70 Fun Facts About New Mexico

What is the capital of New Mexico?

Founded in 1610, it is the oldest state capital in the country and, at about 7,000 feet, the highest.

New Mexico became a US state in which year?

It was the 47th state, admitted on January 6, 1912, after 64 years as a territory.

New Mexico's official state question is what?

The legislature adopted it in 1996 to honor the chile industry; ordering both colors is called 'Christmas'.

Which bird is New Mexico's official state bird?

The state bird appeared on a 1982 sheet of 20-cent US stamps showing all 50 state birds and flowers.

Which TV drama was set and filmed in Albuquerque?

Early scripts placed the story in Riverside, California; Sony suggested moving it for New Mexico's film incentives.

Which town became a UFO byword after debris was found nearby in 1947?

The Air Force later concluded the debris came from a top-secret balloon program built to listen for Soviet nuclear tests.

What is New Mexico's official state nickname?

Writer Lillian Whiting used the phrase as a book title in 1906, but it only became the official nickname in 1999.

Albuquerque's famous October festival fills the sky with what?

It began in 1972 with just 13 balloons in a shopping-mall parking lot and now draws more than 500.

Which national park in southeastern New Mexico contains the largest cave chamber in North America?

The Big Room is the largest cave chamber in North America and was first explored in 1898 by a teenager with a homemade wire ladder.

The dunes of White Sands National Park are made of which mineral?

It is the largest dunefield of its kind on Earth, holding roughly 4.5 billion tons of the crystal.

Which state flag features a red sun symbol on a yellow field?

Adopted in 1925, it is one of only four state flags without blue and the only one of those without white.

Which cartoon rabbit keeps taking a wrong turn at Albuquerque?

The gag was introduced in the 1945 short Herr Meets Hare, when he ends up in the Black Forest instead of Las Vegas.

Which meeting point of New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona and Utah is a Navajo tribal park?

The monument there is run by the Navajo Nation as a tribal park, and it also marks a boundary with the Ute Mountain Ute reservation.

Which river runs north to south through the middle of New Mexico?

At 1,896 miles it is the fourth-longest river in the United States and rises in Colorado's San Juan Mountains.

Which laboratory town was built for the Manhattan Project?

The government took the site by eminent domain in 1943 from a private ranch school for boys.

On what date was the world's first nuclear weapon detonated at the Trinity site?

The blast melted the desert sand into a mildly radioactive light green glass that was named trinitite.

Which cookie is New Mexico's official state cookie, the first in the nation?

The anise-flavored treat was adopted in 1989 and is baked for weddings, baptisms and Christmas.

Which flower is New Mexico's official state flower?

It was chosen in 1927 after a survey of the state's schoolchildren, backed by the Federation of Women's Clubs.

Which tree is the official state tree of New Mexico?

Its edible nuts are a signature of New Mexican cooking, and Pueblo people could store them in pits for two or three years.

Along with chile, which food is one of New Mexico's two official state vegetables?

The pinto bean has been a staple of the Pueblo diet alongside corn and squash since prehistoric times.

Which historic trade route linked Franklin, Missouri, to New Mexico's capital from 1821?

William Becknell pioneered it the year Mexico won independence, and it stayed busy until the railroad reached Santa Fe in 1880.

Which spa town renamed itself after a radio quiz show in 1950?

Host Ralph Edwards promised to broadcast his 10th-anniversary show from the first town to take the program's name; it is now Truth or Consequences.

Which fictional Simpsons team gave Albuquerque's minor-league baseball club its name?

A 2001 episode had Homer go on hunger strike to stop the Springfield team moving to Albuquerque; the real club arrived from Calgary in 2003.

Which painter, called the Mother of American modernism, lived at Ghost Ranch and Abiquiú?

She moved to New Mexico for good in 1949 and explored the landscape in a Ford Model A she learned to drive at 41.

Which uprising in 1680 drove the Spanish out of New Mexico for twelve years?

Leader Po'pay coordinated the villages with knotted cords: one knot untied per day, and the last knot was the signal to rise.

Which Albuquerque-born entrepreneur founded Amazon?

He was born Jeffrey Preston Jorgensen in 1964 and was raised in Houston and Miami.

Which 'Take Me Home, Country Roads' singer-songwriter was born in New Mexico's UFO town in 1943?

His father was an Army Air Forces pilot stationed at the local air field, and the family name was Deutschendorf.

Which Albuquerque-born actor grew up in Ruidoso and starred in How I Met Your Mother?

He graduated with high honors from Albuquerque's La Cueva High School in 1991 despite spending half of each year on set.

Which state capitol building is round and nicknamed the Roundhouse?

Dedicated in 1966, it was designed to look like the Zia sun symbol from above, with four wings radiating from a cylinder.

Which village calls itself the Chile Capital of the World?

It has hosted a chile festival every summer since 1971, and the tagline appears on one of the state's license plate designs.

Which UNESCO-listed community in northern New Mexico is the oldest continuously inhabited city in the US?

In 1970 the federal government returned its sacred Blue Lake, an early success of the modern Land Back movement.

Which radio telescope on the Plains of San Agustin uses 27 dishes in a Y shape?

Each 25-meter dish weighs 209 metric tons and rides on rails; a 28th sits in rotation for maintenance.

What does New Mexico's Latin state motto 'Crescit eundo' mean?

William Ritch added the phrase, lifted from Lucretius' De Rerum Natura, to the territorial seal in the early 1860s.

Which town was outlaw Billy the Kid shot dead in by Pat Garrett in 1881?

He is buried in the old military cemetery there; Garrett's daughter Elizabeth later composed the state song 'O Fair New Mexico'.

The living Smokey Bear was a cub rescued from a 1950 wildfire near which New Mexico town?

He lived 26 years at the National Zoo in Washington and was flown home for burial after his death in 1976.

Which launch site near Truth or Consequences sent up Virgin Galactic's VSS Unity in 2021?

That flight made New Mexico the third state, after California and Florida, to launch humans into space.

Which Santa Fe art collective opened House of Eternal Return in a former bowling alley?

Game of Thrones author George R. R. Martin pledged $2.7 million in 2015 to renovate and lease the building.

Which chimpanzee, launched into space in 1961, was named for a lab at Holloman Air Force Base?

He was known simply as No. 65 until his safe return, and his remains are buried at the space museum in Alamogordo.

Which giant marionette, nicknamed Old Man Gloom, is burned in Santa Fe every year?

Artist Will Shuster first burned it at a backyard party in 1924; the effigy now stands more than 50 feet tall.

Which Albuquerque cable car ride was the world's longest from 1966 until 2010?

It climbs to 10,378 feet and was overtaken by Armenia's Wings of Tatev; it remains the longest in the Americas.

Which Navajo landmark, a volcanic neck in San Juan County, is named for a rock with wings?

Its Navajo name recalls the great bird said to have carried the people from the north; the rock solidified about 27 million years ago.

Which Santa Fe church is famous for a helix staircase built without a central pole?

The 'Miraculous Stair' makes two full turns up 20 feet to the choir loft and is held together with wooden pegs.

Which crop did horticulturist Fabián García begin standardizing at what is now NMSU in 1894?

His student Roy Nakayama later bred the famous Big Jim, and the state's landrace chiles descend from Pueblo and Hispano gardens.

Which fried pastry, served with honey, is a signature of New Mexican cooking?

In northern New Mexico they are also stuffed with meat and smothered in chile and cheese as a main course.

Which Spanish nobleman gave Albuquerque its name in 1706?

The city later dropped the first 'r'; the founder was governor Francisco Cuervo y Valdés, and the town sat on El Camino Real.

Which 1853-54 land deal added New Mexico's southwestern bootheel to the US?

Mexico received $10 million for land wanted as a route for a southern transcontinental railroad.

Which secret military balloon program produced the 1947 debris behind New Mexico's most famous UFO story?

The balloon train was launched from Alamogordo on June 4, 1947, and its instruments were meant to detect Soviet nuclear tests.

Which insect did New Mexico schoolchildren get adopted as the state insect in 1989?

Its sting is rated among the most painful of any insect, and it drags paralyzed tarantulas into a burrow as living food for its larva.

Which dinosaur, found by the hundreds at Ghost Ranch, is New Mexico's state fossil?

A skull of the small Triassic predator even flew aboard the space station Mir; it is the logo of the state's natural history museum.

What is unusual about the New Mexico whiptail, the official state reptile?

The lizards reproduce by parthenogenesis, and the species arose as a hybrid of two other whiptails.

Which physicist suggested the ranch-school mesa for the bomb lab and became its first director?

He had spent much of his youth in New Mexico and owned a ranch nearby; General Groves saw the mesa and said, in effect, 'This is the place.'

Which Santa Fe building, begun in 1610, was the seat of government for centuries?

Recent research suggests construction may not have started until 1618, midway through governor Pedro de Peralta's term.

Which two Native languages spoken in New Mexico are isolates with no relatives elsewhere?

Navajo and Apache are Athabaskan cousins, while Tewa, Tiwa and Towa belong to the Kiowa-Tanoan family.

Which wilderness in New Mexico became the world's first designated wilderness area in 1924?

Forester Aldo Leopold proposed protecting the river's headwaters in 1922 by simply refusing roads and use permits.

Which cave in the same national park as the Big Room was found in 1986 to run over 150 miles?

Until cavers broke through that May it was written off as a minor site whose only history was a year of guano mining.

Which frontiersman led the 1860s campaign that forced the Navajo on the Long Walk to Bosque Redondo?

Some 10,000 Navajo and 500 Mescalero Apache were interned on the Pecos until a treaty let them go home in 1868.

Which Santa Fe physician designed the state flag after seeing the sun symbol on a piece of pottery?

His wife Reba sewed the winning design, and the flag was adopted in 1925 using the red and yellow of old Spain.

Which national monument preserves inscriptions carved by travelers, the oldest by Juan de Oñate in 1605?

Anglo settlers called the sandstone bluff Inscription Rock; a pool at its base made it an oasis on an ancient east-west trail.

Which Albuquerque radio station's 50th birthday sparked the first Balloon Fiesta in 1972?

Station manager Dick McKee wanted to beat the record gathering of 19 balloons set in England; 13 showed up in a mall parking lot.

Which teenager first explored the Big Room's cave system in 1898 with a homemade wire ladder?

His lantern once went out in a chamber and he sat in total darkness for more than half an hour.

Which cutthroat trout subspecies is New Mexico's state fish?

Coronado's expedition recorded seeing trout in the Pecos River in 1541, the first New World trout Europeans encountered.

Which Albuquerque-born singer released 'Sorry Not Sorry' and 'Skyscraper'?

Her mother was a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader and her father an engineer and musician.

Which Laguna Pueblo member from New Mexico became the first Native American cabinet secretary in 2021?

She ran the Interior Department, the agency that once ran the boarding schools, and attended 13 public schools growing up.

Which Republican governor of New Mexico was the first Hispanic woman to govern a US state?

A former Las Cruces district attorney, she served two terms from 2011 to 2019.

Which hotel magnate, born in San Antonio, New Mexico, served in the state's first legislature?

He sat as a Republican in the first legislature after statehood before quitting politics in disgust and buying his first hotel in Texas.

Which prequel to the Walter White drama followed Jimmy McGill's slide into a sleazy criminal lawyer?

Its black-and-white flash-forwards show him hiding out as Gene, manager of a Cinnabon in Omaha.

Which state has the aroma of roasting green chile as its official state aroma?

Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham signed the bill in March 2023, making it the first state with an official smell.

Which tech giant was founded in Albuquerque, where the maker of the Altair computer was based?

Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS) was founded in the city, and Microsoft started there before moving to Washington state.

Which summit in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains is New Mexico's highest point, at over 13,160 feet?

The lowest point, Red Bluff Reservoir in the southeast, still sits about 2,840 feet above sea level; over four-fifths of the state is above 4,000 feet.

Who in 1539 became the first person from the Old World to reach New Mexico?

He was killed by Pueblo peoples; Coronado arrived the next year and Oñate began Spanish colonisation in 1598.