For Good or Bad: People of the Cimarron Country, compiled and edited by Stephen Zimmer, Sunstone Press, Santa Fe, N.M., 1999, $12.95 paperback.
Any Western history buff passing through northeastern New Mexico won’t want to miss the town of Cimarron, on the east side of the Cimarron Range of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, and the surrounding country. In the 1870s and ’80s the area was wild and woolly, what with Clay Allison hanging out at the St. James Hotel and with the land dispute known as the Colfax County War going full tilt. Reading this collection before making such a trip is recommended, since For Good or Bad includes stories on a dozen folks whose deeds have become legendary in that neck of the woods.
“Although some of the entries are better documented historically than others, all are good stories and equally important to Cimarron’s tradition,” writes Stephen Zimmer in the introduction. Zimmer, the director of museums at Philmont Scout Ranch near Cimarron, fittingly opens his 160-page collection with “Master of the Cimarron: Lucien B. Maxwell,” by Lawrence Murphy. The community got its start in 1857 when Maxwell (1818-1875) moved his ranch from Rayado, on the Santa Fe Trail, north to the Cimarron River and built a frontier empire. When Lucien sold his vast holdings in 1870, the Maxwell Land Grant Company was organized, and violence soon followed, because the company took a hard line with “squatters.”
Readers intrigued by Murphy’s piece will also want to try another 1999 book offered (in paperback at $14.95) by Sunstone Press–Lucien Maxwell, Villain or Visionary, by Harriet Freiberger.
Maxwell’s friend Kit Carson, a veteran trapper and trader, lived at Rayado Ranch in the early 1850s before moving to Taos in 1854, and later was a frequent visitor at Maxwell’s Cimarron Ranch. Zimmer has included an excerpt from Dear Old Kit: The Historical Christopher Carson, by Harvey Lewis Carter. Clay Allison, who has been called a bloodthirsty manic-depressive for his killing ways but also heroic for battling the Santa Fe Ring in the Colfax County War, naturally has a place in this collection. Artist-author Will James is also represented here. His experiences as a young cowboy in Cimarron country helped launch his career. The other people of Cimarron Country are not as well known, but their stories have all contributed to the rich history of a place that needed a lot of taming.
Chrys Ankeny
