Video: Life and Death in Small Town New Mexico (Socorro County Historical Society)

 

On July 19, 2025, I made a presentation for the Socorro County Historical Society titled "Life and Death in Small Town New Mexico". I recorded a video of the presentation and posted it on my "Socorro Genealogist" YouTube station.

In my talk, I profiled four Socorro County 19th Century residents. Eutimio Montoya was a staunch defender of the Socorro Land Grant, taking the U.S. Government to court to fight for the grantees' rights. His father Estanislao Montoya was a brigadier general in the New Mexico militia during the Civil War, a businessowner, and a politician. Samuel Zimmerly was a California Column Civil War soldier and prominent miller in Park City. Samuel's wife Maria Pabla Torres was a descendant of an old New Mexico Spanish family, who ran her husband's business after his death and whose children started six prominent families in Socorro County.

I had a great audience that asked good questions and provided stories of their own during the presentation. I shared binders and folders of genealogy with members of the audience, and a few audience members shared their family history with me, too.

I very much appreciate the reception I received from the Socorro County Historical Society and their members. For more information about the society, click on this link.

To view the video, click on this link

July 19, 2025 SCHS Presentation: "Life and Death in Small Town New Mexico"

Life and Death in Small Town New Mexico

The Personal Histories of Socorro and Surrounding Communities

A new presentation by Robert J. C. Baca

Saturday, July 19, 2025, at 2 PM

at The Socorro County Historical Society annual meeting

City of Socorro Convention Center

1220 Hwy 60 West
Socorro, New Mexico

(The old National Guard building.)

There are thousands of stories in New Mexican small towns. Socorro is not different. From its beginnings prior to Spanish exploration, through Spanish colonization in 1598 and up until the present, many families have lived and died in this town. These are the stories of a few notable, but maybe not lauded, residents of the area. These are "personal histories" of the local folk.

Robert J. C. Baca is a former president of the New Mexico Genealogical Society. For the past quarter century, he has been researching Socorro genealogy and history, focusing mostly on the Socorro Land Grant. He has presented before NMGS, The Historical Society of New Mexico, the Socorro County Historical Society, and many other organizations. Robert and his lovely wife Nancy live are teachers living in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Robert invites you to bring photos, documents, and your own personal family histories to the presentation to share. This will be an interactive event. Portions of the presentation will be filmed and streamed on YouTube and social media after the event. 

The Baca Land Grant in Colorado: The Baca National Wildlife Refuge

As I have mentioned before, Cabeza de Baca descendants (including my 2nd great-grandfather Martin Baca) brought a lawsuit to the United States government to reclaim land granted to their ancestor Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca. Although they were unable to get the original property, (in present-day Las Vegas, New Mexico) they were given 5 plots of land of about 99,000 acres each. 

One of the plots eventually became the Baca National Wildlife Refuge in Colorado. Check out the link below:

The Baca National Wildlife Refuge 

Transcription and Translation of Separation of Philip Bourguignon and Maria Tomas Gonzales

I posted last year about the separation of Philip Bourguignon and Maria Tomasa Gonzales. However, I didn't have a full translation. By the miracle of ChatGPT, I was able to transcribe and translate the court documents that plaintiff Philip Bourguignon requested and received custodianship of his children "Margarita, Felipe, Andrea, Eduardo, Trinidad, Jesús, and Luis Bourguignon, all of whom are minors due to their age and otherwise under legal age." He received custody of his children on 22 February 1872.

It does not appear that the couple was formally divorced, and in fact they got back together. Philip and Tomasa had five children after this separation: Pabla, Elisa, Charles, Federico, and my great-grandmother Carolina. 

There is no indication why they separated and why Philip requested custody of his own children.

Click on the link below to see the documents in my Evernote app. The transcription and translation are below the images.

Separation of Philip Bourguignon and Maria Tomasa Gonzales 

Baptismal Record for Maria Andrea Trujillo

Today I found the baptismal record for my 2nd great-grandmother, Maria Andrea Trujillo*. She is my last ancestor to have been born in Mexico. Her family emigrated to Mexico from Socorro in the 1850s after the United States incorporated New Mexico as a territory after the Mexican American War. They didn't stay in Mexico for very long, however they were they were there long enough for Maria Andrea to have been born there. 

She is listed as Maria Albina, however I'm pretty certain that this is her record. Other records indicate that she was born on December 8, 1855, which is close to December 8, 1854. 

I used an AI program on Evernote to do a transcription of the document. I then personally reviewed the image to find mistakes in the transcription and made edits. 

Click on the link below to find the image, transcription, translation, and source material.

Baptism of Maria Andrea (Albina) Trujillo Marquez

* I found a clue that directed me to the baptism in a Ancestry.com tree of my second cousin, once removed Maurine Pool. She is the woman who gave me information decades ago about my relatives Crespin Torres and Andreita Torres. She has done a lot of research into this Torres/Trujillo family that we share.

Fabiola Cabeza de Baca - Educator, Author, and Distant Cousin

 Fabiola Cabeza de Baca was the author of “We Fed Them Cactus”. She was an “educator , nutritionist, activist, and writer of one of New Mexico’s first cookbooks, Fabiola Cabeza de Baca’s lifelong passion was to share the value of New Mexican foods.

The video below describes Fabiola’s contributions to our state’s communities and culture. 

NMPBS: ¡Colores! Fabiola Cabeza de Baca

Fabiola was my paternal grandfather’s half third cousin.

A Summary of a Report to Congress Regarding the Cabeza de Baca Family

 I decided to summarize a report to the House of the Representatives, 1st Session of the 36th Congress, regarding the petition by the Heirs of Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca. I read the entire report, but it found it a little daunting, so I used A.I. to help me summarize it. 

Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca was my fourth great-grandfather. His son Jose Mateo Mauricio (or simply Mateo) was my third great-grandfather. Mateo's son Martin was my 2nd great-grandfather. All three are mentioned in the summary.

Luis Maria was granted a large tract of land in 1821 in the area around present-day Las Vegas, New Mexico. Due to complications including revolutions, wars, regime change, and raids by Native American tribes, Luis Maria lost the land. Other families took possession of the land by 1835 and were issued title for the land. When the heirs of the deceased Luis Maria petitioned the government, they ended up getting up receiving 5 tracts, or "floats", of land in New Mexico, Arizona, and Colorado. Click on the following link by to an article about the Baca Floats in the American Surveyor website.

My summary is in the link below:

The Heirs of Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca

Heirs of Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca

A wealth of information, including the names of descendants of Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca and the residents of Las Vegas, New Mexico in 1860, can be found in in U.S. House of Representatives Documents in Google Book.

It's fascinating. It includes testimony given by a number of New Mexicans.

My second great-grandfather Martin Baca is mentioned in the lawsuit as one of the sons of Mateo Baca, son of Luis Maria Cabeza de Baca

From the document:

"To the Hon William Pelham surveyor general of the Territory of New Mexico under the act of Congress approved July 22 AD 1854 Your petitioners the surviving heirs at law of one Luis Cabeza de Baca deceased would respectfully state that on the 16th day of January 1821 the provincial deputation of the State of Durango granted to the ancestor of your petitioners Luis Cabeza de Baca a tract of land called the Las Vegas Grandes and which said grant was afterwards ratified by the provincial deputation of New Mexico and which said grant has for its boundaries the following landmarks to wit On the north the Chapellote river on the south the boundary of San Miguel del Bado on the east the Aguage de la Llegua and the boundary of Antonio Ortiz and on the west the summit of the Pecos mountains all of which will more fully appear by reference to the said grant now on file in the office of the surveyor general No 137 and the grant to Antonio Ortiz No 727 and the grant to San Miguel del Bado No 125 to all of which reference is hereby made Your petitioners further state that said lands marks and boundaries are well known and easily discovered but inasmuch as no survey of said lands has as yet ever been made the quantity of land included within said boundaries is unknown to your petitioners Your petitioners further state that it will appear by reference to said grant that it was made to the said Luis Cabeza de Baca and his male children and invested him and his male children with an absolute title to said lands."

Check out the link below:

Town of Las Vegas vs. Tomas Baca, et.al. 

Do We Descend from All of Our Ancestors? Apparently, Not!

One of my favorite YouTubers is Jarret Ross, the GeneaVlogger. In his series "Professional Genealogist Reacts," he reviews videos on genealogy, often focusing on DNA-related topics.

In a recent episode, he discusses Marcus Gallo's video "You Don't Descend from All of Your Ancestors." The key point is that we are not genetically related to most of our ancestors, especially those many generations back. Although we inherit a limited number of unique genes, we have an exponentially vast number of ancestors. For example, if you go back 15 generations, you have 32,768 ancestors, but only 1,112 DNA segments to distribute among them. This means that only about 3% of those ancestors contribute to your DNA at that generation. As Gallo explains, with each generation, the number of DNA segments increases arithmetically, while the number of ancestors increases exponentially.

(Side note: My rule of thumb is that with every 10 generations, the number of ancestors multiplies by over 1,000. For instance, the 10th generation has over 1,000 ancestors, the 20th generation has over a million, the 30th generation has over a billion, and by the 40th generation, you have over a trillion ancestors! To put this in perspective, my potential ancestor Charlemagne, born in A.D. 748, is about 40 generations back. He would be one of about a trillion ancestors in that generation. Of course, there weren't actually a trillion people living back then, so pedigree collapse definitely played a role.)

In the video, Jarret Ross not only highlights Gallo's insights but also adds his own analysis. Both vloggers explore essential concepts like Y-DNA, mt-DNA, and pedigree collapse. Jarret also recommends several websites and tools for conducting in-depth DNA research.

It's an excellent video. You should check it out!

Robert B. Baca Inducted into the 4th Degree in the K of C, 1940.

My grandfather Robert B. Baca received his 4th degree in the Knights of Columbus on June 9, 1940, in Albuquerque. My grandfather was one of the founders of the Socorro chapter of the K of C and was also a Grand Knight of the local chapter. The Socorro chapter of the K of C is named after him. 

Below is my transcription of the Albuquerque Journal story about his induction. 

K. of C. to Confer Fourth Degree

20 Candidates Here For Rites Today

A class of 20 candidates from Albuquerque and Santa Fe will be initiated into the Fourth Degree of the Knights of Columbus at rites here Sunday.

The day's program will begin at 7 o'clock Sunday morning, when the class will meet in front of the Immaculate Conception Church rectory and will march to the church for Holy Communion. Initiation rites will be held at 1 o'clock at the K. or C. Hall. A banquet at 6:30 o'clock at El Fidel Hotel will complete the day's program.

Bishop Sidney M. Metzgar, auxiliary bishop of the Santa Fe archdiocese, will be among those to receive the degree, according to reports from Santa Fe, and the class has been named in his honor. He is scheduled to be the main speaker at the banquet in the evening. He is a member of the San Antonio, Tex., council. He is expected to return from San Antonio in time for the rites. 

Capt. E. G. Freeman, master will be charge of the ritualistic team and will be assisted by officers of Albuquerque and Santa Fe. 

Other candidates for the degree are William A. Arias, Leo Robert Burwinkle, Robert B. Baca, Dr. Michael V. Berardinelli, John Francis Duffy, T. Fidel, the Rev. Francis Gleason, Louis A. Grandjean, Francis J. Gormley, Dr. V. A. Knott, Filberto E. Lucero, Rafael Lopez, John Henry Phelan, Leo F. Sanchez, Delfin Salazar, Sergio A. Viscoli, and Mony Persenti. 

Source: "Albuquerque Journal," database, Ancestry.com, Newspapers.com (www.newspapers.com), K. of C. to Confer Fourth Degree, 9 June 1940, p. 6.