Primary Sources and Anecdotes on Kingston's Mythical Past

Much has been written about Kingston, New Mexico. Since the 1970s, and perhaps earlier, stories in the popular press are usually ornamented with statements about the tiny berg being the largest town in New Mexico; having three newspapers; two dozen saloons; Twain and President Cleveland visiting.

For several years we've gathered historical information around Hillsboro, Lake Valley and Kingston, and it's oddly the latter where myths arose and persist. Most recently, New Mexico Magazine repeated these myths in a feature story.

Below is a collection of annotated primary sources that are listed in chronological order. Key dates to keep in mind: the east slope of the Black Range was prospected in the late 1870s; Kingston as a town came to life in late 1882. As a place name, it does not exist before August 1882.  In 1893, the federal government changed its monetary policy and over night, the price of silver slumped, and the silver miners moved on.

We consider the information as either a "primary source," that is, information provided by a direct observation, or anecdotal, or a story passed along without direct observation (Ex: N.W. Chase's 1888 "Cornerstone" letter).

1882
Kingston is but two months old in this Las Vegas Daily Gazette story.

In October, the Lincoln County Leader reported 350 to 500 people in Kingston.

The Albuquerque Morning Journal reports 50 house built in a day; reporter speculates arrivals could go to 100 persons per day.

The Albuquerque Morning Journal reports only 45 men working in the mines in November.

An estimated 1,200 people are in Kingston in this Albuquerque Morning Journal story.

The Rio Grande Republican reports in November, an estimated 5,000 folks in Kingston.

A correspondent for the Engineering and Mining Journal documented his November 22 visit.

This December story notes 150 families in Kingston.

Kingston closes out the year with a party.

1883
This prospectus on Kingston was published in early 1883 by Kingston Tribune editor, Charles Greene. By the end of 1883, he had moved his newspaper to Deming.

The Black Range expected solid growth of Kingston and nearby Percha City.

1884
This McKinney business gazetteer covers Hillsboro and Lake Valley businesses, but Kingston is curiously absent. It's awkward to use, but go to page 1456.

1885
At the often reported height of Kingston's activities and population, this 1885 business journal reveals only 300 people in Kingston, jibing with the 1885 Territorial census that counted 329 people in Kingston and outlying Danville camp. This journal provides an invaluable look at town business, listing names and occupations. Go to page 322, but look elsewhere therein for more details on our area.

1887
Where was President Cleveland when a prankster signed his name on the Victorio Hotel register?

Kingston town plat survey conducted by the General Land Office.

George Rowell's newspaper directory shows the Shaft serving a Kingston population of 725.

1888
The Gospel in All Lands documents 1,000 people in Kingston, a narrative from Rev. N.W. Chase.

Rev. N.W. Chase penned a letter in 1888 for the cornerstone of the Kingston church, and cites that Kingston had 3,000 people a few years earlier. The original letter (no scan available) is in the Methodist archives in Albuquerque, and a copy is kept at the Black Range Museum.

1890
The U.S. Census Bureau documents 633 people living in Kingston and 816 in the mining district; 37 Chinese people lived in Sierra County (less than 400 over the entire territory).

1891
The Territorial Bureau of Immigration documents a population of 5,132 in Sierra County.

The American Newspaper Directory reveals that the Shaft served a Kingston population of 1,500.

1893
The country falls into an economic depression; silver prices slump and Kingston miners leave.

1894
The Territorial Bureau of Immigration documents a population of 1,000 in Kingston.

1895
Kingston fails to show up on maps and atlases until the early 1890s. It's on this Rand McNally published 1895.

1904
This February 26, 1904 article from the Silver City Enterprise was misquoted in a story in the Hillsboro Historical Society's newsletter, December 2014.  The 1904 article states that Kingston had a population of 5,000 in the 1880s.  The newsletter article characterized this Enterprise story as there being that many living in Kingston in 1904.

1907
History of New Mexico by George Anderson has Kingston at 1,800 people in 1882.

1913
The El Paso Herald reported that Kingston had a population of 2,000 in the early 1880s.

1919
Hearst's magazine reports that Kingston swelled to 6,000 people in the early 1880s.

1935
New Mexico magazine states that Kingston had 1,500 residents (see Facebook cite below).

1936
Black Range Tales says that 7,000 people lived in Kingston.

Silver City Enterprise 2/26/04 (part 1)

Silver City Enterprise 2/26/04 (part 2)

You can find more documentation, census records and newspaper directories, on the Hillsboro Historical Society's Facebook site in the "Photos" section.

You can read about the newspaper that tried to make a go of it in Kingston, in this previous post.

You should read beyond this arcana on the origins of Kingston's mythic population, and check out what some of the territory's newspapers were saying about the area for yourself.  You won't be disappointed. You'll read about the comings and going of folks, the values of the mines, the business successes and failures and an occasional killing. You can read about the newspaper that set up shop under a tree, a photo of which was in the most recent HHS newsletter. That press wasn't Kingston's first. You'll read what the observers saw and thought at the time--and how lucky we are to have that available to us.

Kingston, 1890, Starr Peak is visible to the east. Black Range Museum.

Kingston in Myth and Memory

By Craig Springer

To see the old photos, you can tell that Kingston was a busy place for a time. But that time didn’t last.

Set on the east flank of the Black Range in western Sierra County, Kingston is today a relic of the distant past. On some maps, it’s a ghost town. But everyone living there is alive--engaged in business, creating art, active in retirement. It’s an old mining town at the head of the Middle Percha Creek. From a distance, the Black Range looks the part of a long purple armada. The 10,000-foot Hillsboro Peak stands like a silent sentinel above. Vision through the gray distant haze over steep folded mountainsides becomes clearer as you get closer. And so it is with the myth of Kingston being New Mexico’s largest territorial town.

Kingston had its start with the discovery of silver. In the early 1880s, prospectors from nearby Hillsboro, Lake Valley, and Georgetown worked under the continual threat of Apache depredations as they scratched dirt for signs of precious metal. Like most of the Black Range, the surface is more rock than soil. It’s the rock that drew attention; it was rich with silver ore. In October 1882, James Porter Parker, a civil engineer and former Confederate Lt. Colonel and General George Custer’s roommate at West Point platted a townsite. The portly fellow became Sierra County’s first Assessor two years later.

Kingston topped out at about 1,500 residents ca. 1893. Starr Peak and the Caballo Mountain are seen in the distance. The stone church stands in the right margin of the photo. Photo Black Range Museum

Kingston was to get bigger. A Methodist minister in January 1888 reported on the progress of a stone church to serve Kingston’s 1,000 residents. There was work to do: “If I could take the reader along the main street on our way to a school-house for evening service, he would see the typical mining town in all its wickedness.” The minister lamented the gambling, smoking, drinking and a woman singing in soprano at the back of a hall. 

The town grew bigger yet -- but only in myth. In travel guides, state tourism office promotions, and academic writings by professional historians, you will see a phrase repeated so often that a myth has turned to “memory,” that Kingston once exceeded 7,000 residents and was the largest town in New Mexico. It’s even on Forest Service signs. Seven thousand is about as big as Truth or Consequences is today. And it’s a bogus number, usually attended by an equally bogus count of the number of newspapers that kept shop in town: three.


One is led to think that three publications competed for readers and advertisers. Actually, 10 newspapers published in Kingston from 1883-1893, but all were very short-lived titles except the Weekly Shaft. From April 1885 to March 1886 during Kingston's supposed prime the town lacked a newspaper. The Mines of Kingston, a March 1883 prospectus on the then five-month-old town of Kingston, was published by the weekly Tribune. Editor and publisher Charles W. Greene would pull up stakes and move the newspaper to Deming by Kingston's first birthday.

The 1890 census counted 1,449 people in Kingston; 3,785 lived in Albuquerque--more than all of Sierra County’s 1890 population. A Territorial Bureau of Immigration publication printed in 1894 reported on the condition and prospects of the territory stating that, “The town itself is well situated, has a public water service, churches and schools, two good hotels, and a pushing, go-ahead population of about 1,000 persons.”

Those prospects may had already changed by the time the Bureau publication hit the streets. The economic Panic of 1893 and with silver prices going south, Kingston was all but abandoned. 

How such a myth got started is a bit of a mystery. The earliest writing on an inflated town size, a purported 5,000 people, that I found was in Log of a Timber Cruiser, published 22 years after Kingston was abandoned. 


Then, in August 1936, WPA writer Clay Vaden interviewed Sadie Orchard in Hillsboro. Orchard told Vaden that Kingston thronged with 5,000 residents in 1886. You can read what Vaden documented from Orchard in the Library of Congress holdings.


That same year Sierra County pioneer, James McKenna published Black Range Tales and upped the Kingston population by 2,000. And so it’s become gospel since, that Kingston was New Mexico’s largest town. 


The entire population of Sierra County didn’t reach 7,000 until 1950, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.


Craig Springer and his wife Felicia own the historic George T. and Ninette Stocker Miller home in Hillsboro. He's a professional writer in Santa Fe County.

Wicked Kingston

Funds were being collected to build this Kingston church in 1888, by the Methodist Episcopal Mission Society. Photo courtesy Matti Nunn Harrison

Kingston's church is long gone, as are so many other buildings thrown up in a hurry in the 1880s boom town. The church, made of stone, would seem to have some permanency. Yet it did not stand the near-abandonment of Kingston after the Panic of 1893.

An 1888 publication of the Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church titled, The Gospel in All Lands, has some interesting things to say about Kingston. "If I could take the reader along our way on the main street to a school-house for evening service, he would see the typical mining town in all of its wickedness." The writer remarks on the behaviors of people he sees in Kingston, and how the church building is being funded.

Something else is worth noting, the reported population size of Kingston on page 61. It's far below the oft-reported 7,000 souls alleged to have lived there.  You'll have to see it for yourself. -- Craig Springer