DRIPPING SPRINGS

County: Dona Ana

Year Established: 1879

Year Abandoned: 1907

Location: The Dripping Springs Natural Area is located 10 miles east of Las Cruces, on the west side of the Organ Mountains. From Exit 1 on Interstate 25, take University Avenue/Dripping Springs Road east to the end

About: The Dripping Springs ruins complex is not ancient. The buildings, which are clustered in three groups scattered through a narrow canyon, date from the late 1800s and early 1900s. The sites include the remains of a stagecoach station, a resort hotel and a tuberculosis sanitarium

Remains: Extensive remains! MUST SEE!!!

TIMELINE

1859

Eugene Van Patten arrived in New Mexico at the young age of 20 years old

1870's

Eugene Van Patten built the Van Patten Mountain Camp

1890's

Van Patten rented land adjacent to the resort to Nathan Boyd

1892

Boyd built his sanatorium near the reservoir Van Patten had built

1895

The government awarded Boyd a permit to build a dam north of Las Cruces at a site called Elephant Butte

1910

Boyd started the construction of the sanatorium

1916

Van Patten went bankrupt due to a dispute over land and water with Nathan Boyd causing Van Patten to sell Dripping Springs to Boyd for $1

1917

Altitude Therapy had become a popular method for treating tuberculosis

1922

Boyd was forced to sell Dripping Springs property to Las Cruces physician Dr. Tony Sexton

1988

The Nature Conservancy bought the property, 2,800 acres, from A.B. Cox family, then transferred the title to the Bureau of Land Management

Butterfield stagecoach stop and livery station

Butterfield stagecoach srop and livery station in Dripping Springs, New Mexico

August 2019

August 2019

The first buildings hikers come upon – just like mountain travelers more than a century ago – is the Butterfield stagecoach stop and livery station. This was not a stop on a main stagecoach line. It was constructed specifically to service the resort, known as Van Patten’s Mountain Camp, which is about a quarter of a mile further up the trail.

Resort guests boarded coaches in Las Cruces for the 17-mile journey into the mountains. After they were dropped off at the resort, the coaches and horses returned to this livery area. At the height of the resort’s popularity the station included a barn for coaches, wagons and horses, a general store, a large vegetable garden and a chicken coop. Today in addition to the buildings, you’ll see a watering trough and a corral.

Boyd Sanitarium

August 2019

During the 1800s, for reasons that are still unclear, people began to link tuberculosis to the climate. It was felt that the humid atmosphere in big cities along the coasts was making people who already had consumption sicker as well as causing the disease to spread more rapidly. Doctors recommended that patients move to the high mountain deserts of the Southwest for the thin, dry air. Thousands upon thousands of them, along with their doctors and nurses, migrated to New Mexico.

Sanitariums opened across the state to accommodate the influx of people. They ranged from modest operations that were little more than clusters of tents to elaborate and elegant facilities that catered to wealthy sufferers from as far away as Europe. Both Presbyterian Healthcare Services and Lovelace Medical Group began as tuberculosis sanitariums.

August 2019

The resort hotel, Van Patten’s Mountain Camp

August 2019

Construction began around 1895 and the resort opened in 1897. It had 15 guest rooms, a dining hall, a concert hall, a gazebo and a roller-skating rink. The resort, named after its founder and owner Eugene Van Patten, offered guests a refreshing break from the oppressive heat of Las Cruces in the desert below.