holy cows

 

In the Texico Cemetery, the Ortiz family plot abuts pasture land.  Tumbleweeds line the boundary between the cemetery and adjacent acreage.  The original purpose of fences in cemeteries was two-fold -- to protect the graves from cattle and define the family plots.  When the popularity of municipally owned cemeteries grew, fences and other borders became a way to mark a family's burial plot as well as to keep people from tampering with flowers left or to keep stray animals from wandering onto the grave. The type of border used depended on the financial resources of the family. The Ortiz family, perhaps of modest means, has simple iron posts topped with crosses.  In earlier times, the family could order ironwork in a variety of styles from pickets and hairpins or posts that were panel, square or scrolled.  In any case, the Texico cows are more interested in the photographer than the denizens of the graveyard.

 

Texico Cemetery

Texico, New Mexico

1.2.2014

gone and forgotten

 

The heyday of Texico, New Mexico lasted less than a decade.  The first settlers arrived in 1902, the site bustled with churches and saloons, and then the railroad located in nearby Clovis.  Many business moved lock, stock and barrel.  The cemetery just outside town has participated in the Cemeteries of New Mexico preservation project and has maintained its gravestones amid the arid landscape. "Unknown" marks the final resting place a forgotten early citizen.

 

Texico Cemetery

Texico, New Mexico

1.2.2014

 



this way to ???

 

For my birthday, my friend gave me a book entitled "Going Going Gone" about vanishing cultural icons.  She said it suited me because that's what I photograph.  I'm drawn to old signs, dilapidated buildings and cemeteries.  This sign and a concrete slab stand at the crossroads of US 84 and 60.  There is a motel just north of the corner.  To see what the Crossroads Motel sign supposedly looked like in 2010, click here.  Honestly, after all the trips through Texico, I don't remember the sign.  However, according to an online realty ad, this is about the time you could have bought the Crossroads Motel for $65,000.  Now the sign points aimlessly nowhere.

 

I also learned a new word.  "Texico" is a portmanteau of Texas and New Mexico  so named because the town is on the border of the two states.  Only an imaginary line and a railroad track separates Texico from its Texas twin Farwell.  Follow the directional arrow on the cemetery sign to the Texico Cemetery where a barbed wire fence separates the tombstones from the grazing cattle.

 

Texico, New Mexico

1.2.2014