Tales from the Morgue

1964: Previously unpublished Chamizal Treaty photos

I recently discovered about 240 photo negatives taken during the Sept. 25, 1964 Chamizal Treaty meeting between Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and President Adolfo Lopez Mateos of Mexico. The two presidents met to formally resolve the long-running land dispute between Mexico and the United States.

The vast majority of these photos are never before published and probably not seen in forty-nine years. If you have any additional information on any of the photos in the photo galleries below please email me at [email protected] or call 915.546-6179.

Photos: Chamizal Treaty meeting

1952: Flood Caused Founding Of Socorro Mission

June 22, 1952

By CLEOFAS CALLEROS
(Editor’s Note: This is the 13th of a series on El Paso del Norte Missions by Cleofas Calleros, El Paso historian.)

There is a legend, and a strange one, told among residents of this valley. It is a story that takes one’s fancy, and that strongly suggests the supernatural. However, it is held to be truth by many, which fact gives it worthy historical significance.

According to the legend, a wooden image of San Miguel was being transported by ox cart to New Mexico. The Indians, entering El Paso del Norte Valley on their tedious journey, were anxious to travel as far as possible with their burden by nightfall. But a bewildering thing happened. At one point along the river the cumbersome team of four oxen bogged deep into the mire, the ladened cart slowly sinking with it.

This was an irritating delay to their progress. The tired Indians strained at the cart for hours, pulling at the chains and frightening the animals, but no strength could budge them. They seemed permanently lodged there, as if by the will of God, and it was thus so that the Indians interpreted the incident.

And so at the exact spot where the oxen had stalled the faithful natives erected a mission, designed in the form of a cross, and dedicated to its patron saint, San Miguel. This was the beginning of the original Socorro Mission, built in 1683, but inundated by a change of the Rio Bravo bed in 1776.

The mission had come to play an important part in the life of the Valley Indians, which truth left the padres no other course than to duplicate the old one. This, they knew, would be an undertaking that would employ their energies for years. It would entail months of backbreaking labor, bringing materials and carved beams over miles of hot desert from Mexico.

Had a contract been signed, it would have specified that construction was to be completed 64 years from that date, that the site of the mission was to be one mile from the original one, and that dimensions were to be the same.

In 1840 the completed mission was an architectural wonder of its day. The intricately carved ceiling was, and today is, the only one of its kind in the country. These “vigas,” closely resembling herring fish ceilings, are the most interesting part of the mission to tourist.

WALLS THICK

The walls, three feet in depth and formerly wide enough for two men to walk on them pushing wheel barrows, as well as the woodwork of the mission, contribute further toward making it an architectural gem. Although the wooden frame of the structure is not held together by steel nails, but by wooden pegs, it is nevertheless as secure and stable as the day they were placed.

Wandering through the mission, one sees the original statue of San Miguel, standing prominently in a niche on the left side of the church where once it was proudly placed by its owners. Searching further, one encounters a room in which the vestments and equipment are stored in anticipation of Passion Week when the natives will portray the Passion from its beginning to the Resurrections.

To one who will let his imagination soar, the low, oblong room speaks out of the past. It is damp and wet. In one corner an image of the crucified Christ, its hair and eyes dark brown and its face sallow and blood-stained, lies in a wooden sepulcher beneath cloths of silk and linen. One is startled by the torn and emaciated body.

Leaning against the wall is an old cross, so heavy that it is barely portable, which is carried annually by one of the natives in the pageant. Antique mural paintings, designed on elk’s hide and canvas, are further remnants of an Indian regime contained in the room.

Originally Mision de Nuestra Senora de la Concepcion de el pueblo de Socorro, and then Mision de San Miguel del Sur, and finally La Mision de la Purisma, is a legendary and colorful page in this region’s history. From its cottonwood trees outside several outlaws have hanged, these being bandits that had come from independent state of Texas and rudely asserted their sovereignty over the valley.

These and others were disposed of while the sagacious old mission look attentively on.

Remember September 25, 1964?

Remember the 1960's? Recognize the family shaking hands with President Lyndon B, Johnson in this photo?

This was President's Johnson's Sep. 1964 visit to El Paso to meet with Mexican President Adolfo Lopez Mateos to settle the Chamizal dispute.

An article from the coverage says crowds lined the route and LBJ's motorcade stopped so he could shake hands. This house was at 3101 Gateway West, the street was Madera street before I-10 was built. This is not the family that lived at that address.

Contact me with any information on this photo at [email protected] or 915-546-6179.

1899: Festive Hoboes Rounded Up Last Night And Put To Work This Morning

January 3, 1899

It was a tough looking band of ten which compromised the chain gang which left the police station this morning in compliance with the order of Chief Lockart, to advance the improvement of the new city park. When brought from their cells into the chief’s office, they all had pitiful stories o tell of their past lives. One of them, in particular, was very much indignant over being arrested and vowed he would make the city pay dearly for it in a damage suit. He gave his name as Frank Linkey and said that he had a brother in San Francisco who was a prominent attorney and that he would see to it that the city of El Paso paid dearly for arresting him. He said that nothing less than $10,000 would heal the wound inflicted by the poisonous blade of the El Paso law. The chief leaned back in his chair and rather enjoyed the animated talk made by the man who claimed that his felling were bleeding buckets of blood, and assured him that every attention would be paid to his case. After the office was cleared the chief said that almost half the number on the chain gang today had been given a chance to get out of town. “One of them, in particular,” said the chief, “has been in here three times and every time he promised to leave town if he was released. I took his word for it but here he is again. I am getting very tired of this element and intend to make a round up every night and all I find will be put to work on the new city park grounds.” The chief told the men who composed the gang today that if they worked well and a good report was made of them this evening, he would release all of them if they would leave town on the first train. They all agreed to do their best and they will, in all probability, be given their liberty this evening.

In the estimation of the police both the Bridgers woman and the Paxton woman, who were arrested yesterday on a charge of theft from person and transferred to the county jail, will be given terms in the penitentiary. No more of the money stolen from the old man has been recovered. He was relived of $100 and $38 of this amount, as reported in yesterday’s paper, is in possession of the police.

There is a Richard Roo and John Doe on the docket this morning. Mr. Roo was fined $2 for being drunk and disorderly, while his doughnuts was picked up for being a common vag.

A chinaman by the name of Luis was arrested for riding a blind bike and was assessed $1 which he paid.

Henry blue was arrested by Franco for fighting and disturbing the peace and was fined two dollars.

1931: Prisoners Ask For Telephone In Jail Cells

April 16, 1931

Also Requests Radios to Hear Amos 'n' Andy and Time To Visit Wives

A switchboard would have to be installed in county jail and a telephone placed in every cell if the requests of friends and relatives of prisoners were complied wlth, according to Sheriff Tom Armstrong.

Armstrong said persons call the jail many times and ask, to be connected with some prisoner. They
seem to think there is a telephone in each cell, he said.

"An extra crew of jailers would have to be kept on duty day and night to take prisoners between
their cells and the telephone if we complied with all those requests," the sheriff said.

County jailers say prisoners are often indignant because they are not offered all the conveniences of
home.

They ask for-magazines to read, fans for their cells in the summer, ice water, radio music, feather matresses and time off to go home and visit their wives, Jas. Lowenstein., chief jailer, says'

"They want radios in their cells to hear Amos 'n' Andy" Lowenstein said.

"They get mad when we don't do those things. They seem to think we are the cause of them being in
jail and make demands for comfort instead of taking a jail sentence as punishment."

1913: Free Harry Prince; Police Satisfied He didn’t Help Take Pictures

September 12, 1913

On the plea that he was not in any of the pictures taken by Sam H. London’s moving picture company, Harry Prince, who was arrested Wednesday in connection with the taking of “red-light” district views by that company, was released from custody yesterday morning.

Prince stated that he was in an automobile watching the making of the pictures. He told Police Captain W.D. Greet that other El Pasoans had been employed by the New York company to appear in various scenes, but that a majority of them got away before the detectives appeared.

In a letter to the Times, Rabbi Martin Zielonka of the Temple Mt. Sinai, denies the claim of London, who told Police Chief I.N. Davis that he was taking a series of moving pictures for a Hebrew society of New York. Rabbi Zielonka writes as follows:

September 11, 1913.

“Editor Morning Times – In answer to many inquires I wish to say that Mr. S.H. London is not connected with any ‘Hebrew’ society of national standing and according to the best information I am able to obtain the pictures were not taken for ‘a Hebrew society of national standing to be shown in civic societies throughout the United States in a crusade against the white slave traffic,’ but it was the work of a private corporation organized for profit. At the same time I wish to say that Mr. London is not the author of a book dealing with the white slave traffic, at east no such book has seen the light of day.

“Sincerely yours,

Martin Zielonka”

With the release of Prince the case is closed. All the principals of the “movie” company having left the city and the film made by them, which was confiscated by the police, will be destroyed.

The police force has been instructed to watch all people carrying Kodaks and no one is allowed to take pictures on Broadway. One man who said he was a tourist was stopped yesterday by the two patrolmen on that beat and made to open up his Kodak. He was not allowed to proceed until he had shown them that his Koadak did not have a film in it.

1963: 1914 Mines Class Had Easy Time (?)

September 16, 1963

A student at the brand-new Texas School of Mines and Metallurgy in September, 1914 would have had an easeir time, in some ways, than his counterpart entering Texas Western College 49 years later.

The student, whose college had been authorized by the State Legislature in 1913, wouldn't have
worried about thousands of strange faces, or which fraternity to join: there were 28 students in the college's first class.

Nor would he have found it a problem to know the faculty members. There were three—Dr. S. H. Worrell, dean of the school; J. W. (Capt.) Kidd, and Prof. Frank H. Seamon.

(AT LEAST the names would be familar to 1914 and 1963 students, Worrell Hall is a dormitory,
Seamon Hall the mining and metallurgy classroom building, and Kidd Field the older football stadium at the present college.)

Neither would 1914's man on campus develop sore muscles from climbing hills and dashing
from one building to another. The School of Mines campus consisted of one building, formerly owned by the defunct El Paso Military Institute and donated by the City to the State of Texas.

It was located east of the city in what is now the heart of Ft. Bliss.

There were no modern-time feuds between the "Westsiders" (engineering and geology students) and "peedoggies"  (liberal arts students). Everybody was a "Westsider."

The courses offered consisted mainly of geology, engineering, chemistry, assaying and metallurgy.

Both 1914 and 1963 students enjoyed the same sport—football. The early Miners faced vast problems in finding and equipping 11 men to take the field. The team was cheered, not by up to 30,000 fans, but by a few dozen interested El Pasoans.

Even so, 1914's team enjoyed a reasonably good season, squeezing by the YMCA squad, 7-6 and smashnig 20th Infantry, 27-0. However, the Miners lost to El Paso High School and the Dig
college to the north, New Mexico A. and M.

In 1914, too, the Texas Mines student had no parking problems.

1931: El Paso Wife-Seeker Gets Two Proposals

July 29, 1931

Tularosa Women With 'Plenty of Money' Want George Strand To Look Them Over and Take His Pick

Geo. O. Strand, 408 Wyoming, Wednesday had a chance to marry, and he can take his pick of two
Tularosa, N. M., women.'

Last week he offered to marry any woman with good sense and enough money to set him up In business.

The Tularosa women heard of his offer, and agreed to let him make a choice between them.

Strand is waiting to have an interview before he decides which one he wants.

"They wrote me that they had plenty of money so we wouldn't have to worry," he said. "And they
want to get married. After I look them over, maybe we can fix it up."

Strand had two telephone calls. One woman decided to delay her proposal a week until she had time
to think it over, he said.