Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1905-12-27
A VISIT TO OLD SANTA FE.
lhe First of a Series of Weekly Letters
From Charles A. Byers Who is Making
a Tour TO old Mexico and the South
west and Will Describe his
Travels for Public Opin-
ion Readers.

Special Correspondence Santa Fe,
sometime destined to be the capital OF
a new state, is an interesting city.
The Southwest has many Meccas,
but among them none stand out more
conspicuously as atfording interest to
tourists than does this little city of
the Holy Faith. Astounding as it
does with some of the oldest relics of
European colonization in America, AID
presenting representations of each
succeeding period of architectural
progress up to the present day, the
modern Santa Fe affords opportunities
for study equalled by no other city
in the United States.
When Coronado, in 1910, with his
proud band of Castilian knights,
penetrating the then unexplored
Southwest of new America on his
fruitless hunt for the seven tabled
cities of Cibola, he found where today
stands Santa Fe, an Indian pueblo,
containing what he estimated to be
fifteen hundred souls. This was the
first time that white men had ever
looked upon that valley. In about
the same year, however, or probably
year later Catholic missionaries be-
gan the erection of church at this
,,laoa for Indian oopyartc I'm rh;c
account there are some who argue that
Santa Fe is entitled to precedence in
point of priority as an European
settlement over st. Augustine. Our
historians, however, fail to recognize
this claim, and in consequence 1892,
the year in which it was permanently
founded by the Spaniards, is given as
the date of'the birth of the real Santa
Fe. The name then given it was
LA Cindad Real de la Santa Fe de
San Francisco meaning ''T h Q
Royal City of the Holy Faith of st.
Francis, which name has been
reduced in the lapse of time to the pre-
sent lower term. Immediately after
it was founded it became the seat of
government for the part of New
Spain which was ceded to the United
States in l84S.
The traveller ON nearing Santa Fe
beholds, nestled on plain within the
embrace of encircling mountains
whose peaks tower to heights of 10, 600
and 5000 feet, busy little city of
6, 900 inhabitants-the oldest capital
in the United States, and still of only
territory. Above the many shade
and fruit trees peep the spires of
churches of nearly every denomination
and of schools and colleges: the dome
of the capital and other public buid-
ings, and the chimneys of handsome
residences. Around the city, scattered
over the hills and plains, are pro-
ductiSe mines of many valuable
minerals and well irrigated fields of
grain, and entering the city from as
many different directions are three
railroads, each accompanied by it's
telegraph lines.
AS the traveller draws nearer he
learns that his distant view has not
been misleading, but that there is a
model little city. 1t has telephone,
electric light and water work system
and all other modern improvements.
But the view now is Lot only of the
modern. Side by side with these
modern structures and improvements
one finds struggling groups of low
adobe huts, among which wind mar
row, unsidewalked lanes. Tumbled
or partly tumbled down houses, oc-
casionally an old church and may be
the crumbling ruins of a garita, or
fort, also help make up the view, all
of which are monuments to past age.
and the stories that cling to these
relics are of more than passing interest
Here one also finds associated with
the city's busy Americanized citizens
anu itS NAoiti~k tOoitOPOAttoh tOuAiSoS,
a people that we'll match these
antiquated surroundings, as interesting
in appearance and customs as would
be, imagine, vitisoopic portrayal
of the inhabitants of Santa Fe of two
and half centuries ago. In the
shadows of their one and sometimes
two-story huts, often built as many
as two hudred years ago of sun-dried
brick, or within doors on the
earthen floor, sat wrinkled-faced old
men and women in apparent idleness,
while before thsir doors sleepy looking
burros loaded with fire wood or garden
truck pass lazily to and fro at the
admonition of a Mexican "herder. "
There are also groups of chattering
girls to be met now and then, and
should he ask question of them, the
visitor may expect nothing more in
reply, in spite of the closely drawn
| tapalo, than glimpse of interrogating