Winter in Santa Fe
by Jon Burch Photography
Title
Winter in Santa Fe
Artist
Jon Burch Photography
Medium
Photograph - Digital Capture And Enhancement
Description
Dating from the 1600's, part of the original foundation of the Palace of the Governors can be seen in this photograph made in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
The Palace of the Governors, built in 1610, is an adobe structure located on Palace Avenue on the Plaza of Santa Fe, New Mexico between Palace Avenue and Washington Street. It is within the Santa Fe Historic District and it served as the seat of government for the state of New Mexico for centuries. The Palace of the Governors is the oldest continuously occupied public building in the United States. Originally constructed as Spain's seat of government for what is today the American Southwest, the Palace chronicles the history of Santa Fe, as well as New Mexico and the region.
In 1610, Pedro de Peralta, the newly appointed governor of the Spanish territory covering most of the American Southwest, began construction on the Palace of the Governors. In the following years, the Palace changed hands as the territory of New Mexico did, seeing the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, the Spanish re-conquest from 1693 to 1694, Mexican independence in 1821, and finally American possession in 1848.
The Palace originally served as the seat of government of the Spanish colony of Nuevo Mexico, which at one time comprised the present-day states of Texas, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, California, and New Mexico. After the Mexican War of Independence, the Mexican province of Santa Fe de Nuevo M'xico was administered from the Palace of the Governors. When New Mexico was annexed as a U.S. territory, the Palace became New Mexico's first territorial capitol.
Lew Wallace wrote the final parts of his book Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ in this building while serving as territorial governor in the late 1870's. He remembered later in life that it was at night, during a severe thunderstorm in the spring of 1879, after returning from a tense meeting with Billy the Kid in Lincoln County, when he wrote the climactic Crucifixion scenes of the novel. Wallace worked by the light of a shaded lamp in the shuttered governor's study, fearing a bullet from outside over the tensions surrounding the Lincoln County War.
Between 1909, when the New Mexico state legislature established the Museum of New Mexico, and Summer 2009 the Palace of the Governors served as the site of the state history museum.
In 2009 the New Mexico History Museum was opened adjacent to the Palace, which is now one of nine museums overseen by the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. The adobe structure, now the state's history museum, was designated a Registered National Historic Landmark in 1960 and an American Treasure in 1999.
Image copyright 2014 Jon Burch Photography
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February 6th, 2014
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