More than a century ago, the Hubbell House was a well-known, hospitable stop just south of Albuquerque. It's a shade of itself these days, but restoration efforts could change that.

Ollie Reed Jr.'s Trail Tales are stories rooted in the rich history and legends of New Mexico and the Southwest. Reed can be reached at oreed@abqtrib.com

By
Tribune Reporter

PAJARITO - An American Army officer watched intently as 11 horsemen rode slowly toward him, squinting to make out who they were and what they were up to.

In 1851 in the high plains of northwest New Mexico - Navajo country - a band of horsemen might mean an Indian raiding party, bandits, saddle tramps or some other kind of trouble.

As the mounted men rode nearer, the American officer made out sombreros, serapes and complexions the color of old leather.

"Hispanics," the officer thought. "Whatever else they might be, they are sure Hispanics."

He almost popped a uniform button in surprise when the leader of the horsemen reined in and spoke to him in English unmarked by any kind of foreign accent.

The dusty, sunburned rider was James L. Hubbell, a New Englander who had come to New Mexico as a soldier during the Mexican War and stayed on to marry into a prominent Hispanic family and become wealthy as a livestock owner and merchant. Hubbell had become fluent in Spanish but had not lost any of his native tongue.

He told the officer he and his men had been out chasing Navajo raiders who had stolen livestock belonging to him and his father-in-law. They found the stolen animals dead, killed by the Navajo as Hubbell and his men had closed in on them.

Now, the weary horsemen were making the long ride back to Hubbell's lands and fine house in the community of Pajarito near Albuquerque.

It would be good to rest in the shady rooms of his adobe home after the heat, the rigors and the disappointment of the trail.

A seductive coolness reaches out through the missing panes of glass in the window of the old Hubbell House and strokes the curious visitor's cheek with soothing, phantom fingers, offering him brief respite from the hot, afternoon sun that slaps at the back of his neck as he stares into the darkness.

At first, the shadowy interior seems as welcoming as this house must surely have been in the middle of the 19th century when it was the hospitable home of Hubbell, his genteel Spanish-American wife, Juliana, and their large, bilingual family.

For a time back in those days, this hacienda, just south of Albuquerque, was a stagecoach stop, a place for muscle-sore, bone-tired, bottom-bruised travelers to take a break from their journey along the Camino Real, the old, royal road from Mexico City to Santa Fe.

That was then.

But as images begin to emerge from the dimness inside - a pile of adobe debris on a floor, planks supporting walls and ceilings - it's easy to see that the Hubbell House is not receiving guests.

That's now. But what about the tomorrow?

"Our hope is to have people from various organizations working here and farmers coming through," said Thaddeus Lucero, director of Bernalillo County's Community Services Division. "We're trying to figure out how to get kids out here and have talked about doing that through our own Parks and Recreation Department."

In 2000, Bernalillo County purchased the Hubbell House and the 10-acre site on which it stands with open space funds. The county wants to turn the house and land into a living museum and a farm that can demonstrate both old agriculture techniques to the young and emerging agriculture techniques to working farmers.

Efforts to restore and preserve the 5,748-square-foot, one-story adobe house got a boost when it was selected as one of 12 locations from across the country to benefit from "Restore America: A Salute to Preservation," a partnership between Home & Garden Television and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

That means national TV exposure and up to $50,000 in funds for the Hubbell House.

Perhaps by this time next year, the voices of adults and children will mingle with the rattle of activity, enlivening the old hacienda in ways not seen there in decades.

The community of Pajarito, which means "little bird," is in the valley just south of Albuquerque.

Today, cars sweep through Pajarito on Isleta Boulevard, which runs just scant feet from the Hubbell House. As close as they come to it each day, most commuters probably never notice the historic structure grimacing through the broken and decaying slats of a front-porch railing.

"I had been by this property numerous times and never realized its value," Bernalillo County's Lucero said. "We probably never would have known if a neighborhood group had not brought it to our attention."

Things were different in Pajarito 150 years ago. It was a slower-paced time when, as author Martha Blue put it, dried anise and coriander hung from vigas, scenting the air in homes as "burros and roosters vied with each other at dawn and bullfrogs held forth at dusk; and alfalfa, chile peppers, corn, geraniums and grapes colored the irrigated river lands."

Back then, everyone took notice of the Hubbell House. In May 1868, a writer for the Santa Fe Gazette called it "one of the largest, most convenient and comfortable buildings for a residence that we know of in New Mexico."

With its 3-feet-thick adobe walls, 15-feet-high ceilings, hand-hewn doors, pine vigas, deep-set windows and flat, dirt roof, it is a traditional Spanish hacienda later expanded into a New Mexico Territorial-style home.

"It is a particularly well-preserved, large adobe that symbolizes the mixing of the Spanish and American cultures," said Bobbie Greene, executive director of Save American Treasures.

Save American Treasures is a partnership formed in 1998 by the White House and the National Trust for Historic Preservation to protect American cultural treasures.

"It shows the techniques of the old traditional ways of building these structures," Greene said of the Hubbell House. "Paints (for the renovation) are going to be made from ingredients that they used in those days."

In those days, the Hubbell House was at the center of a large family farm and ranch. Old acequias or irrigation ditches - mostly filled now with dirt, leaves, tree limbs and time - run along the west and south sides of the house.

No one knows for sure how old the house is. We know that by 1871 it was a large dwelling complete with outbuildings, but it might date back to the 1840s.

James Lawrence Hubbell, known as Santiago to his Hispanic in-laws and friends, made his home there with his wife, Juliana Gutierrez Hubbell.

Hubbell had found his way to Santa Fe as a member of the Missouri Mounted Volunteers during the Mexican War.

He stayed in the Southwest after he was discharged in 1847, and in 1849, he married Juliana, the daughter of a wealthy family that could trace its history in New Mexico back to the early days of Spanish colonization.

Their union established a bond between the old Spanish families and American newcomers that helped produce a spirit of cooperation between ethnic groups that is still prevalent in much of New Mexico. It also produced 12 children. Four of those children died while still very young, but the other eight grew up speaking English and Spanish.

James Hubbell pursued a career as a soldier, politician and businessman. He organized a troop of New Mexican volunteers to fight on the Union side during the Civil War and campaigned against Apaches with Kit Carson in 1862.

He was sheriff of Valencia County, a Probate Court judge and a member of the American military government's first legislature. He sold livestock and ran a freighting enterprise.

Juliana, blue-eyed and blond, was reportedly 16 when she married James. Tested by the loss of several of her children and the long absences of her husband on business or military duty, she matured into a respected member of the Pajarito community, a woman sought out for her counsel.

A son, John Lorenzo or J.L. Hubbell, would become one of the Southwest's great Indian traders, establishing many successful trading posts in Arizona.

Family patriarch James died in February 1885. Juliana died at Pajarito in December 1899.

But members of their family lived at the house on and off for many years after that and it remained in the family until 1996.

And now, through the efforts of preservationists, the house may live on forever, a monument to the melding of cultures, a reminder of some of the best things about our past and an inspiration for what might be possible in the future.

TRAIL GUIDE

"Restore America Honors" can be seen at 6 p.m. Friday on HGTV. The one-hour show salutes the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Home & Garden Television's efforts to restore 12 historic sites throughout the country, including the Hubbell House in Albuquerque's South Valley.

Over the next year, HGTV will feature one of the 12 sites each month on its "Restore America" program.

The sites are -

Hubbell House, a large adobe house that predates New Mexico's 1912 admission as a state.

Liberty Theater in Astoria, Ore., a vaudeville and motion picture palace built in the 1920s.

Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.

Cranbrook House in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., an example of early 20th-century design.

Mark Twain house in Hartford, Conn., a monument to the writer.

Far East Building in Los Angeles, a 1909 hotel, storefront and restaurant located in the city's Little Tokyo Historic District.

The Mount in Lenox, Mass., home of author Edith Wharton.

Bodie Island Lighthouse in Manteo, N.C.

Lower East Side Tenement Museum in New York City.

Frederick C. Robie House in Oak Park, Ill., built in the style of famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright.

Conservatory of Flowers in San Francisco, home to rare tropical plants.

Lincoln Cottage in Washington, D.C., located on the grounds of the Soldiers' and Airmen's Home. The site, now a national monument, was a presidential retreat.

Book trail

To learn more about New Mexico's Hubbell family, read "Indian Trader: The Life and Times of J.L. Hubbell" by Martha Blue, 2000, Kiva Publishing Inc., Walnut, Calif.

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