by Kathleen Blair.
Greetings to all from the Black Range Museum Bookshelf! In our Gift Shop we carry about 100 titles to offer for an interesting selection to feed your curiosity. We emphasize books relevant to the Hillsboro Historical Society’s mission statement and topics developed in our museum displays. We have many titles on the people and events that have impacted our region of the southwest including Native Americans, mining, ranching, local community development, significant places, and historical events, as well as natural history. We also keep books on more current activities such as hiking and camping, field guides, a children’s section, our giftshop artist skills, and a few southwestern classics just for a good, thoughtful read! In these periodic notes, I will try to keep abreast as new tiles are acquired and favorites revisited. Remember, with your membership you receive our Quarterly Journal filled with interesting articles as well.
For today here are a few interesting titles to pique your interest in coming to visit your museum!
Boy Who Made Dragonfly – A beautiful retelling of the powerful Zuni Myth by Tony Hillerman, one of New Mexico’s most beloved writers.
Buffalo Soldiers: A Narrative of the Negro Cavalry in the West – William Leckies’ book is still regarded as one of the best written on this subject. Units of the 9th and 10th Cavalry operated out of several places in the southern Black Range, including a camp in Hillsboro, and had several significant engagements in our area.
Embree (Sonny) Hale of Sierra County, New Mexico; Stories of his life in Sierra County and in the Black Range is a book transcribed by Susan Roebuck and published by the Hillsboro Historical Society of a notable, long time local resident.
Nobody’s Horses: The Dramatic Rescue of the Wild Herd of White Sands. Don Hoglund tells the story of the “last Roundup” of a historically significant wild horse herd from the White Sands Missile Range area. These are descendants of the horses of Pat Garrett, Eugene Manlove Rhodes, many smaller ranchers, and escapees from the historic Jornada del Muerto trail.
Tracking Nana – Nana was one of the most significant leaders of the Chihenne band of Chiricahua Apache and the southern Black Range was very much his home. R.M. Hagan brings him to life particularly focusing on an extraordinary raid and pilgrimage he and a few followers made in 1881 – when Nana was nearly 80 years of age covering over 1,000 miles in less than a month and included the Hillsboro area.
