .

11. In 1860, Louis B. Huning buys the in Los Lunas from his cousin, E.E. Franz.

12. Despite strong opposition, the new is completed and blessed in 1860.

13. Between 1863-64, Navajo Long Walk to Bosque Redondo routed through Bosque de los .

14. In 1873, opened the first U.S. Post Office in Belen, with himself as postmaster.

15. Valencia County seat moves from Tomé to in 1876.

16. In 1877, John Becker opens mercantile store in .

17. The Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad built through Valencia County in .

18. Since hacienda stood in the right of way of the Santa Fe Railroad’s proposed rail

lines, the railroad agreed to build a home to Luna’s specifications in 1880 west of the hacienda. The mansion is today a restaurant.

19. Guadalupe Otero was of Valencia County Schools in 1885.

20. In 1884, one of the worst in Valencia County history.

21. In 1888, Valencia County’s first two , the Valencia County Tribune and the Valencia County Vindicator, were founded.

22. serves as Valencia County’s superintendent of schools in 1887.

23. In 1895, Francis Schlatter,

2 • Locals: Community & Growth • Valencia County News-Bulletin • October 31, 2009

n See Quiz, Page 3

valencia county and state history quiz

News-Bulletin file photo

FOR MORE THAN two centuries, a mystery has persisted at St. Augustine’s Catholic Church in Isleta. It involves a priest’s grave near the altar in the historic church.

Valencia County’s history is rich with tradition, culture and momentous occasions. This section, Community and Growth, is filled with quizzes and facts about the county and notable citizens, elected officials and some of its more historical and recognizable places. The first quiz is strictly about the county’s history, which was generously pro-vided by the pages of “Valencia County: History Through the Photographer’s Lens,” by Margaret Espinosa McDonald and Richard Melzer. Take some time, have some fun and learn about Valencia County and its history.

October 31, 2009 • Valencia County News-Bulletin • Locals: Community & Growth • 3

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n See Quiz, Page 4

Quizfrom PAGE 2

arrives in Valencia County.

24. In 1898, “Bronco Bill” Walters and Kid Johnson robbed the south of Belen.

25. was one of the first doctors in the county. According to legend, the first local resident that he encountered on arriving in Los Lunas in 1900 was literally hanging from a rope.

26. , a wealthy busi-nessman from Belen, opened the Academy for Girls in 1900.

27. In 1903, John Becker opens the of Belen.

28. Felipe Chaves, , died in 1904.

29. Joe Tondre built the in Los Lunas in 1906. Tondre worked for Neustadt and eventual-ly, he and his brother-in-law, Frank Davila, bought the store. FELIPE CHAVES, also known as one of the richest men in New Mexico at the time, built this hacienda in Belen as well as a

school for girls.

30. In 1907, a , com-plete with good food and excellent service, opened next to the Belen depot.

31. Bertha Rutz, a former house-keeper to John Becker’s children, built the in 1907.

32. In 1908, died in a tragic accident at a sheep ranch in western New Mexico.

33. The was built in 1909 by J. D. Cordova.

34. were introduced on a private basis in the Belen area in 1910. John Becker had his own private service, and would allow select individuals to hook into his operation.

35. In 1912, New Mexico becomes the state in the United States.

36. In 1918, the Village of was incorporated, with Manuel Garcia elected as its first mayor.

37. Frank Kaneshiero, a native of Okinawa, Japan, arrived in Belen in 1919 to open the area’s .

38. In 1923, the begins service.

39. created in 1925.

40. The New Mexico state legis-lature establishes the in 1925.


n See Quiz, Page 5

Quiz: from PAGE 3

News-Bulletin file photo

HUNDREDS OF MILES of ditches run throughout Valencia County. The maintenance and daily handling of these water ways are in the trust of the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District.


Quiz: In 1928, the Village of Los Lunas was incorporatedfrom PAGE 4

41. The Solomon Luna High School was founded in in 1926.

42. In 1928, the Village of Los Lunas was incorporated, elected as its first mayor.

43. The first was shown in Valencia County in 1930.

44. Dennis Chavez, a native of, was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1932, and became a U.S. senator in 1935.

45. In 1937, a covered the Belen streets.

46. In 1939, the Belen Chamber of Commerce was founded with

as its first president.

47. Belen High School Homecoming Queen in 1939 was

.

48. The unit was established in 1947.

49. Gil Sanchez, having worked at Harrell’s Bakery, opened in 1947.

50. The new was competed in Los Lunas in 1948.

51. In 1948, of Isleta helps win the right to vote for Indians.

52. and other volun-teers erected three crosses at the top of Tomé Hill in 1948.

53. In 1960, Ranchers State Bank was founded by and other local investors.

54. Los Lunas native Daniel Fernandez was killed in combat in Vietnam in 1966 and was posthu-mously awarded the .

55. The was sold to the Horizon Corporation in 1968.

56. In 1973, despite strong oppo-sition, Our Lady of Belen Catholic Church was .

57. The Village of Bosque Farms incorporated in 1973 with as its first mayor.

58. In 1978, The University of New Mexico satellite center opened in .

59. A medium security opened in 1980 in Los Lunas.

60. Valencia County divided in 1982, creating the new with Grants as its new county seat.

61. The University of New Mexico branch campus opened in 1986 in .

62. The town of Peralta incorpo-rated in 2007, and was elected its first mayor a few months later.

63. In 2005, the state Legislature approved a bill naming the as the state’s official aircraft.

64. The State of New Mexico is the “Greater

Roadrunner.”

65. The , a Western staple, was adopted as the state’s official tie in 2007.

66. The New Mexico Legislature adopted the as the official state cookie in 1989.

67. The New Mexico State Legislature supported and adopted a bill to name the as the official state flower.

68. The was selected as the state’s official ani-mal on February 8, 1963.

69. In 1996, the New Mexico State Legislature passed a house joint memorial declaring as the official state question.

70. The is the official state tree.

See answers on page 19

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municipal mayorsThere have been many lead-

ers who have made their marks in Valencia County, including the many mayors of the four municipalities of Belen, Bosque Farms, Los Lunas and Peralta. This is a list of all the mayors who have served, and pho-tographs of the first mayors of each municipality.

Belen1922-1930: Manuel Garcia1930-1932: Con Hendren 1932-1940: Mel Tate1940-1942: Waite J. Keeney 1942-1946:Don Redenbaugh1946-1948: L.C. Becker1948-1956: Earl Peter

1956-1960: Neel Alexander 1962-1968: Carter Waid 1968-1980: Neel Alexander 1980-1990: Boleslo Lovato 1990-1998: Richard Aragon1998-present: Ronnie Torres

Bosque Farms1974-1980: Robert Fisher1980-1984: Sharon Eastman 1984-2000: Carl Allen 2000-2004: Roger Baldwin2004-present: Wayne Ake

Los Lunas1928-1930: Antonio Archuleta1930: 1934: Emiliano Castillo1934-1936: Jose Castillo1936-1952: Fred D. Huning, Sr. 1952-1962: Fred Castillo1962-1968: Howard C. Simpson1968-1982: Emiliano Castillo1982-2009: Louis F. Huning2009-present: Robert Vialpando

Peralta 2007-2008: Edward Archuleta2008-present: Bryan Olguin

(Names and dates provided by each municipality)

Manuel GarciaBelen’s first mayor

Robert FisherBosque Farms’ first mayor

Antonio ArchuletaLos Lunas’s first mayor

Edward ArchuletaPeralta’s first mayor


who is that baby?

1. 2. 3.

4. 5. 6. 7.

Every child has a chance to grow up and make a difference in his or her own community. These children all have made a contribution, in one way or another, in Valencia County. Try and match each picture, with the help of hints on page 8, with an elected or community leader in Valencia County. Take a guess — you’ll be surprised at some of your guesses. Clues are on page 8.

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8. 9. 10. 11.

14.13.12.

1. This elected official spends most of his free time on a boat with a fishing rod.

2. This longtime Belen resident was a NCAA Division I referee for 27 years, and is a key player in the education community.

3. This long-haired elected offi-cial is a lifelong Valencia County resident. He is one of eight children and was born in 1962.

4. This former Valencia County Hispano Chamber of Commerce president is a Tomé resident. She works in the real estate industry.

5. This person worked in the Bernalillo School District and is the former director of education for Isleta Pueblo.

6. This current Los Lunas busi-ness owner was born in Old Horse Springs, N.M., in 1946, and his favorite style of music is Mariachi.

7. This long-haired man was born in San Francisco, Calif., and his first language was Japanese. He moved to New Mexico in 1962.

8. Most people know this elected official by her unusual nickname.

9. This person has coached the same sport for more than 20 years, and has an office in the Belen ath-letic building.

10. This Belen resident loves antiques and lives in a home that came in a kit-form from a Sears-Roebuck catalog. He is heavily involved in city projects such as the Heart of Belen and improvements to Becker Avenue.

11. The longtime Belen resident was 4 years old in this picture. Her maiden name is Gurule.

12. This current Los Lunas resi-dent was born in 1949 and lives on a 4-acre lot that was previously owned by his great-grandfather.

13. This little girl grew up and ‘branched’ out into education.

14. This baby girl is “saddled” with the responsibility of balanc-ing the village’s budget, while maintaining a rural community. Answers on page 19

Who is that baby hints

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where’s this place?Our photographers took a ride around Valencia County capturing historic and

well-known areas of the community. Try and guess where you are with the hints given in each caption. The answers are awaiting you starting on page 16.

1. THIS ITEM IS near the intersection of Don Pasqual and Main.

2. THIS FIGURE GUARDS the entrance to “the marigolds.”

10 • Locals 2009: Community & Growth • Valencia County News-Bulletin • October 31, 2009 October 31, 2009 • Valencia County News-Bulletin • Locals 2009: Community & Growth • 11


3. EVERYTHING IS GOING swimmingly at this community park east of the river.4. A TRIBUTE TO ground-pounders and fliers alike, this item stands tall in a south-ern community.


Shopping in Valencia county

helpS proVide SerViceS

in our communitieSVillage of Los Lunas

660 Main Street NW/Don Pasqual & Main Street Phone (505) 839-3840 FAX (505) 352-3280

Robert Vialpando MayorCouncilors

Cecilia CC Castillo Charles GriegoRichard Lovato Gerard Saiz

5. LADY JUSTICE can look across the street and see a soccer complex. 6. THIS WATER FLOWS in a municipality that was incorporated in 1974.


Newspapers deliver lots of opportunities for parents and their

children to read, share information and make informed decisions together.

Encourage your children to participate in one or more of the following activities:

Assign sections of the newspaper to each family member. Have each family member browse their assigned section in print or online, and make a list of five words that are new to them or rarely used. Discuss the words’ correct usage and definition together.

Ask your child to select an article that appeals to him or her. Help your child write an editorial response to the article and send it in to the editor!

Ask your child to gather infomation about a favorite sports team, and continue to chart the progress of the team by clipping out articles. At the end of the season, encourage your child to write an an article on that team’s performance.

www.news-bulletin.com

Belen864-4472

Los Lunas865-7477

7. THIS LIGHT can be found by the light of the “moon,” or, at least, the Spanish word for it.


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ansWers for Where is this Place?

1. THE FOUNTAIN at Main Street Memorial Park, Los Lunas. 2. THIS STEEL OUTDOOR art work welcomes residents and visitors to Las Maravillas subdivision.

3. A CHAIN OF PONDS and walking paths are features of Las Maravillas subdivi-sion.


4. A LABOR OF LOVE built the war veterans memorial in Jarales. 5. THE VALENCIA COUNTY Courthouse at NM 314 and Morris Road in Los Lunas.

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We are proud to have worked with your communitiesfor close to half a century to help plan, develop and ensure

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6. THE FOUNTAIN IN front of the Bosque Farms Village Hall. 7. A LIGHTING FIXTURE in front of the Luna Mansion in Los Lunas.


1. Francisco Coronado2. Onate3. Santa Fe4. Isleta Pueblo5. Mendoza6. New Mexico7. Our Lady of Belen Catholic Church8. Father Juan Jose Padilla’s9. The Mexican-American War10. Tomé11. Huning Mercantile Store12. Our Lady of Belen Catholic Church13. Pinos14. John Becker15. Los Lunas16. Belen17. 188018. Don Antonio Luna’s19. Superintendent20. Floods21. Newspapers22. Father Jean Baptiste Ralliere23. “The Healer”24. Atchison, T Topeka and Santa Fe Rail-road25. Dr. William F. Wittwer26. Felipe Chaves27. First National Bank28. El Millionairio29. Simon Neustadt Store30. Harvey House31. Belen Hotel and Restaurant32. Solomon Luna33. Jarales flour mill34. Telephones35. 47th

36. Belen37. Dry-cleaning establishment38. Belen Light and Power Company39. Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District40. Los Lunas Hospital and Training School41. Los Lunas42. Antonio J. Archuleta43. “Talkie” movie44. Los Chavez45. Flood46. Edwin Leupold47. Eva Garcia48. Belen National Guard unit49. Gil’s Bakery50. San Clemente Catholic Church51, Miguel Trujillo52. Edwin Berry53. Henry Jaramillo Jr.54. Medal of Honor55. Tome Land Grant56. Destroyed and replaced with a new church57. Robert Fisher58. Rio Communities59. Prison60. Cibola County61. Tomé62. Edward Archuleta63. Hot air balloon64. Bird65. Bolo Tie66. Biscochito67. Yucca68. American Black Bear69. “Red or Green?”70. Pinon

ansWers to history quiz

ansWers to baby Pictures

1. Wayne AkeBosque Farms Mayor

2. Jim DannerBHS principal

3. Bryan OlguinPeralta mayor

4. Georgia 0tero-KirkhamCounty commissioner

5. Patricia RaelBelen superintendent

6. Pedro RaelCounty commissioner

7. John PopeDistrict Court Judge

8. Nancy “Pug” BurgePeralta councilor

9. Barbara RodriguezAthletic supervisor

10. Ronnie TorresBelen Mayor

11. Sally GarleyBelen city manager

12. Robert VialpandoLos Lunas mayor

13. Alice LetteneyUNM-VC excutive director

14. Dolly Braught WallaceBosque Farms coun-cilor


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H E R I T A G E

October 31, 2009Lo c a l s



JaralesRuperto Garcia Baldonado was born

and raised in Jarales. He lives just a mile south of where he grew up helping his family work their farm.

The fourth of 17 children, he was born January 12, 1931. Growing up in the rural community in the southern part of the county, Baldonado wasn’t looking to join the Army. On June 25, 1950, the Korean War began, and Baldonado soon felt the impact.

“I had a cousin, Pat Garcia, who served in World War II, and he ended up in Barstow, Calif., working on a Marine base,” Baldonado said. “When the war broke out, he came here and said, ‘Let’s go. There’s lots of jobs in California.’ I was content here, very happy living with my mom and dad working in my vegeta-ble garden,” Baldonado said with a laugh.

But he ended up going to California with his cousin and finding work on the local Marine bases. Eight months later, January of 1951, Baldonado was drafted into the Army.

Instead of staying out west, he came

home until late August when he reported to the local draft board. From there, he was sent to Oklahoma for intake and a haircut.

“They peeled our heads,” he chuckled.Then it was back to California for

training. Finally, Baldonado and his unit were loaded on board a ship and shipped out on Oct. 31, 1951. On board were 5,700 Army soldiers, 1,200 Air Force men, 1,000 from the Navy and only 30 Marines.

After two weeks at sea, during which they experienced seas so rough the men were restricted to their bunks for three days, Baldonado arrived at Yokahama, Japan.

“We were the relief, you see. So there was this big line of guys leaving, going home, as we were coming in,” he said. “As they walked by us, they just said, ‘You’ll be sorry!’”

For the next year, Baldonado was almost constantly on the battlefield.

“We would get a few days rest, then go back,” he recalls.

During his first month in country, he learned of the death of a friend and fel-low soldier from back home in a rather unusual way.

“Another friend of mine was at the

headquarters of the 2nd Division, and he saw me and told me he had something important to tell me. ‘Come by Sunday,’ he tells me,” Baldonado said. “So I went over, and when he saw me coming he

ducked into his tent. He came back out holding our church bulletin. That’s how I learned Fidel Peralta was killed 24 days before.”

2 • Locals: Heritage • Valencia County News-Bulletin • October 31, 2009

n See Baldonado, Page 3

RupeRto Baldonado

Jarales native, Korean Warveteran tells story of conflict

AFTER BEING wounded in combat, Ruperto Baldonado was awarded the Purple Heart.

Submitted photo

WHILE SERVING DURING the Korean War, Jarales native Ruperto Baldonado saw temperatures dip below freezing.

VETERAN RUPERTO BALDONADO relaxes at his Jarales home. After serving a year in the Army during the Korean War, he came home to Valencia County to farm.

Baldonado’s 23rd Infantry Regiment was one of the 2nd Division’s infantry regiments that participated in the infa-mous struggle for Heartbreak Ridge in 1951. While the seemingly never-ending battle for the ridge lasted a month, Baldonado remembers hearing about it for months.

“From November to March of the next year, we were hearing stories about Heartbreak Ridge,” he said. “It took guys that long to rotate back.”

Christmas 1951 saw Baldonado posi-tioned on the front lines. In the summer of 1952, the 23rd Infantry Regiment relieved the 25th Division of their position near Old Baldy Hill.

“I was a forward observer. I went out and took a look, called in the positions,” he said. “I had a radio operator with me. On July 18, all hell broke loose. We lost the hill.”

After that, Baldonado was reassigned to the forward outpost, again close to the front lines. Almost immediately upon arriving at his new post, Baldonado and his radio operator were caught out in the open by enemy fire.

“All of a sudden, it was like rain. Shells were falling — boom, boom, boom,” he said. “The battalion commander told us to take cover in one of the bunkers and to report back when the shelling stopped.”

After finding nothing but full bunkers and literally being thrown back outside, Baldonado and his operator found safety.

“There were three lieutenants. When we came in, one of them sitting by the open-ing got up and moved,” he said. “A second later, a shell hit the edge of the bunker where he had been sitting.”

Shrapnel tore through Baldonado’s left elbow, upper arm and knee.

“I was pretty well immobilized, so they loaded me on a stretcher and started carrying me down the hill,” he remembered. “About half way down, there was another barrage and they just dropped me and took off.”

Left to his own devices, Baldonado began rolling.

“I rolled about down the hill about 50 feet or so and when things settled down, the put me back on the stretcher and we went on,” he said.

Baldonado was finally taken to a Norwegian-run field hospital for treat-ment.

“Since Norway and Sweden were neu-tral, that’s how they participated ― with medical services,” he said.

After surgery to remove the shrapnel, and a month-and-a-half in the hospital, Baldonado went back to his outfit.

“I didn’t have enough time to go home,”

he said. “Those were scary times. You really thought about a lot of things in your life.”

To the day, Baldonado was shipped back home after a year in Korea. After landing in San Francisco, he went to

stay with his father, who had moved to California.

Baldonado and his wife, Flora D., along with their six children lived in Barstow, until moving back to New Mexico in 1977.

“I came back more or less to farm,” he said.

Baldonado also ran his own barber shop from his home for 10 years, and worked at Pat’s Barbershop in Belen for a decade before retiring in 1993.

After returning home, Baldonado and other veterans in the area began discuss-ing the need to do something to honor those from the local communities who had served. Planning for what would become the Jarales War Memorial began in 1985, and on Memorial Day of 1986, the travertine marble monument was dedi-cated to the soldiers from Jarales, Bosque, Pueblotos and Casa Colorada who died in service.

“It was a labor of love,” Baldonado said. “It was very satisfying. Now we have something for the next generation, and for that, it makes it all worth it.”

October 31, 2009 • Valencia County News-Bulletin • Locals: Heritage • 3

Baldonadofrom PAGE 2

FILLED WITH MEMORIES of a year served in Korea, a shadow box at Ruperto Baldonado’s home features his Purple Heart and pictures of its presentation, his one remaining dog tag, a pocket calender complete with days marked off while waiting to return home and a prayer book.

“Those were scary times.”RUPERTO BALDONADO

Korean War veteran

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los lunasDon Fogal didn’t think he was suited

for military life.But Fogal, a native of Altoona, Pa.,

decided to enlist after his brother, Lawrence, joined about nine years ear-lier.

“I wanted to get out into the world,” Fogal said of his enlistment date into the Navy, which was the same day as his 17th birthday. “They put me in radar systems. I didn’t know nothing. That’s what they assigned me as a job.”

Fogal said radar systems in the ’50s were made of up of men who inter-cepted aircraft and guided planes that made air strikes on land. He was first on a ship that escorted bigger ships such as aircraft carriers across the Atlantic Ocean during the Vietnam War, and gave fighter jets the locations of enemy targets.

“In the old days, jets didn’t have radar systems,” Fogal said. “We guided them and got them into position to make attacks on aircraft.”

Fogal spent 16 years in the Navy

before going on permanent disability in 1970 after suffering from an inner ear disorder that left him unable to effec-tively communicate with pilots. He said he doesn’t regret going into the military, and said it was a good career choice.

“It was very satisfying,” Fogal said. “It’s the smartest thing I ever did in my life. They took care of me then, and they are taking care of me now.”

But at first, life at sea wasn’t what Fogal envisioned when he signed up in December of 1954. Fogal dropped out of school at age 16, and before that, was part of a family of 12, taking on a number of odd jobs including scrubbing floors, selling newspapers and working in a bowling alley.

“I hated it,” Fogal said. “I didn’t like someone to tell me to do everything. If I wanted to go to the bathroom, you had to get permission. I was thinking, ‘When can I get out of this canoe club?’

“I didn’t listen to my parents or any-body else,” Fogal said. “I had my own thoughts. Then, you go into the military and all the sudden military rules. It’s a dictatorship. They tell you to do some-thing, and if you don’t do it, you get extra details.”

Fogal said the Navy also provided

some unwanted education at the start of his naval career.

“I didn’t want to go to school,” Fogal said. “I get into the Navy, and they are sending me to school. What the hell did I want to go to school for? I quit school.” But after he went absent without leave a few times, he realized that life on the water wasn’t so bad after all.

“I grew to like it,” Fogal said. “After about two years, I went AWOL, and one night out to sea I thought, ‘Why is this so tough for me?’ I found out if you give a little bit, they work with you. If you want to be a taker all the time, you get nowhere. Nobody likes you.

“But the next thing I know, I got (pro-moted) and I was in charge of things. You don’t go along with the program, but then you find out if you do your job and give a little bit, life is pretty easy.”

Fogal recalled some prolific memo-ries, though he was never aboard a ship that was under attack by the enemy during his days with the Navy. He was in charge of transmitting information between nearby ships when an explo-sion occurred while he was on the USS Enterprise during a training mission in January 1969. An MK-32 Zuni rocket

warhead detonated after the missile overheated from the exhaust from an airplane starting unit. The incident killed 27 men.

“The kid heating the jet wasn’t watch-ing his exhaust,” said Fogal, who was just below the flight deck where the incident occurred. “The plane behind it had a heat-seeking missile. It took off, and planes just started blowing up. You would see a fire hose team go in and then, all of the sudden, there ain’t no fire hose team. Another bomb blew up and they got blown away.

“Your first instinct is to be scared,” Fogal said. “I remember having flashes and thinking I wouldn’t ever see my kids grow up. I wanted to run to the side of the ship and get the hell out of there. But I don’t know what it is, I just automatically start doing my job. I guess that’s why you train so much in the military. The fear is there, but you just do your work.”

Fogal was shocked the first time he saw a casualty on a ship he was aboard. He said planes that don’t get enough speed fall directly into the water and may not have any survivors.

“If a plane goes in the drink, the


n See Fogal, Page 5

Brent Ruffner-News-Bulletin photo

DON FOGAL holds a flag outside his Los Lunas home. Fogal enlisted at 17, and served until 1970 when he became an independent life insurance salesman. He retired in 2002.

don FogalLos Lunas veteran says Navy provided him life skills


Fogal: People show appreciationfrom PAGE 4

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DON FOGAL, right, working in Navy radar systems in the late 60s. Fogal enlisted in the military in 1954 and was assigned missions in Hypong Harbor in Vietnam.

carrier keeps launching (planes),” Fogal said. “They don’t stop. The helos and the escort destroyer go back to see if there are any survivors. It just seemed so cold. But the bottom line is that the carrier is going so fast into wind that it is five miles down the road before they can even turn around.

“If the least little thing goes wrong, that plane is not going into the air. Then a 95,000 ton ship runs right over top of you. The first time I saw that it was right over the coast of California. I thought, ‘Holy Christ. We just lost three men.’”

Fogal said one of the carriers he was on would frequently perform rescue mis-sions by picking up pilots in the ocean near Hypong Harbor in North Vietnam.

The unit used beepers to track the pilots’ whereabouts. He said one assign-ment left the carrier firing into an enemy location designated by a spotter.

“One night, we fired for three hours (on one location),” Fogal said. “ We get the damage assessment and we get, ‘Numerous fires in the area, killed three (Vietnamese) in a tree. I said, ‘Holy (expletive). Those shots we fired over there must have cost about $500,000 to kill each one of those guys.’”

Fogal retired from the military after he

was discharged in April 1970, because of an inner ear disor-der and could no longer do the duties of some-one controlling radar systems.

Shortly after, he began a career as an independent life insurance salesman, a job he retired from in 2002. In 2007, he moved from Pennsylvania to New Mexico and has lived in Los Lunas for about a year.

Since 2007, Fogal has been slowed by two heart attacks and currently wears a device in his chest that has a pacemaker and a defibrillator.

Fogal said Valencia County residents show appreciation when they learn that he is a veteran.

“People come up and shake my hand and make me feel special,” Fogal said.

“I’m not special. There are thousands of veterans here. But you go to a place like Home Depot, and they make you feel like a king.”

Don Fogal


bosqueWhen Gill Mullins stepped forward to

volunteer for the U.S. Marines in May of 1969, the anti-war protests in the United States had more than reached a boiling point.

The nation had already witnessed innumerable protests, including the brutal clashes between protesters and police at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. And just six months after Mullins was sworn in, an act he knew would send him to com-bat in Vietnam, the second march on Washington occurred, attracting 500,000 protesters.

But the country kid from Datil, who now acknowledges that the mood and violence in the country was enough to start a civil war, was unaffected by all the turmoil.

“I went in with the intention that I was going to serve my country,” Mullins said. “To me, it was the thing to do.”

Mullins was influenced by those who

lived around him. Datil, a rural commu-nity, was patriotic; several of his class-mates volunteered for the military.

“We didn’t have the anti-Vietnam men-tality there,” he said.

Perhaps his father, John Vernon Mullins, had the greatest influence on him, especially in regard to Gill’s choice of service. Vernon served with distinc-tion as a Marine in the Pacific during World War II.

So when the 19-year-old kid from Datil volunteered for that inexorable trip to Vietnam, where he gathered the label of “baby killer” along with all of those who served, he couldn’t have known what would befall him: That he would return physically damaged from dreadful inju-ries suffered in combat, as well as men-tally damaged from a psychiatric disorder that has only been acknowledged as a combat wound in recent times.

As with all services, the Marines give their recruits an aptitude test to deter-mine for which military occupation they are best suited. For Mullins, it was truck driver.

After training, he was shipped to Vietnam and assigned to a motor pool

thinking he was going to drive in con-voys, perhaps carrying munitions.

But the motor pool Mullins was assigned to had very different duties

“Our motor pool had the responsibility of about six miles of the military supply route,” Mullins explained. “We were to keep it free of land mines.”

Some time later, he realized that the road he helped patrol was about five feet higher than the rice paddy that bordered it, thus creating a high profile for their vehicles, and their real mission was to draw enemy fire to help keep the pres-sure off the ground troops.

When reflecting upon his duty to be a sitting duck, he said, “I didn’t feel like I was more of a sitting duck than the ground pounders out in the field.”

While Mullins felt relatively safe because his base was close by, he was frequently the object of enemy ground fire, which caused casualties.

“It was on your mind constantly that that could happen,” he reflected

Mullins’ Vietnam moment of truth occurred after he had completed eight months of his one-year tour. A friend of his volunteered him for the job of helping escort his battery commander to a visit with a Korean colonel.

“It was supposed to be a safe trip,” Mullins said. “We had infantrymen almost shoulder to shoulder along the road we were on.”

Unfortunately, no one was able to

detect “Charlie,” hidden in a spider hole not too far away, who triggered a land mine charged with 50 pounds of explo-sives just as the vehicle Mullins was rid-ing in crossed over it.

The driver of the vehicle was killed immediately. Fortunately for Mullins and the rest of the crew, they were closest to the blast, which blew them out of the vehicle.

The “percussion” injuries Mullins suffered were a broken back, a broken hip, and multiple shrapnel wounds. He was sent to a naval hospital in Yokuska, Japan, thinking that his days in Vietnam were over.

Mullins was released from the hospital after 45 days, and returned to his unit.

Because his injuries made him unable to sit for long periods of time, he was assigned to help the mechanics maintain the motor pool vehicles. But at night, he was frequently required to guard the base’s perimeter.

“I saw more action on the perimeter than anywhere else,” Mullins said. “The enemy was always trying to get into our base at night.”

Mullins survived his remaining time in Vietnam, and returned home after his one-year tour carrying with him the seeds of mental trauma that would grow and torment him to this very day.

He spent his remaining days in the


n See G.Mullins, Page 7

GILL MULLINS, commander of the Belen Veterans of Foreign Wars, suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder because of what he went through during the Vietnam War.

gillis Mullins

Vietnam veteran is now thecommander of Belen VFW

GILL MULLINS, right, poses with a friend during his tour of duty in Vietnam. Mullins was assigned to a motor pool, and was responsible for patrolling a stretch of road to keep it free of land mines.


G. Mullins: Says care at Veterans Administration is top notchfrom PAGE 6

Marines at a base in Twentynine Palms, Calif., where he was discharged in 1973.

Reflecting upon his Vietnam experi-ence and whether the war, which killed 55,000 troops, was justified, Mullins believes that the country’s motives were pure, and that the war was winnable, but that the proper backing wasn’t there.

“I think it was a mistake that Congress and the military leaders didn’t give us the backing that we needed and let us go and do the job they were paying us to do.”

Mullins returned to New Mexico and worked as a truck driver. He found him-self drinking heavily, which he says was instrumental in breaking up two mar-riages.

He eventually found work as a federal employee at Kirtland Air Force Base, working on the flight line. He was able to maintain his job without incident until about 15 years ago, when his life began to unravel.

“I noticed I was feeling a lot of depres-sion,” he said. “I wasn’t happy with anything in my life. I would get up in the morning, and I’d have my coffee and a cigarette, but I just couldn’t make it in to work.”

The pattern, exacerbated by the noise of the jets and helicopters on the flight line, repeated itself until his supervisor

referred him to mental health experts.The resulting diagnosis, Post

Traumatic Stress Disorder, led him to retire from civil service after 20 years.

For many of the years since, Mullins and his third wife of 18 years, Susan, have been engaged in a battle with the Veterans Administration to recognize his disorder and award him 100 percent disability.

“The VA will fight you every step of the way,” Mullins said. “They make the process so hard, and that’s what they want is for you to give up.”

Mullins admits that if it were not for his wife, he would have given up.

“It took a lot of pushing on my part,” Susan said.

Susan would observe her husband’s behavior and write it down, then attend meetings with authorities to voice what she had experienced.

These symptoms included his exag-gerated adverse reaction to loud noises, such as the slamming of doors, the noise of a helicopter or jet, his uneasiness in crowds, such as family gatherings or on shopping excursions.

After a long process, Mullins was finally awarded 100 percent disability.

“Once you get in the door, and once you get compensation, you’re their best buddy in the world,” Mullins said.

He says the care he is receiving at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Albuquerque is top notch.

While the PTSD will never go away, and Gill and Susan have altered their lifestyle to prevent him from reaching “trigger points” to his disease, Gill’s life has noticeably improved.

“I’ve gotten a great sense of relief in my life,” he said. “I feel a lot better

about living, a lot closer to my family, and I feel a lot closer to my community.”

On that last note, Mullins has become commander of the Belen Veterans of Foreign Wars, a position he would have once avoided.

“At first, I didn’t want to get involved. And most Vietnam vets don’t want to get involved. They got involved once, and look what it got them,” he said

He finally took the first step, and now it’s a vital part of this life.

“I am so deeply embedded with the VFW right now, I don’t have time for anything else,” he said.

This has allowed him to become close to veterans of all wars, but par-ticularly those who have served in Iraq and Afganistan. He and the VFW offers support to these veterans, and Mullins is quick to advise them on the ravages of PTSD ― all of which has been thera-peutic to him.

If there’s one thing positive that has resulted from Vietnam, it is that the nation has learned to support its veter-ans, even if the country is involved in an unpopular war.

“I don’t believe in the Iraq war,” Mullins admits. “I think that it was a big mistake from the beginning. But I support the people over there doing what they’re required to do.”

Gill MullinsAt age 18


VERNON MULLINS holds a small medical box full of photographs that he’s kept since his time in the Pacific during World War II. The box was once lost during a combat exercise and found on a beach later and returned to Mullins.

VeRnon MullinsWWII veteran, former cop, remembers the smell of warBy Jason W. BrooksNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

belenThe peaceful, green landscape and

waterfall setup of the yard at Vernon Mullins’ Belen home bears at least a little resemblance to Peleliu, an island within the nation of Palau near the Philippines.

The tranquility found in Mullins’ yard, however, is not how he would remember Peleliu the way he was first introduced to the island. As a member of the 3rd Armored Amphibious Battalion of the U.S. Marines, Mullins was part of one of World War II’s most deadly battles at Peleliu in 1944.

“Our battalion’s job was to move in and set up the artillery,” said Mullins. “And there’s sure a lot of Japanese guns buried in the cliffs on that island.”

Today, Mullins, 83, is able to enjoy the part of his life in which he is retired

and trying to catch up with his four children, 11 grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.

After his time in the Marines, Mullins bounced around New Mexico with his family before starting a career with the state police, followed by a stint as the Catron County sheriff.

Reflecting on his time with the 3rd Amphibious Battalion, it isn’t easy for Mullins to talk about some of the hor-rors of combat.

“There’s so much smoke and noise, it’s even hard to tell how well things are going, at certain moments,” said Mullins. “Even though photographs don’t show how gruesome it was, there was so much happening, and a lot of lives were lost, so there were things like the smell of human decay.”

So much went into the war effort, Mullins points out. While there was plenty of sentiment against Adolf Hitler

n See V. Mullins, Page 8


and the Nazi efforts in Europe, but what really seemed to spur enlistment, and boys lying about their age to enlist early, was the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese.

“That really stirred up a hornet’s nest,” said Mullins, who grew up partly in Roswell and enlisted in the Marines in 1943 at age 18. “I jumped the gun and joined the Marines, because anyone in the regular draft got put in the Army.”

Mullins doesn’t go into too much detail about the harrowing experiences of the war, but he does talk about the fel-low soldiers he knew well, and what part of the country they were from.

In more recent combat, mobile hos-pitals, helicopter evacuations and better field equipment help keep soldiers alive and minimize injuries to the wounded. But World War II field medics did the best they could, Mullins said.

“My hat goes off to the medics,” he said. “No matter what was being fired at us or how many wounded there were, when a guy went down, they came run-ning.”

Based in the Russell Islands, the 3rd Battalion was involved in some important operations in the latter part of Pacific campaign, including Okinawa. That’s where Mullins thinks he picked up a left-behind photo album he kept ― one with professional photographs that reveal the humanity of the opposing side in the war.

“It’s a family album, and the Japanese never seemed to smile,” he said. “I’ve also wanted to trace it back to the fam-ily.”

When Japan surrendered in the sum-mer of 1945, Mullins said, there was more to the Americans arriving than was seen in the official surrender aboard the USS Missouri.

“When we got there, the Japanese were happy to see us,” he said. “Some of them were waving American flags.”

After he was discharged from the Marines in March 1946, Mullins went to live with a sister in Bisby, Ariz. He signed a waiver regarding having no major health problems as a result of military service.

“There wasn’t a scratch on me,” he said. “I guess God must have other plans for me.”

In the years to come, Mullins would get into the construction business, meet and marry his wife Mary, and they would move around as they began to raise their four children.

Ending up in Alamogordo, Edgewood and then Lordsburg, Mullins worked at welding repair before joining the New Mexico State Police in 1957.

While many state police officers like to stay in one area, especially if their family is in one community, Mullins

bounced around with the NMSP. He was with the force for 28 years, being stationed in such spots as Datil, Grants and Silver City before spending 10 years in Belen before he retired in 1984.

He later was elected Catron County sheriff, overseeing one of the most far-flung and hard-to-patrol regions of the state. While he had few ancestors that served in the military, he seems to have started some traditions. Two of his sons and several grandchildren have joined the service, and four nephews joined the state police.

Mullins has private health insur-ance, and has never sought Veteran’s Administration benefits.

“I have some hearing loss, but that’s not necessarily from the war, and I’m basically in good health,” he said. “There were so many chain saws and firing ranges through the years, it could have been any number of things. I’m a veteran because I chose to be. Let the benefits go to the guys who really need it.”

Mullins credits the civilian side of the World War II effort that kept troops supplied and helped the U.S. succeed. He said unity is important in supporting the efforts of the military.

“At some point, we have to let our-selves be governed,” he said.

Mullins’ son, Gill, served in Vietnam and is the commander of the Belen Veterans of Foreign Wars chapter. The elder Mullins said he doesn’t participate in many VFW activities, but “I really should.”

He said both the U.S. military and the world in general have learned basic and important lessons from World War II.

“The military has so much more technology to keep soldiers in touch with their families now, and they’ve learned that all that iron hand stuff isn’t all it takes to make a good soldier,” he said. “And we’ve looked harder for ways to settle differences without war.”

V. Mullins: Was elected sherifffrom PAGE 7

Vernon MullinsJoined the Marines in 1943


John BearNews-Bulletin Staff [email protected]

los lunasTerry Overbay did one tour in Vietnam,

got a bronze star and was exposed to Agent Orange, the defoliant that has wreaked havoc on thousands of people, both military and civilians, since the end of the war.

Most of what he did during his year in Vietnam, working as a cryptographic equipment repairman, was and still is top secret.

“There’s not a whole lot I can talk about from what I did,” Overbay said. “Most of the stuff that I was associated with was top secret. I can talk in generalizations, and that’s about it. ”

The Clayton native and current Los Lunas resident joined the army in the 1960s and was in seven years, getting out in 1974.

He said he volunteered to avoid the draft, and give himself some choice of where he went.

After his stint in the Army came to an end, Overbay worked a variety of jobs. He sold insurance, tended bar and worked for U.S. West, the phone company now known as Qwest, for many years.

He is currently on disability because of exposure to Agent Orange, a chemical known to cause cancer and birth defects.

He said he has had surgery to remove his prostate after it became cancerous. The cancer is now in remission, but he also developed diabetes as a result of the expo-sure.

“It’s one of the things that it can cause,” he said. “My family didn’t have any history of diabetes.”

He said the hardest part of being in Vietnam was being far from his loved ones.

“For me, the hardest thing was being away from family,” he said “I was married at the time, and had small children.”

Overbay’s unit was in charge of com-munications and operated cryptographic equipment, which disguised radio transmis-sions from the prying ears of enemy troops.

“My unit was responsible for keeping communication up,” he said. “My unit also was responsible for locating and identifying enemy units by their electronic signatures.”

Overbay received a bronze star for meri-torious action for being resourceful during Operation Parrot’s Beak, during which he was the second shift noncommissioned officer in charge.

“That was when they were trying to interdict North Vietnamese Regulars who were coming south on the Ho Chi Minh Trail,” he said. “It was called Parrot’s Beak because of the way the border between Vietnam and Cambodia looked like a par-rot’s beak.”

The Parrot’s Beak was one of the places North Vietnamese Regulars were coming back into Vietnam via Cambodia.

“We were able to scavenge stuff from some place else and keep communications,” he said.

His unit’s other job was to locate and identify enemy units via radio communica-tions. He explained that most radios will go through a encryption device before being broadcast. Any radio has an electronic sig-nature, like a finger print.

He said he may have not been able to understand an enemy transmission, but the un-encrypted transmission would give away an enemy’s position, which could be triangulated within 50 yards.

“If an enemy was stupid enough to key their radio and talk in the open, our people could ID that radio,” he said. “If the radio was ever keyed again, we could ID it.”

He said sometimes people would lose perspective and do foolish things, such as talk on the radio out in the open.

“That’s why it’s called the fog of war,” he said. “You get people that do things. If they stopped to think about it, they’d know it was stupid. You spend more time reacting than thinking. We would catch these people reacting instead of thinking.”

Overbay said if they uncovered an enemy position, the information would be forward-ed to reconnaissance or the Air Force, who would bomb the target. He said the enemy troops would usually not know about the presence of bombers until the bombs start-ed detonating. If they were lucky, they may see contrails in the sky.

“The Air Force would do some carpet bombing,” he said. “Charlie did not like B-52s.”

He said the technology used to determine an enemy’s position has advanced in the years since Vietnam.

“It’s even more sophisticated nowadays,” he said. “You can see predator strikes.”

Overbay was affected by some of the information he was privy to during his time in Vietnam. Though he cannot go into detail, he said he has suffered from depres-sion that comes and goes.

“I had some real bad depression for a while,” Overbay said. “I saw communica-tions that 90 percent of the soldiers would never see. I saw communications that sometimes only generals saw.”

He said doctors have told him that he could have been suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, though he has never been diagnosed.

“There were some things that came through that even now I would say 98 per-cent of American people don’t know any-thing about,” he said. “It wasn’t what was being told to everybody else.”

TERRY OVERBAY worked in communications during his one tour in Vietnam. He now lives in Los Lunas and is retired.

teRRy oVeRBayVeteran still holds top secrets


rio CommunitiesJohn Perkins’ early travels were influ-

enced by the Dust Bowl, the severe drought conditions that ravaged much of the Midwest in the 1930s.

Perkins was born in southwestern Kansas, but left for northeastern New Mexico.

“We blew out of there with the dust-bowl,” Perkins said.

Perkins was a Marine in WWII, and saw action in Okinawa, one of the most violent battles in the entire war. Perkins spent several months in Japan following the end of the war, and was sent home in March 1946.

He married, had children, farmed and sold mutual funds, living in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. He now lives in Rio Communities with his wife, Nan.

Though the numbers of WWII veter-ans are dwindling, Perkins still relishes seeing his remaining buddies. He hopes to get to see one this year. He’s traveled the country to visit old comrades and attended reunions. He’s even been back to Okinawa.

Perkins said he emerged from the war largely unscathed, saved for the occasion-al dream. He never suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, an anxiety disorder that plagues many war veterans.

“I’m an emotional guy,” he said. “I think I could have made some problems, but I didn’t want to.”

He said the stress of combat and hor-rible conditions on Okinawa did cause some people to come unglued.

“Guys just kind of lost it,” he said. Perkins remembered a physically weak

kid named Duff Riley, who he helped climb down the “Jacob’s Ladder” off a ship, and therefore became responsible for him. Riley was one of many who suc-cumbed to the horror of war.

He said Riley became stuck in some mud and appeared to be staring off into space, like no one was home. Perkins pulled him out and got him help.

“That’s the last I saw of him,” he said. Before the war, Perkins spent much of

his formative years in New Mexico.“I went to high school up in northeast

New Mexico, in the little town of Farley,” he said. “They don’t even have a school there anymore, and I think there’s about six residents.”

Following graduation, Perkins returned to his home state and took a job hauling wheat. But he wasn’t satisfied with his station in life. He wanted to be a Marine.

“I heard it was the premiere service,” he said. “I thought if that was the best, I wanted to be with the best.”

Perkins was working with a friend one day when he made his plan known. He would travel to the courthouse the next day, his 18th birthday, and begin the pro-

cess of becoming a Marine. His friend then informed him that his

birthday was today and not the next. It had somehow slipped his mind.

“I just lost track,” he said. Perkins made a bee line for the court-

house and volunteered for the draft, that way he would have a choice of service.

When he got to Kansas City to be inducted, he found out that it didn’t make any difference whether or not you volun-teered.

“It didn’t make any difference to them,” he said. “You took tests, a lot of tests. I never knew what the tests were for.”

It was during one of these tests that the Marines came into the room and asked for volunteers.

“I threw the pencil down and jumped over the table,” he said, adding that he nearly knocked another recruit down in his mad dash for the front of the room.

After seven weeks of boot camp ― it had been shortened because of the war ― Perkins found himself in Oklahoma.

“I got assigned to aviation for some reason,” he said, adding that the military seemed to believe that if a person had touched anything mechanical, he must be a “wiz” at it. Perkins didn’t see how a 17 or 18 year-old kid could be a wiz at anything.

Training took place at Norman, Okla., but not before a long hiatus after an out-break of spinal meningitis left Perkins and his unit stuck in quarantine.

“They put us in an old barracks,” he said. “None of us came down with the disease.”

Perkins wanted to be a gunner, and did qualify. But he ended up volunteering for an air crew after actor Robert Stack paid a visit looking for recruits.

He would eventually find himself in the Pacific Theater, a member of the bomb squad, the crew of men who loaded bombs onto planes. He said pilots bombed the remnants of Japanese forces holding out in the Marshall Islands.

“What they were doing was practicing on those poor devils,” he said.

Perkins was part of the landing force on Okinawa on April 1, 1945. One of the main objectives was to take the airfields on the islands.

“It was quite an April Fools Day,” he said. “It was also Easter Sunday, so it was easy to remember.”

He said the initial landing was met with minimal opposition because the Japanese dug into caves to fight the battle

and pulled away from the beach. “Thank God the beaches weren’t that

tough,” he said. Perkins said that Okinawa, despite the

initial ease of landing, turned out to be one of the most horrific battles in World War II, worse than Iwo Jima.

“History bears it out,” he said. “Okinawa was a bigger battle. We lost far more people.”

He had to wait at the beach, inside a landing vehicle, to wait for a vehicle to be off loaded, which he was to drive to an airstrip.

“It wasn’t a good place to be,” he said, explaining that Kamikaze fighters had begun attacking allied ships in a last ditch effort to keep the troops away from the Japanese mainland.

“I wanted to get off that thing bad,” Perkins remembered.

The rain caused vehicles to sink into the mud, and the military began pil-ing coral onto the ground to stabilize it. Suicide squads attacked the airstrips, blowing up planes and attempting unsuc-cessfully to retake the fields.

Perkins said that Okinawa was secured on June 22, nearly three months after the assault began.

He said preparations were made to attack the Japanese mainland, and he admits that, at the time, he was “gung ho” to go.

“Your still gung ho when you’re 20,” he said.

Perkins would later learn that the allies stood to suffer casualties in the hundreds of thousands if an attack went forward.

“Had I known that, I doubt I’d have been that eager,” he said.

The invasion never came. The allies dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the war ended.

“I’ll tell you what, I was glad,” he said of the end of the war. “I know it’s a ter-rible thing to say, but it’s all relative to where you are.”


John PerkinsWorld War II veteran

John peRkins

WWII veteran says he relishes talking tohis fellow Marines and attending reunions

JOHN PERKINS, behind No. 2, still has this photograph, which was taken for a pub-lication. He said that the neat appearance of the soldiers does not reflect reality. In the heat of the tropics, they were usually far more rugged in appearance.


VeguitaWhen Sylvestre “Sy” Sisneros volun-

teered for the Navy as an 18-year-old in January 1944, he knew exactly what the quartermaster was ― the unit responsible for supplying the troops.

Having worked for the Civilian Conservation Corps, which followed Army protocol, he had been assigned to the quartermaster in San Antonio to pro-vide supplies to the mess hall that fed the men working at Bosque del Apache.

So after Sisneros joined the Navy to avoid the draft, he was given an aptitude test, which he scored well on.

“I wanted to be in a place where I could take a shower,” Sisneros laughed.

He was asked to select any job he wished on board ship. His decision was instant.

“That’s what I came in with ― quar-termaster. I wanted to go to supply,” he said

When he reported for training, he thought there was a mix-up.

“They were explaining the properties of a compass. I saw charts, and I saw a steering wheel and all the things of navi-gation,” he remembers.

Unbeknownst to Sisneros, in the Navy, quartermaster means navigation. His mistake opened up a whole new world for the kid who grew up in Abo. He would be working with the ship’s captain help-ing to steer the boat. Also, it probably spared him from a fiery death in the waters of the Pacific.

Before getting to the Pacific, the indus-trious Sisneros advanced in rank quickly by helping the chief petty officer update the ship’s charts. When it came time to take a promotion test, Sisneros’ on-the-job training helped him leapfrog over more highly trained shipmates when he scored the highest on the test.

He eventually achieved the rank of sec-ond class petty officer, and was now boss of those who had outranked him when his ship, an aircraft carrier named the


n See Sisneros, Page 12

sy sisneRosWWII veteran recalls being

hit by a kamikazi strike

Curt Gustafson-News-Bulletin photo

SY SISNEROS picks chile from his garden at his Veguita home. Sisneros, who has been buying and selling real estate for many years, once farmed chile and onions.


Sisneros: Career ended in 1946from PAGE 11

USS Salamaua, headed for the Pacific.“We visited almost every group of

islands in the Pacific,” he said. And by the fall and winter of 1944, he

had seen considerable combat action, but he wasn’t afraid because he had not yet encountered the kamikaze.

“The Japanese were coming in to get you, and then get back to safety,” Sisneros said. “I started shaking when the kamika-zes started coming.”

As January of 1945 approached, the airplanes coming from the U.S. aircraft carriers, including Sisneros’, had inflicted a heavy toll on the Japanese by devastat-ing the islands.

When the kamikazes did start to come, their targets were the aircraft carri-ers. While patrolling the waters off the Philippines, Sisneros saw a sister ship receive a direct hit from a kamikaze.

“I could see them jumping off that ship. They saved 800 of those sailors, but 300 were killed. That was the first baptism of the kamikaze, and then they kept coming every day,” Sisneros remembers.

“What really shook me in my boots was one day when I was on the wheel. I looked out the porthole and I saw this Japanese plane coming directly at us. My legs went wobbly,” he recalled. “Then somebody hit him, and the kamikaze figured he couldn’t make it to us so he swerved and hit a cruiser. That was a scary moment for me.”

Because the cruiser was heavily armored, it received little damage.

Sisneros and his shipmates thought they had received a reprieve from the kami-kaze when his ship was ordered to travel about 200 miles out into the China Sea to refuel.

“As soon as we got off the coast, we said, ‘Oh boy, we’ve got it made,’” he said.

On the morning of January 13, 1945, there were low-lying clouds over the sea.

“I guess either the radar people were asleep, or they didn’t catch it. This air-plane came from above the clouds and made a vertical dive. And he had two, 500-pound bombs on it,” Sisneros said. “I was in the chart room when I heard the explosion. It knocked me against the bulkhead, but it didn’t hurt me. So then I scampered on deck and I saw smoke and a hole in the flight deck.”

The plane had pierced the flight deck and fractured the bulkhead. Fuel for the ship’s airplanes was ignited as well as bombs they were to be armed with. And the supply area, Sisneros’ intended work place, was devastated.

Although the captain gave the order to prepare to abandon the boat, the ship was eventually stabilized, and made its way to the Philippines, then New Zealand for temporary repairs, and then on to San Francisco for total restoration.

The Salamaua returned to the Pacific,

this time in Okinawa where it was assigned to escort some oil tankers.

“The kamikazes were coming like flies then,” Sisneros remembered. “We were there for seven days, and every day they were coming like crazy. We certainly would have been hit if we stayed there.”

This time, Mother Nature intervened in the form of a typhoon.

“The typhoon came and it tore us up worse than the kamikaze,” he said.

An instrument designed to measure the wind’s velocity, got stuck at 105 miles per hour.

Because an aircraft carrier is such a high-profile ship, it was bounced around in the sea, often rolling on its side.

“I thought we were going to be a goner,” Sisneros said. “You’re at the wind’s mercy.”

Fortunately, the ship survived, although gravely damaged and with all of its planes washed off. It was sent to Guam for repairs, and when it returned to the Pacific waters, the U.S. was preparing for an invasion of Japan.

The atomic bombs, made at Los Alamos, were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, ending the war.

Sisneros knew a monstrous weapon existed. One time, while at home on leave, his uncle, a shepherd working in the area of the Ladron Mountains, reported to Sisneros that he had one night witnessed the night sky light up brighter than the sun.

“He thought it was the end of the world,” Sisneros said.

Sisneros’ ship was anchored near Yokahama, about 15 miles from the USS Missouri, where Japan officially surren-dered.

Sisneros remained in the Navy ferrying soldiers home in Project Magic Carpet. His fourth, and final, trip ended his Navy career in March 1946.

Sisneros returned to New Mexico, even-tually receiving training in air condition-ing, and found employment working for the military at Ft. Irwin, Calif.

After about 14 years, he returned to New Mexico, purchased his current prop-erty in Veguita and began farming cattle, chile and onions.

A series of strokes suffered by his wife, Antonia, required him to find new sources of income to pay for his wife’s medical expenses.

He purchased the book, “How You Can Grow Rich Through Rural Land, Starting From Scratch.”

Since then, he has bought and sold property in such communities as Mountainair, Willard, Bernardo, Abo Valley and Polvadera. He has carved out a prosperous niche that doesn’t seem to let up even at the age of 84.

“I don’t want to slow down,” Sisneros said, “because if I do, I’ll kick the bucket.”

Submitted photo

THIS PHOTO was taken after a kamikaze struck the USS Salamaua on Jan. 13, 1945, while the ship was about 200 miles off the Philippines shores.

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PeraltaMarion G. “Red” Young is the liveliest

dead man you will ever meet.“My mother got a telegraph telling her

I was MIA. Then she got, ‘We regret to inform you . . .’ I’ve read my own obitu-ary,” Young says. “It’s amazing what a nice guy you are ― after you’re dead.”

Born in Ravenna, Texas, on Oct. 27, 1922, the Peralta resident was drafted into the Army on Jan. 20, 1943.

“I took the Army General Classification Test, and they told me I got 138 out of 150,” he said. “They also told me I had the first perfect score on code. I can’t say I’m surprised. I played the guitar since I was 6, so it seemed fairly straight forward to me.”

During his training, Young attended gunnery school, radio school and after being assigned to a combat crew, he was shipped to Colorado Springs for training on the B-17 bombers. Eventually, he was also trained on the B-24 bombers.

“There were some similarities, but they are not the same,” he said.

In March of that year, he received his orders to ship out overseas. After being routed through northern Africa, Young arrived on a mud airfield in Italy.

“They had literally just scraped off a bean field,” he said. “We landed on those mud runways, and with those heavy bombers, that was a real chore.”

Loaded down with eight 500-pound bombs and 27,050 gallons of fuel, Young said the pilots learned the trick of “bouncing” the planes at the end of the usually too-short runways to get them off the ground.

“One morning we didn’t quite make it and hit an olive tree,” Young remem-bered. “We just kept going. We flew out of there for a year.”

Young was a radio operator, mechanic and gunner, sitting right behind the copi-lot in the radio room. He refers to the planes as “whistling outhouses.”

Flying at 20,000 to 25,000 feet up in temperatures 55 to 65 degrees below zero, crews required oxygen and special caution around the guns.

“If you touched a gun, your hand stuck and you pulled back a skeleton,” he said.

With the average life expectancy of a flight crew at nine missions, Young flew 70 sorties during his time in the Army. While there was some aerial combat,

most of the crew’s concerns were focused on the ground and anti-aircraft fire.

On May 31, 1944, while flying over Romania targeting oil refineries that fueled enemy vehicles, Young’s plane took heavy fire. It limped back to base with 129 holes in the fuselage.

“Everything was gone,” he said. “We were walking around in an inch of hydraulic fluid. When we got back to the field, it took us five passes to land.”

When the plane was less than a foot above the ground, the pilot hit the main switch, Young said, deploying the para-chutes on both wings.

“We ran out the entire mile and a half of that runway, and our nose ended up in a British anti-aircraft foxhole. I guess I was one of the first ones out of the plane, because one of the British soldiers stuck a bottle of Scotch in my face and said, ‘Here. You deserve this, you bloody bloke,’” Young says, affecting an English accent.

He laughs. “It was funny, I suppose, but it wasn’t,” he said. “That was quite a sacrifice for him. Those guys only made about a dollar a month.”

Young has other humourous stories about cathouses, stolen Jeeps and the mil-itary police. But he also has more stories about missions and injured crew mates.

“There was one time, we were tak-ing fire and a shell ripped through the fuselage and hit our copilot in the knee. It took out most of it except for a little bit of flesh on the back,” Young remem-bers. “I grabbed him under the arms and pulled him back to the deck. Left the leg behind.”

After applying a tourniquet to stop the bleeding, and giving the copilot his own oxygen mask, Young also had to get the pilot, a major, under control.

“He was just flat out panicking. Yelling that we had to bail out right now,” Young said. “Well, we were over enemy waters on the Mediterranean, and if we had bailed out, we all would have perished. So I grabbed him by the shoulders and set him down, told the crew we were not bailing out. Everything was OK because our tech sergeant was flying the plane. We all knew how to fly.

“Well, he sat down, and we got back to the base. I guess I should have been court marshalled for that.”

Instead, he earned the Distinguished Flying Cross.

He pauses for a minute, then looks


n See Young, Page 14

MaRion g. “Red” young

Peralta veteran talks aboutsurviving 70 missions

MARION G. “RED” YOUNG served for more than a year as part of a flight crew for the Army during World War II. He celebrated his 87th birthday earlier this month.

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you straight in the eye. “It was blood and guts over there,” Young says evenly. “Our blood, and our guts.”

While Young describes himself as nothing more than a “ drafted civilian,” he said he was very proud to serve with the Tuskegee Airmen of Alabama.

“We were so proud to fly with them. They didn’t sit up in the sun and wait until the other planes were out of fuel and ammo and then ‘ace’ them,” he said. “They flew cover just like they were ordered.”

The first mission Young’s crew flew with them ended up with one of the Tuskegee planes being shot down by friendly fire.

“They flew the P51s that looked almost just like the German Messerschmitt 109s, and one of ours became injured, so they were flying under them for protection,” he said. “Well, one of our trigger-happy ball gunners shot one of the P51s down.”

Later that night, a squadron of Tuskegee planes paid a visit to the crew’s sleeping area.

“They knocked down every tent with prop wash, wave after wave. It rained all night,” Young said. “I can guarantee from then on we knew the difference between a P51 and a Messerschmitt 109.”

After returning to the states, Young went back to school, earning his Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engi-neering at Texas Tech and a masters at the University of Texas-Austin. He is certified in mechanical, electrical and civil engineering in both Texas and New Mexico.

Young even-tually took a job with the Southwest Public Service Company, now Excel Energy, in Oklahoma. After skillfully handling a massive power outage one win-ter during an ice storm that coated most of the Oklahoma panhandle in several inches of ice, Young was promoted to the supervisor of the power company’s Oklahoma and Kansas region.

“They called me in the middle of the night and said, ‘we need you here right now,’” Young said in reference to the ice storm. “Everything was on the ground. At one point, I had 2,300 people work-ing under me. I had to drive over 40 miles to use a phone, but we got every-thing back up and hot in 31 days.”

Not long after his promotion, Young visited Albuquerque to visit a friend from the service.

“He told me he had an interview with Sandia Labs lined up for me in the morning. I wasn’t really that interested. I was the top man in my region, so why would I want to go back to the bottom of the ladder?” Young said. “He said, ‘Oh just go. It will be quick.’”

That one quick interview turned into an 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. marathon of seven inter-views that ended in seven job offers. For an extra $275 a month, Young made the ‘down-ward’ move and took a position with the lab.

“I had a family and five, six mouths to feed,” he said. For five years, Young tested the firing systems components and became lead engineer in that department.

Eventually, he was transferred to sys-tems with the test and evaluation team.

“We were the ones that tested, stock-piled and certified the building of the weapons,” he said.

During his time with Sandia, Young worked on projects such as the Persian and Minuteman missile development.

“We were fighting the Cold War. I certified the neutron bomb to go for manufacture and stockpiling,” he said. “I was their main warhead guy.”

ON THE FAR RIGHT, in the back row is Marion G. “Red” Young, a Peralta resident by way of Texas. Young was the radio operator for his flight crew during World War II. He survived 70 missions bombing enemy territory.

“It was blood and guts over there. Our blood, and our

guts.”MARION “RED” YOUNG

WWII veteran


Matanzas have a long history in our commu-nity. In fact, the matanza tradition came to New Mexico from Spain. Many who attend a matanza for the first time ask why matanzas are held during our coldest time of the year. Traditionally, matanza season starts before Christmas. The main focus is to bring family and friends together. It’s a very social event usually ending with homemade tortillas, red chile and pork, tamales & chicharones to celebrate. In earlier times, without refrig-eration, the cold winter kept the food from spoiling and easier to store and dry meat. Though times are different, the culture and tradition are still popular and what a better way to embrace this heritage by joining in on the 10th Annual Hispano Matanza 2010.

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Come celebrate our10th Annual Matanza on January 30, 2010

Call 505-702-9468www.hispanomatanza.com

valencia county news-bulletin: locals 2009

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