A couple of major anniversaries to celebrate this year in the Land of Enchantment. 2026 is the 200th anniversary of what some like to call “Kit Carson’s escape to Santa Fe.” In addition “Historic Route 66” commemorates its 100th year of existence. Both are important to New Mexicans. And to us new New Mexicans whose east-coast memories include TV programs featuring the American frontiersman and one the first roadways in the Federal Highway System.
“The Adventures of Kit Carson” was a popular American Western that aired from 1951 to 1955, starring Bill Williams as the title hero and Don Diamond as his Mexican companion, El Toro. One of the most watched programs of its time this classic TV western was a totally inaccurate, but entertaining, portrayal of frontiersman, fur trapper, wilderness guide, Indian agent and U.S. Army officer Christopher Houston Carson. The television Carson was a cowboy and lawman. The series was set in the 1880s, but Carson died in 1868. El Toro was totally fictional – and the actor an American of Russian ancestry. To add to the inaccuracies, although the stories mentioned Taos they were filmed in California and Arizona.
Carson’s 1826 “escape to Santa Fe” however is factual and refers to his departure from a difficult home life in Missouri at the age of 16 to join a wagon train on the Santa Fe Trail. From Santa Fe he moved to Taos where he became a trapper, guide, and Indian Agent. And became a legend in his own lifetime largely through dime novels that also told exaggerated versions of his exploits. (For the real skinny check out the book “Blood and Thunder” by Hampton Sides. For fantasy watch this video.)
Five years after Kit Carson left the airwaves a contemporaneously set series followed the adventures of two young men driving across America in a Chevrolet Corvette convertible. Unlike Kit’s Taos adventures this program was filmed entirely on the road with each story taking place in its actual setting. (Here are the opening and closing credits.) Martin Milner played recent Yale graduate Tod Stiles and George Maharis was Buz Murdoc, a friend and former employee of Tod’s father. (Maharis left during the third season due to illness and was replaced by Glen Corbett as recently discharged Vietnam veteran Lincoln Case.) The duo stopped at twenty-five different places but only a few were in reality on Route 66. The iconic highway’s name was meant to be emblematic of the freedom to travel the U.S. rather than the literal roadmap they followed. One location that was on that interstate however was Santa Fe, which was featured in three episodes – “A Skill for Hunting,” “The New Born” and “Trap at Cordova.”
Route 66 was a 2,448 mile highway (1/5 in New Mexico) connecting Chicago to Santa Monica CA and passing through Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. It was created by a massive Depression-era Works Progress Administration/Civilian Conservation Corps (WPA/CCC) set of projects. (Not the largest such undertaking however. That was the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA.)) The roadway was built in segments, often following existing auto trails – many composed of gravel and ungraded dirt. In Santa Fe the original path of Route 66 followed the old Santa Fe Trail north from Santa Rosa, through the city, and then south to Albuquerque. Portions of the Old Pecos Trail and El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro were also used. This so-called “Santa Fe Loop.” was a part of the historic roadway from 1926 until 1937, when it was replaced by a more direct route to Albuquerque.
Google AI tells us that “the exact route of Route 66 is disputed and complex because it changed frequently, was often just a collection of existing roads, and parts were paved over by Interstates like I-40, creating gaps and multiple potential alignments, making a single ‘original’ path hard to define, especially in cities like LA where its endpoint wasn't clearly defined for years.”
This rusted 1932 Studebaker in Petrified Forest National Park's Route 66 "Highway of Dreams”
exhibit in Holbrook AZ may be the most photographed abandoned car in the country.
Thousands of workers were involved the asphalting efforts, allowing the highway to achieve “continuously paved” status by 1938. The first transcontinental road to accomplish this. Completion was particularly important to the nation’s defense capability at the outset of U.S. involvement in World War II. The highway was decommissioned in 1985 having been replaced by the Interstate Highway System (IHS) initiated by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. (One story goes that the terrible, muddy, and sandy roads, which then Lt. Col. Eisenhower's Army convoy had to deal with on its 1919, 62-day, 3,251-mile journey from Washington D.C. to San Francisco directly inspired his later push for a paved transcontinental roadway system.)
Hundreds of small towns sprang up along Route 66 – many of which became ghost towns or near-ghosts after the IHS bypassed them in the 1960s – e.g. Cuervo and Endee in New Mexico, and Texola, OK. Other towns like Seligman, AZ, revived itself by embracing their historic Route 66 identity.
However the best known of the things Route 66 engendered were its motels. They began as simple accommodations like motor courts and cabin camps and evolved into futuristically designed and themed motels (“Lariat Lodge,” “Arrowhead Motel”) – many with pools, diners, modern amenities and bright neon signs featuring cowboys, cacti, or teepees. Most were small, local, family-owned-and-operated businesses.
And like the pop-up small towns a large number faded into oblivion when the Interstate Highway System bypassed their locations. It is estimated that more than 300 such motels once operated in the Land of Enchantment. Sixty or so have been restored by their owners. In Santa Fe there is the Pecos Trail Inn, Cottonwood Court Motel, The Mystic (formerly Silver Saddle) and, a personal favorite, El Rey Court – a beautifully restored adobe motor court from 1936, which (based upon a recommendation from our Primary Care Provider in 1992) was our first layover spot on our first NM vacation. And became our go-to stay-at place for several years after that. (We loved the free breakfast of tortillas with jelly and Baskin Robbins Ice Cream just across the street among other things.) Did not know until this writing exercise of the hostelry's history.
Albuquerque offers more renovated classics such as the El Vado, Monterey Motel, Hotel Zazz, Luna Lodge, Piñon Motel, and Pioneer Motel along with many more gone-but-remembered ones along Central Avenue in the heart of the city. In the town of Tucumcari (230 miles east of Albuquerque) the Blue Swallow Motel (estab. 1939) is one of few anywhere in America still operating in its original Motor Court configuration.
Along with other states New Mexico will be celebrating the Route 66 Centennial throughout the year with events such as Albuquerque's Summer fest and the Railyard Festival, Tucumcari’s “Fired Up Street Festival” plus vintage car shows, themed markets, music, parades, museum exhibits and historical talks in towns like Grants, Moriarty – and Santa Fe.
Our hometown will not however be celebrating Kit Carson’s “escape” to here. The famed frontiersman has become a problematic historical figure due in part to his actions against Native Americans. In 1864, under orders from the U.S. Army he force-marched thousands of Navajo for 18 days over 300 miles from their homeland in Arizona to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. At least 200 died. In the same year Carson oversaw the destruction of Navajo crops, orchards, and livestock to force them into submission. A statue in town memorializing him was vandalized and partially toppled in 2023 – and its future remains undecided.
Carson and his wife are interred in a small cemetery in Taos located within the town’s main public park. Each was named in his honor until November of last year when Taos Town Council approved a resolution changing the names of both to “Red Willow.” (“Place of the red willows” is the English translation of the town’s name in Tewa, the language of the people that have occupied that land for over 1,000 years.)
99.9% of what we wrote in this essay is knowledge we have acquired since moving to Santa Fe. We jokingly tell people that what we were taught about our New Mexico back in Connecticut was that Cortez showed up here in the 1500s looking for the “Cities of Gold” – didn’t find them and left. Then it became the 47th U.S. state in 1912.
Historical fiction is a genre of storytelling where a fictitious narrative uses real people or places from the from the past as characters or settings. Sometimes these works pique the interest of their readers or viewers and inspire them to learn more about the real-life individuals and/or visit the actual sites. Like what we are doing now, here in Santa Fe.
But sometimes it’s the other way around – and real history causes us to look back on some of the happenings from our own past life. As we did in this essay, revisiting two of the ‘50s and ‘60s TV programs that entertained and (we thought at the time) educated us. It was fun looking back on them. Despite the fact that, even though we were faithful viewers of both, neither of us can recall one single episode or storyline from either of them.
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