Fort Sumner
34°24′07″N 104°11′41″W / 34.40194°N 104.19472°W
Fort Sumner Ruins | |
Nearest city | Fort Sumner, New Mexico |
---|---|
Area | 50 acres (20 ha) |
Built | 1862 |
Architect | Alexander LaRue |
NRHP reference No. | 74001194[1] |
NMSRCP No. | 139 |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | August 13, 1974 |
Designated NMHS | 1968[2] |
Designated NMSRCP | January 9, 1970 |
Fort Sumner was a
History
On October 31, 1862,
The
When the Bosque Redondo was established, Gen. Carleton ordered Col.
In April 1865 there were about 8,500 Navajo and 500
The 1868 Treaty of Bosque Redondo was negotiated with the Navajo and they were allowed to return to their homeland, to a "new reservation". They were joined by the thousands of Navajo who had been hiding out in the Arizona Territory hinterlands. This experience resulted in a more determined Navajo, and never again were they surprised by raiders of the Rio Grande valley.[7] In subsequent years, they have expanded the "new reservation" into well over 16 million acres (65,000 km2).
Fort Sumner was abandoned in 1869 and purchased by
Fort Sumner Historic Site
A hundred years after the signing of the treaty that allowed the Navajo people to return to their original homes in the Four Corners Region, Fort Sumner was declared a New Mexico State Monument in 1968.
The property is now managed by the New Mexico Historic Sites (formerly State Monuments) division of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. On June 4, 2005, a new museum designed by Navajo architect David N. Sloan was opened on the site as the Bosque Redondo Memorial. Congress had authorized the establishment of the memorial by the Secretary of Defense in 2000, making federal funds available for construction.[8]
The Bosque Redondo Memorial and Fort Sumner Historic Site are located 6.5 miles (10.5 km) southeast of Fort Sumner, New Mexico: 3 miles (4.8 km) east on U.S. Route 60/U.S. Route 84, then 3.5 miles (5.6 km) south on Billy The Kid Road.
See also
Notes
- ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
- ^ "About New Mexico's Historic Sites". New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. Archived from the original on October 30, 2016. Retrieved December 22, 2016.
- ^ "Fort Sumner Historic Site/Bosque Redondo Memorial" Archived 2016-06-13 at the Wayback Machine, New Mexico Historic Sites website
- ^ https://www.newmexico.org/fort-sumner/, New Mexico website
- ^ Brown, Dee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West. Thirtieth Anniversary Edition. Henry Holt and Company, 2000. pp. 28–29.
- ^ Very Slim Man, Navajo elder, quoted by Richard Van Valkenburgh, Desert Magazine, April, 1946, p. 23.
- ^ Indian Depredations in New Mexico, John S. Watts, Wash. D.C., 1858, 66 pages.
- ^ "Public Law 106-511 – Title II–Bosque Redondo Memorial". uscode.house.gov. Retrieved 2019-04-01.
References
- Bosque Redondo – destination of the long walk
- The Long Walk Trail Of The Navajos
- Thompson, Gerald (1976). The Army and the Navajo: The Bosque Redondo Reservation Experiment 1863–1868. Tucson, Arizona: The University of Arizona Press. ISBN 0-8165-0495-4
External links
- New Mexico State Historic Sites – Fort Sumner Historic Site/Bosque Redondo Memorial
- New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs
- History of the NASA Scientific Balloon Flight Facility from which are launched stratospheric balloons each year