On March 3, 1874, the names of the successful bidders for the upcoming contract term were published in California. Richard C. Kerens and Mitchell (first name unknown) were awarded the contract for two routes in New Mexico: Las Vegas to Mesilla, and Route No. 17404, Mesilla to San Diego.¹²⁶

News of this must have been much slower to reach Grant County, as on March 7 the Mining Life was reporting that no definite information had as yet been obtained on the names of the new contractors. It was not until March 28^th that the newspaper was at last able to publish the news that the contract for the San Diego to Mesilla route had been awarded to Mitchell, and that he had purchased a number of small Concord wagons for passenger transport.

The commencement of the new contract period on July 1, 1874, would signal further change to the route in Grant County. Silver City and Pinos Altos were at last embraced into the main route. This now meant that at Rio Mimbres the route took a northwesterly turn, along what had been until then the spur route to Pinos Altos and Silver City. Now, instead of returning to Rio Mimbres, coaches continued on from Silver City in a southwesterly direction to Ralston City. From there the route rejoined the original Mesilla to San Diego road and continued on as before. As a result, that stretch of the route between Rio Mimbres and Ralston, which included Cow Springs and Soldier’s Farewell, was abandoned by Kerens and Mitchell.

The 1874 Business Directory for San Diego listed the “prominent points” on that section of Kerens & Mitchell’s route in New Mexico Territory as being Ralston, Silver City and Mesilla, with the distance between the first two being given as 45 miles – a very close match to the distance today when traveling over NM90.¹²⁷

It is unlikely that Kerens & Mitchell themselves established a road between Silver City and Ralston. It is far more probable that they made use of, and perhaps improved, a pre-existing military trail to Fort Bowie and points west, forged by the U. S. Army after the establishment of Fort Bayard in 1866. Evidence to support this is for the most part circumstantial, but New Mexico Territorial Survey maps produced in 1873 do show a well-defined trail named the Burro Mountain trail, which approximately follows the route of present day NM90.

In later maps the trail is even more well defined, with its approximation to NM90 being clearly evident for the most part.¹²⁸ There are some slight deviations from the present day highway, one of which  is of particular relevance. On the November 1881 survey map (Map 5 in the reference above), at a point approximately two miles north of the present day Gold Gulch road, the old stage road turns almost directly west and descends into Knight Canyon for just under 2 miles to a spring which is named Ojo Bonito. It passes by “Knight’s Ranch”, and after that continues in a southwesterly direction rejoining what would become NM90 about three and a half miles southwest of the ranch.

That this was the route used by Kerens & Mitchell is confirmed by a paragraph from the Mining Life of September 19, 1874, which reported that Black Bros. of Silver City were soon to begin erecting a home for R. S. Knight and his family at Ojo Bonito in the Burro Mountains, about 30 miles southwest of Silver City, and that this was “on the stage road leading west to Ralston and Arizona.” Ojo Bonito had “an unlimited supply” of water.¹²⁹ Other reports in the same edition of the Mining Life confirm that, by September of 1874, the route between Silver City and Ralston was in regular use; one report stating that George C. Spears, Probate Clerk for Grant County had left Silver City for Ralston “on Tuesday’s buckboard”, and another that he had returned “by Wednesday’s buck-board.”

Although mails and passengers were being transported through Ralston throughout Kerens & Mitchell’s contract period, Ralston itself remained without a Post Office and, therefore, a Postmaster; something which would not change until over a year into the subsequent contract period.

©2007-2023 Jim & Erica Parson

REFERENCES FOR THIS INSTALLMENT:

¹²⁶Daily Alta California. March 3, 1874.

¹²⁷Land Lines of Travel from San Diego. In: Information Relative To The City Of San Diego, California. Containing Also, A Business Directory Of The City. San Diego: Office Of The San Diego Daily Union. (1874).

¹²⁸Department Of The Interior, Bureau Of Land Management, General Land Office Records:

1.  T18S-R14W. DM (District Manager) ID: 119739. Originally surveyed August 1873.
2.  T19S-R14W. DM ID: 119835. Originally surveyed August 1873.
3.  T19S-R15W. DM ID: 119849. Originally surveyed December 1881.
4.  T20S-R15W. DM ID: 120007.Originally surveyed October 1881.
5.  T20S-R16W. DM ID: 120029. Originally surveyed November 1881.
6.  T21S-R17W. DM ID: 120123. Originally surveyed June 1882.

Note: In map number 5 the stage stop at the center of Section 32 is mis-labeled as “MacKnight’s Ranch, it should be “Knight’s Ranch”.

Survey maps from 1871 do not show the Silver City to Ralston road. T22S-R18W DM ID: 120199 surveyed in January of 1871 shows only the Overland Mail Route, and T23S-R18W DM ID: 120267, also surveyed in January of 1871 shows only Barney Station, Ralston City, and the Overland Mail Route with its branch to Ralston City. These two 1871 maps (T22S-R18W and T23S-R18W) cover that area of land on which the town of Lordsburg is now sited.

¹²⁹Mining Life. September 19, 1874.