New Mexico joined the Union on this date (January 6th) in 1912, becoming the 47th state.
Fun fact, New Mexico is the only state that has ‘USA’ appended on its license plate. We have to clearly state ‘New Mexico USA’ for the geographically challenged who don’t know that New Mexico is actually a state.
You may scoff, but I’ve personally met many of these people. I’ve been asked if you need a passport to go to Albuquerque, or if we only speak Spanish here. I had my drivers license handed back to me once, and was told I needed a valid US identification.
Many years ago, when the Summer Olympics were in Atlanta, a member of the US team from New Mexico called to make arrangements to travel from Albuquerque to Georgia. The team rep told him he’d need to go through his embassy.
But, we can’t really make fun of the rest of the country. True story; when my kids were in school, their New Mexico History textbook had the wrong date in it for when New Mexico became a state. Alas, public education.
Another fun fact, the earliest human inhabitants of New Mexico were here around 23,000 years ago. This is based upon fossilized footprints found at White Sands National Park in 2021. These people would have been the first inhabitants of North America, pre-dating the long-held theory that the earliest North Americans came from Siberia via a land bridge 13,000 years ago.
Yet another fun fact, Santa Fe was established as a capital in 1609. This was years before the Pilgrims landed and established the Plymouth Colony, making Santa Fe the oldest capital city in the country.
Many years ago, somewhere around 1926, the great Ernie Pyle visited New Mexico for the first time. He eventually returned, purchasing a home on the edge of Albuquerque that would serve as his home base until his death in 1945. That first visit to Santa Fe certainly made an impression. At the time, he wrote in his column:
“The town lies in a wide valley, close to mountains on the east. They are not the high, sinister mountains of the northern Rockies; they seem more like neighbors. But sometimes you can stand in the bright sunshine in Santa Fe and see not five miles away an ominous blackish-gray snowstorm swirling down upon the mountain ridge. Or if you visit a friend who lives a few miles out of town you can sit in his library and look northwest through the big window and see a vastness of valley and mesas and far-off mountain chain that almost drives you crazy with its immensity. In all the time I have spent in Santa Fe, I have never seen the surrounding country or sky look alike on any two days, and I have yet to see it when it was not fascinating. Boston for beans, Seattle for rain, San Francisco for bridges, and Santa Fe for long, far looks at what God made.”
Find yourself 114 candles, some Green Chili Cheesecake, and enjoy what God made.
P.A. Tennant – January, 2026
Soli Deo Gloria
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Photo: P.A. Tennant
Copyright 2026 Paul A. Tennant
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P.A. Tennant 