Turbulent Taos

By Den Galbraith

Revolutions, native conspiracies and subsequent insurrections, filthy mountain men sleeping on the dirt and wrestling with grizzlies, radical priests, belligerent American soldiers, betrayal, violence, early forms of commerce, and other enthralling accounts are part of this small New Mexico town’s history. Complete with illustrations and archived photographs, “Turbulent Taos” is Den Galbraith’s groundbreaking examination of Taos’s wild past in its pre to post territorial days. Informative and entertaining, the narrative reads like a boozed-up solitary poet smiling into the calm desert night. Huddle with the pueblo natives as they consult the spirits of the dead to revolt against the onslaught of Spanish imperialism in 1680. Learn what “The Massacre of 1760” was all about. Who were some of the first Americans to arrive? Who was Kit Carson? Why has Taos always been a hotbed for political turmoil? Galbraith takes the reader on a journey from the vast expanse of early pueblo life to the artist colonies that have flourished since the late 19th century. Everything in between is hell. Men of all color have shed blood on this sacred land that makes one visualize the blood red reflection of the setting sun ricocheting off the intimidating Sangre de Cristo Mountains that shroud Taos.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sunstone Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2011
• ISBN: 9781611390469

Book preview

TAOS sits in an embayment of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Its cluster of earth-colored adobes look like a helter-skelter grouping of brown boulders that have rolled off the mountain slopes. To its front, the broad, rolling, gray-green plain stretches as far as the Jemez Mountains, essentially unbroken except for the tumble of desert hills which resemble scoops of melted pistachio ice cream. The Rio Grande runs through a deeply-incised, vertical-sided canyon of black basalt which looks like a split in an overripe watermelon.

The town is old. A sign in the plaza gives a date of 1615. That’s quite old. That’s old enough for the place to have established some traditions and legends and Taos has plenty of traditions and legends. And enough history to fill several books, yet several books could never tell the complete story.

As much or as little as we know of Taos, no historian as yet has positively determined the origin of its name. We know that the village was early designated as Don Fernado de Taos, after a Captain Don Fernando de Chavez, but the Taos portion remains an enigma. It may have come from tu-o-ta, red willow place, or from tua-tah, place of the village. Yet others contend the name stems from a Chinese word, Tao—the way—and not just a few Indians have suggested that Taos means the place of the sacred mountain.

Its name has been spelled and misspelled dozens of ways. Early documents called it Braba and Valladolid. Roving Zebulon Pike mentioned the town variously as Tons, Tous, and Toas, these variations sometimes blamed on a tongue-in-cheek editor, while the engraver for his map labelled it Yaos. George C. Sibley stayed in Taos during his expedition of 1825-1826, and his diary mentioned San Fernando, San Fernandez, Tous, and Taos. Joseph C. Brown, surveyor for the expedition, mentioned Taos Valley and San Fernando, the principal village in Taos. Others have reported a Taosi and Teaos.

Don Fernando de Taos, the Spanish town of Taos, was settled in the early 1600s. It has long been a trading center, beginning in prehistoric times when Taos Pueblo Indians traded with the Apaches, Utes, Navajos, Comanches, and Pawnees. The first official annual Taos trade fair was held at Don Fernando de Taos in 1723.

No matter! Whatever its origin, Taos has been popular as a local place name: a county, the three towns, a mountain range (The Taos Range forms part of the Sangre de Cristo), a mountain, a stream, a canyon, and a valley. One thing for sure, its present pronunciation Ta-ous, like house undoubtedly originated with the colorful mountain men.

Taos! The name has an intriguing sound. And, after all, why not? Taos is a vastly different sort of place.

The Early Years

RECORDED HISTORY began with Coronado’s expedition in 1540. A small group under Hernando de Alvarado wandered north until it stood at a vantage point and gazed across the gray-green plain to the mighty blue mountains, that esthetic combination which subsequently attracted artists from around the world.

Even then the legends started. Standing there, gazing at the mountains, the group witnessed the beautiful, irridescent-red coloring which sometimes bathes the slopes in the dying slants of the afternoon sun, and they whispered, reverently, Sangre de Cristo, the Blood of Christ Mountains.

Yet those intrepid explorers were not the first to view the place called Taos, for even then multi-storied pueblos stood alongside a clear stream that flowed out of a pleasant canyon. The Indians have chosen not to tell their story, but the sedentary Pueblos had occupied this area for a long time, maybe centuries, while the nomadic Utes and Jicarilla Apaches roamed deep in the mountains, above and beyond. Their history is lost to us in much the same manner as the wind obliterates the tracks and wingbeats of the eagles in the sky, yet we can surmise what might have been, way back when.

We can surmise, for instance, that the Taos Fair may have had its origin long before intruding Europeans settled New Mexico. Undoubtedly, peaceful Plains Indians came in the fall of each year and camped near the pueblo, as nomadic and sedentary tribes bartered and bargained, like a great gypsy convention.

It is not such a far-fetched thought for many to believe the Taos Indians may have once been related to the Plains Indians. Certainly they differ from the other Pueblo types. They are taller, much handsomer, have sharper features, and the men wear their hair in long braids, much like the Indians of the