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​History Blog

Going Inside the Archives to Visit the Pajarito Club

2/3/2021

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“If Ashley hadn't created the Pajarito Club, he would never have met Harold Brook and started the Los Alamos Ranch School. Without that school on the mesa, the Manhattan Project would most likely not have been located here, and all of us would be living somewhere else today!”
A horse-drawn wagon loaded with provisions sits in front of a two-story building. Two people unload the wagon, three stand in the doorway.
Pajarito Club around 1915 or 1916. Peggy Pond Church Collection, Los Alamos Historical Society Photo Archives.

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Master Cottage #1 And The History It Has Seen

2/1/2021

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Master Cottage #1 shown in 2018, now known as the Hans Bethe House and Harold Agnew Cold War Gallery. Photo by Todd Nickols
By SHARON SNYDER

The Los Alamos Ranch School (LARS) was in its seventh year when Director A.J. Connell had a small wooden building constructed to the west of the Big House to use as director’s quarters, giving him some privacy and freeing up space in the main building. 

However, there was a slight miscalculation, and long foul balls from the nearby baseball field had the potential to land on his roof. When Fuller Lodge was under construction in 1928, Connell moved to the third floor and turned over the small plank house to two young masters—Lawrence Hitchcock and Art Chase.

In 1931, during a cold winter, the wooden cottage caught fire. With nearby Ashley Pond frozen over, there was little water to fight the flames, and the structure burned to the ground. There was, however, something odd about the fire. May Connell, A.J.’s sister, noted that one corner of the house burned much longer than the rest of the building. The explanation revealed that a 30-gallon keg of corn whiskey was stored in that corner! (Prohibition was still in force but winding down, and the young men said they were aging the keg in case prices increased when prohibition ended.)

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Bathtub Row In Three Eras Of History

2/1/2021

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By SHARON SNYDER
Los Alamos Historical Society

​The road that is Bathtub Row today passed by masters’ quarters and classrooms during the Los Alamos Ranch School years. During the Manhattan Project, it was the road to the houses assigned to key staff members at Project Y, and now it leads to lovely homes, the History Museum, the offices of the Los Alamos Historical Society, and Fuller Lodge. The lane that became Bathtub Row has been significant in three eras of our history.

In the beginning the road was dirt and not much wider than a path. It wound its way through the Los Alamos Ranch School (LARS) property, and gradually a few rustic buildings appeared along the way. Those structures, built of logs and stone in the 1920s and 30s, are historic today.
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The sign that made Bathtub Row an official street name. Photo by Sharon Snyder

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Duchess Castle

1/11/2021

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In January on Facebook we're going #InsideTheArchives to enjoy one of the treasures of Los Alamos history through the years. Following the Tsankawi Trail, you have a great overlook of what is now known as Duchess Castle. While this weathered structure is on National Park Service's Bandelier National Monument land its history impacts the Pajarito Plateau and continues to capture imaginations today.
Partial adobe walls are in the foreground, students on horseback ride behind the structures.
Peter Dechert took this photo in the early 1940s. Los Alamos Historical Society Photo Archives.
How Duchess Castle looks today. Photo by Bandelier National Monument, NPS.

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Edith Warner’s Christmas Letter, 1943

12/20/2020

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By SHARON SNYDER
​

In this very different Christmas season, I find comfort in the words of Edith Warner, the woman who lived at Otowi Bridge. Life hands us challenges in many different ways. 

The challenges we are facing now are different from the ones she faced during World War II, but the way she faced them with strength and hope can be a comforting inspiration. 
Edith wrote Christmas letters to her friends each year. In sharing this one with you, I’ve had to delete some parts to stay within the publishing space available, but the flow of her thoughts and the message are still there.

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The Oppenheimer House Through Time

12/8/2020

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This month on Facebook we're going #InsideTheArchives to explore the Oppenheimer House at 1967 Peach St. Affectionately called the Oppenheimer House, the log and stone structure was built in 1929 for the Los Alamos Ranch School.
Four students stand in the back row. Two students sit on the ground on either side of the front row, then two students sit on chairs, and in the center of the front row two students sit on a wooden box painted with horses and flowers. All are wearing Boy Scout uniforms.
Laura Gilpin photographed these Los Alamos Ranch School students in front of the Oppenheimer House around 1935. This is probably the Fir or Spruce Patrol, the two oldest patrols at the school. Back row: Chuck Pearce, John Wolf, James Woodhull, and Talbott Mead. Front row: Sandy Chapin, John Kiser, Jamie Soper, John Simondon, Henry Preston, and Paul Frank. Gift of Peggy Pond Church. Gilpin Collection, Los Alamos Historical Society Photo Archives.

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An Ancestral Pueblo Site In The Middle Of Town

12/7/2020

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This photo accompanied the 1959 article in the LASL Community News and shows the fenced area. The boys and their dog are Dick Lilienthal, 12; Dick Baker, 10; Chip Lilienthal, 10; and Shag, Courtesy/LASL Community News
By SHARON SNYDER

I’ve walked past the Ancestral Puebloan site in our historic district often since I moved back to Los Alamos in 2014, and I’ve sometimes wondered why I never noticed it when I was growing up here in the late 1950s and 1960s. Then, while doing research in our archives one afternoon, I noticed a story and photograph on the front page of the LASL Community News of Aug. 13, 1959. The picture showed that the pueblo remnants were behind a chain link fence and obscured by overgrown weeds and tall grasses.
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The only structure visible in the scene behind the fence was a small stone building that had been part of the Los Alamos Ranch School campus. It was built in the 1920s by Severo Gonzales Sr., a homesteader hired by the school’s director, A.J. Connell, to build a stone storage structure to store firefighting equipment for extinguishing fires that might result from droughts or the use of wood burning stoves. Unfortunately, the stones used for that building came from the Ancestral Puebloan site, a common practice in the years before such structures were seriously studied and revered.


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Thanksgiving at the Ranch School

11/26/2020

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By SHARON SNYDER
Los Alamos Historical Society

The observance of Thanksgiving at Los Alamos Ranch School (LARS) in 1941 was the last one of a traditional nature. Ten days later, Pearl Harbor was bombed, and within the next few months Headmaster Lawrence Hitchcock and other masters would be in the military on active duty, but in 1941 the holiday was carefree.


A fine turkey dinner with all the trimmings was served in Fuller Lodge and enjoyed by staff and visitors as well as all but five of the LARS boys. William “Bee” Barr went home to Chama to be with his family. Jim Thorpe invited Wilson Hurley to spend the weekend with his family in Santa Fe, and Charley Butler and Stirling Colgate traveled to Albuquerque to be with relatives.


The long weekend was filled with activities for the boys who stayed at the school. Outings were arranged for those wanting to get away for the weekend and experience other New Mexico sites. Eleven boys went to Acoma, chaperoned by Master Oscar Steege. Senior Patrol Leader Ben Raskob went along and assisted with the driving. That group took a short side trip to the Albuquerque airport and were given a tour of one of the army’s large bombers.


Other students chose to spend three days at Camp Hamilton with Headmaster Hitchcock and Master Harry Walen. They explored nearby pueblos and cliff dwellings as well as doing their part in caring for the cabin and preparing meals.


Boys who chose to remain at the school stayed busy as they worked to clear the ski area on Sawyer Mesa. In the three days, they removed brush and trees to prepare for the upcoming ski season. Master Cecil Wirth was in charge of skiing at LARS and supervised the workers. A weekend snow fell as the young men removed logs from their ski run and looked forward to the outings they made possible.


Masters Harry Walen and Fermor Church used some of their time off to drive to Santa Fe to listen to the annual Harvard-Yale football game with other area graduates of those universities, but there was also another reason for their trip. They brought back to Los Alamos a very important passenger. As they drove home that evening they were accompanied by Mrs. Walen and her new son, born Nov. 8 at St. Vincent’s Hospital. Welcoming the new little resident to the ranch school wrapped up a fine holiday.


​A year later, the Thanksgiving observance of 1942 had a very different tone as the turkey dinner was served at Fuller Lodge. The boys contemplated an unknown future, and LARS Director A.J. Connell and the remaining masters awaited a letter from the War Department that would reveal the fate of the school. The Los Alamos Thanksgiving of 1943 was observed by young men and women living behind a fence and working on a secret effort that would become known as the Manhattan Project.
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Manhattan Project Secrecy

11/4/2020

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On Facebook this month we're going #InsideTheArchives to explore Manhattan Project secrecy.
The examiner wrote: “Sorry, Wilder, The idea is that NO EVIDENCE of censorship is to leave the site. (The official card of notification is returned to the security office). Please, no mention of ‘censorship,’ ‘security,’ ‘secrecy,’ etc. / By the way, we don’t discourage the ‘X’s’-- / Good Luck--and we’ll try not to ‘get in your hair’ too often, ‘2034’ “
A military examiner, identified only as #2034, used these two censor form slips to return a letter to Edward Wilder. Wilder Collection, Los Alamos Historical Society Archives and Collections.

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Shopping in Los Alamos

10/20/2020

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On Facebook we went #InsideTheArchives to explore some of the history of Los Alamos retail. Click through to explore historic photos and artifacts from businesses and shopping in the past.
Proprietors George Hillhouse and Henry Martin are dressed in baker's clothing and stand behind a counter filled with baked goods. Mrs. Henry Martin stands behind the cash register which is to the left of another pastry filled counter. A tall shelf filled with goods stands in the far corner and holds a telephone. Mirrors behind Mrs. Martin produce the reflections of the two men.
George Hillhouse and Mr. and Mrs. Martin in the Los Alamos Pastry Shop, sometime between 1947–1957. Los Alamos Historical Society Photo Archive.

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    These articles are written by the Los Alamos Historical Society Staff. Many of these articles were originally published by the
    ​Los Alamos Daily Post.  

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  • Home
  • About Us
    • Who We Are
    • Contact
  • Museum
    • Plan Your Visit
    • Tours
    • Museum Campus
    • Exhibits >
      • Online and Temporary Exhibits
    • Victory Garden
  • Archive
    • About the Archive
    • Research Appointments
    • Inside the Archives
    • Share Your Stories
    • COVID-19 Collecting
  • Learn / Research
    • Information For Teachers
    • Information For Caregivers
    • Explore Los Alamos
    • Topics & Resources >
      • History Blog
      • National History Day
      • Homestead Driving Tour
      • History at Home
      • Pioneering Women in Los Alamos
      • Development of the Atomic Bomb
      • Links and Resources
  • Programs
    • Upcoming Events
    • Lecture Series
    • 2020 Gala
    • History Award
    • Los Alamos / Japan Project
  • Donate
    • Oppenheimer House Fund
    • Membership
    • Donate to Projects
    • Legacy Society
    • Collections Donations
    • Donate Your Time- Volunteer
  • Shop
    • Books
    • Audio Books & DVDs
    • Children's Books & Gifts
    • Apparel
    • Gifts