Tony's Dad, Fidel, was born near the town of Mountainair New Mexico in 1922. Mountainair, located on Abo Pass between the Rio Grande and the Estancia Valley is a ranching and farming community near ancient Indian country. The year 2003 marked Mountainair’s 100th anniversary. Follow the hyperlink to take a virtual tour of Moutainair or check out what's happening today in town by reading the online city newspaper, The Country Chronicles.
Mountainair is in Torrance County on New Mexico Highway 60 in southwest United States. Around 1900, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad (AT&SF) was planning a "cut-off" at Belen, New Mexico, for routing freight trains either east or west. John W. Corbett, a newspaper man from Winfield, Kansas, learned that the easterly tracks would likely pass through Abo Pass in New Mexico. He and a friend, Colonel E. C. Manning, decided to locate a townsite at the top of the Pass. The cool summer breezes off the Pass resulted in their naming their new community, "Mountainair". In addition to being a railroad town known for shipping pinto beans, Mountainair became a site for summer lecture series, for a place to find bargains in used cars, and for "Pop's" Hotel Shaffer. The pinto beans, lecture tents, and car dealers are now gone--but there are new art galleries and the National Park Service Visitors' Center headquarters for Salinas National Monument sites. Fast becoming a New Mexico attraction worth a visit is the new Art Alley, displaying art works outdoors.
The family eventually migrated to Albuquerque, where many of Tony's relatives live today. A few years back, Tony accompanied his Father to a family reunion in Belen, New Mexico.
P.S. - Serpent Gate , the third novel in the Kevin Kerney mystery series by author Michael McGarrity, is set in the town of Mountainair.
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