Sierra County Courthouse - a new view

The building was icon in its time. Even today, as the pull of gravity reduces the historic former Sierra County Courthouse to rubble, the building is still something to see. Here's a look at a view the likes of Oliver Lee and Jim Gilliland had for a spell.  They were tried and acquitted for killing the 8-year-old Henry Fountain.

As hammers nailed planks together, construction of a platform from which teenager girls Valentina Madrid and Alma Lyons would hang by the neck was underway on the courthouse lawn. They may have watched the workers build the device that would kill the condemned gals.

No doubt many other miscreants and those wrongly accused had this same view.

The jail and courthouse ruins are iconic today.  The jail is one of the 100 historic images on the New Mexico Centennial celebration's Get the Picture contest.  Will this historic ruin be completely lost, or might it be conserved for posterity and interpretation of New Mexico's rich judicial heritage?