Beginning in the late 1930s, the Farmers Security Administration and other New Deal Agencies undertook the task of documenting American life. As part of this effort, Russell Lee and Jack Delano, along with other photographers, captured images of New Mexico's past.

I am pleased to present a few of those photographs here.

My thanks to the Library of Congress for permission to use these photographs.

Rain over New Mexico

Capulin National Monument, Capulin, New Mexico

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Photographer: Russell Lee 1903

Created/Published: Sept 1939

New Mexico desert

Highway No. 70

Description:  The route many refugees cross

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Photographer: Dorothea Lange

Created/Published: June 1938

Spanish-American Village

Along the Rio Hondo near Taos, NM

The residents live in town and commute to their small farmlands on the outskirts of the town

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Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: 1939

Southwestern New Mexico

Along the Rio Hondo near Taos, NM

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Photographer:  Dorothea Lang

Created/Published: June 1938

Watching the amusements

Roswell, New Mexico

Carnival

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Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

Spanish-American residents of Mora

Mora, New Mexico

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Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: Sept 1939

Corner of adobe house

Taos, New Mexico

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Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939

Old Spanish Mission Church

Taos Pueblo

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Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

Temporary schoolhouse

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Bosque Farms, NM

URL:  88 of 100

Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

WPA weaving project supervisor making skeins of thread

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Costilla, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939

Town hall and light standard

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Cimarron, NM

URL:  82 of 100

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published:  August 1939

Children of Spanish-American farm family playing on wagon

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Taos County, NM

Russell Lee

URL:  80 of 100

Photographer: Lee Russell

Created/Published: September 1939

Indian children

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Mescalero Reservation, New Mexico

URL:  72 of 100

Photographer:  Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

New Mexico Capitol building

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Santa Fe, NM

URL:  67-100

Photographer: John Collier

Created/Published: February 1943

Riding a buffalo

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Wagon Mound, New Mexico

Bean Day

URL:  57 of 100

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: Sept 1939

Tourists waiting to go into Carlsbad Caverns

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Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico

Photographer: Rusell Lee 1903

Created/Published: May 1939

Sneaking under the Circus Tent

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Roswell, New Mexico

Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

Spanish-American resident

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Mora, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939

Spectators at Bean Day Rodeo

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Wagon Mound, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939

Spectators at Bean Day Rodeo

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Wagon Mound, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939

Taos Pueblo; Rio de Taos in foreground

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Taos, New Mexico

Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

Pueblo Indians in the Indian Service School

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Taos, New Mexico

Photographer: Arthur Rothstein

Created/Published: April 1936

Bosque Farms project.  Making adobe brick for school and permanent houses.

web link

Bosque Farms, New Mexico

Photographer: Dorothea Lange

Created/Published: October 1935

Tourists buying Indian pottery from children

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Tesuque Pueblo, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: August 1939

WPA weaving project supervisor making skeins of thread

web link

Costilla, New Mexico

Photographer: Russell Lee

Created/Published: September 1939