Tag: Los Alamos History (Page 1 of 9)

I think many of us find some humor in the idea that residents who’ve been here in Los Alamos since the late 80s and 90s remember Film Festival at Home as the place we stop to grab a video or a DVD to keep us occupied for the evening, while modern residents known Film Festival as a place to grab coffee and do their laundry. In a strange turn, many businesses in Los Alamos have done double or even triple duty over the years. Then again, Los Alamos has always been a place where businesses or even just a building make space for whatever our community needs. And back in the early days, even just the completion of everyday household tasks took an awful lot of ingenuity.

So You Want to Grocery Shop?

I think most of us have lamented the grocery shopping situation here in Los Alamos. We have a lovely Co-op, Natural Grocers, and two different Smith’s stores, but it always seems as though our community is getting less in the way of options and inconsistent availability of products between the stores.

Strangely enough, it used to be something of the opposite back during the Manhattan Project! Los Alamos had a commissary which was stocked by the military supply lines. Most of the shoppers were military personnel, but even the civilians were allowed to shop at the commissary thanks to the sometimes erratic working hours and the unreasonable expectation of having time to leave Los Alamos after working a long day on site.

Though the initial offerings of produce and other items were not of great quality, there were several memos from the management in Los Alamos to the Army distribution center in El Paso suggesting that Los Alamos residents should be given access to higher quality produce and other grocery items in order to encourage their motivation to keep plugging along on “the mission”.

That pattern continued as the project progressed. In a memo dated August 1944, the commissary in Los Alamos was asked to procure a wider variety of goods than were made available under Army regulations. Even with the rationing, it was decided that the population of Los Alamos needed to be given some perks to keep them productive and happy. This meant Los Alamos moms could pick up milk, Jell-O and other hard to find necessities at the local commissary.

So You Need to do Your Laundry?

Back to the task of doing laundry in early Los Alamos. It’s not easy to think back to what laundry facilities were like in the 1940s. In fact, the 1940s saw a huge change in the way folks did laundry. This short YouTube video offers a look into just how much time it took folks to wash their clothes back in those days!

Now, laundry facilities were something residents here in Los Alamos were always clamoring for more of. So by the summer of 1946, the laundries were all updated to the point where there were 36 machines available for the 6000 residents of the hill to utilize in keeping their clothing cleaned, pressed, and presentable.

I think it’s important to remember that clothing back then was different as well. Uniforms and work clothes required pressing. Back then you would rent an electric iron for $0.30 per hour. That was if you wanted to iron by hand. You could also use a machine called a “mangle” which had two heated rollers and would press your larger items at the cost of $0.40 per hour.

Many folks who could would hang their clothes out on a line to dry. But that didn’t alleviate the need to press them! Can you imagine in our world today if you actually had to iron all of your clothing? We are so used to wash and wear fabrics for most of our clothing that it would likely feel like a return to the Dark Ages to have to iron each day’s outfit for every member of the family!

So You Need to Send a Letter?

We’ve discussed the importance of Post Office Box 1663. And I’m sure most of you are fully aware of the incredible level of censorship going on back then. The security handbook at the time stated specifically that personnel, professions, numbers of people, size and scope of the Project, and even opinions and rumors could not be revealed or commented upon. Before long, the 6000 strong population had outgrown PO Box 1663 and two more “boxes” were created.

PO Box 1539 was a “regular mail service” box and PO Box 180 was mostly for military personnel. Sorting, censoring, and delivering mail was one of the most complicated processes of the Manhattan Project. In previous posts, we’ve talked about the enormous volume of catalogs delivered to Los Alamos residents. The ridiculous number of scientific magazines sent to one address. The huge number of library books ordered to PO Box 1663 from the central lending library in Santa Fe. Mail indicates population and that was a big worry of officials of the project.

With that in mind, military and civilian residents were asked not to mail anything that they could hand deliver around town themselves. Christmas Cards were an especially big concern. In 1946 Norris Bradbury and Colonel Herbert Gee themselves made a request that residents hand deliver their cards as much as possible in a way that prevented the holiday greetings from clogging up the mail clerks’ task lists!

So You Want to Look Good for the Weekend?

Considering many folks in the early days were living in barracks, doubling up in Sundt Apartments, bunking in McKeeville, or even living in a camper, places to spruce up your personal looks with frequent hair washings, barber services, and even the nail salons were in high demand here in Los Alamos. Several early residents recall there being so few barbers in the early days of the project that the Tech Area guys got a barber chair and honed their barbering skills on each other. But that doesn’t sound like a solution for the ladies, does it?

It didn’t take long for barber and beauty shops to set up in the Service Club, the Military Police Exchange (MPX), and the Special Engineering Detachment’s Club (SED PX). The SED barber was so efficient he won a $50 bet for proving he could complete 12 haircuts in an hour. For reference, the average cost of a haircut at that time was twenty-five cents so a $50 bonus was an enormous amount of money!

I hope you’re noticing that there is a certain ebb and flow to life in Los Alamos. In some ways, our retail markets are a bit like the weather. Just wait a bit and it will change so entirely you hardly remember what came before! For now, I’d encourage all of you to get outside in Los Alamos and enjoy this glorious spring weather we’re having! Whether you’re already a resident or looking to find your home here in our lovely community on the Pajarito Plateau, give me a call! I’d love to talk with you about housing in Los Alamos!

You might look at the title of this post and scoff. Nightlife in Los Alamos? Does that exist? Well yes, actually, it does! Even more interesting is the fact that Los Alamos has always had quite a vibrant nightlife. It’s just not driven by block after block of bowling alleys, restaurants, stores, theaters, and bars. A pub crawl in Los Alamos is usually done simply because one establishment has the beverage and the other has the food!

In the early years of the Manhattan Project, the nightlife here in Los Alamos was really all about the parties. ANY excuse for a party. Holidays, birthdays, office gatherings, going-away parties, outdoor picnics, steak parties… EVERY occasion was a chance to let loose. Simply suggest an event and someone would start planning it. But as I’ve said before… The thing that social events and nightlife had in common was the existence of an actual human to plan the event!

Radio Los Alamos

Modern folks are pretty demanding with their personalized playlists, Spotify accounts, and iTunes libraries. But back in the early days, Los Alamos had a “closed circuit” radio station. A man named Bob Porton was the first station manager and the first announcer of the radio station named KRS. If you weren’t aware, radio stations west of the Mississippi begin with the letter K and if your radio station is east of the Mississippi you begin your letters with a W. The official record states that KRS was established in February of 1946 as a “carrier current” station with limited broadcasting. KRSN took over in 1949 and was officially licensed to broadcast beginning in 1950.

During the early years, KRS was said to be keeping a lot of Los Alamos sane! Talented classical musicians like Otto Frisch often played live on the broadcast and there was a daily show called Music of the Masters. The show utilized records owned by anyone on the post (aka in Los Alamos) who wanted to contribute and a playlist was tacked outside the broadcasting booth. In some ways, KRS was a lot like many of us remember local college radio. The station sponsored dances and encouraged just about anyone with a music related talent to showcase on the broadcasts.

The Bands and Musical Groups of Los Alamos

One of the most well known and loved musical groups in Los Alamos in the mid 1940s was Los Cuatros. The group consisted of three military men and a civilian machinist, (Los Cuatros is pictured above). Sometimes Lois, wife of bass player “Locky” Lockhart would provide vocals for the group. Lois also regularly appeared with the Keynotes and Sad Sack Six. The Keynotes included a larger number of players and some brass instruments which made them super popular for “big band” sound dances, and dancing was the thing in Los Alamos in the 1940s!

Dances were available nearly seven nights a week! Even with three children under six years old, the Lockharts were constantly busy with the business of entertaining Los Alamos. Los Cuatros finally had to break up when the war ended and Gallo and Gard eventually left the Pajarito Plateau for their next military assignment. Los Cuatros actually made it 10 years. Both Locky Lockhart and Jon Michnovicz stayed on in Los Alamos, too enchanted by the scenery and the life to want to leave. Michnovicz can be spotted in almost every photo of musical talent acts in Los Alamos at that time. Of course, that might be due to his status as first a military and then a civilian photographer. A good number of the photos we’re used to seeing when we head to the Blue Window for a night out were taken by Michnovicz.

Theaters 1 & 2 were popular places for dances when there weren’t weddings, church services, theater performances, or other events going on. In the John Mench interview, he talks about the battles for supremacy that often happened when there was a basketball game and a sewing circle or a quilting bee overlapped on the Theater 2 schedule. Can you imagine?

Dorm Parties and Service Clubs

From the earliest times, life in Los Alamos involved lots of people living in tight spaces. In the early days you would have married couples and singles all living in the dormitories together. Los Alamos wife, Bernice Brode, once said that “Dorm parties were the biggest and brassiest.” She spoke further about the boys removing all the furniture from the common rooms in the dorms and bringing a supply of “Tech Area Punch”. Brode swore that even with the rather stiff punch, behavior never got out of control. Having grown up here myself, I find that a bit difficult to believe…

By 1946 when the town began to open just a bit, one of the most popular places to hang out was the Service Club. All were welcome. Indian or Hispanic, immigrants, scientists, PhDs, and regular working folks got their cokes or beer and ate a lot of fried egg sandwiches! As you can see in the photo, a jukebox sits in the lower left hand corner of the photo. The jukebox and the pinball machines were always going as folks gathered to enjoy a break.

In the early days, the service clubs were actually military post exchanges. There was a Military Police PX and a “Special Engineering District” or SED PX. Both required attendees to be military service members in some way. The WACs didn’t have their own PX, so they were welcome in the SED PX and often spent time enjoying the refreshments, snacks, sundries, and tables where they could meet up for a beer or a coke.

There was a NCO club for officers and it was once reported in mid 1946 that while beer was becoming scarce in the “outside world”, Los Alamos was scheduled to get 10,000 cases of beer. The speculated rate of arrival of alcoholic supplies in Los Alamos was rumored to be 200 cases per month. One PX procurement officer reported that 300 cases per beer were consumed a day at the Service Club.

I personally wonder if that number was padded in order to assure there would be enough delivered to keep the customers coming back. I can’t help but think of that long standing slogan: “Los Alamos is a drinking town with a science problem.” Maybe this is in part because there were so many Europeans here from the beginning. Alcohol tolerance, consumption habits, and limits are very different from culture to culture. We can’t forget the huge amount of stress either! A night of dancing and Tech Area Punch was likely to help you forget all about the actual project you were working on during the days.

Tech Area Punch!

Several times in the past I have mentioned “Tech Area Punch”. I first found references to this mysterious sounding beverage in Toni Michnovicz Gibson’s and Jon Michnovicz’s book, “Los Alamos: 1944-1947”. With a bit of poking around I found a mention in the Michnovicz’s book that the liquor component of Tech Area Punch could be somewhat uncertain. Some of the female writers refer to “mixed alcohol of all kinds” and there are plenty of suggestions about grapefruit juice or any available fruit juice as a mixer. But according to the John Mench interview included in the “Voices of the Manhattan Project”, Tech Area Punch developed like this:

And every night in the barracks they had a party where they played cards and drank “Tech Area Punch.” For those who don’t know what Tech Area Punch is, in “K-stock”—which was the chemical stock room—you could draw out a gallon of 190-proof grain alcohol. And they cut it with pineapple juice. And this was the drink of people who drank in Los Alamos, at least among the GIs, all during that period. So there was lots of Tech Area Punch, lots of card playing, lots of swearing, lots of singing, lots of noise, lots of hell-raising every night in the barracks.

Let’s Go to the Theater!

Something that John Mench refers to quite often in his interview, is the frequency of theater productions and movies available in the evenings. Remember that the Los Alamos Little Theater has been in operation since the first attempt at a play, “Right About Face” happened in 1943. If you want to know more about LALT, visit their website or check out a previous post HERE.

Take a look at the marquee visible in this photo of two GIs exiting the theater after enjoying a matinee. There were movies available almost every evening. John Mench remembers there being a lot of John Wayne pictures to see, but I imagine it didn’t matter what there was to watch. Escapism was going to be popular during wartime no matter where you are! Hmm… Not unlike escapism of any kind is welcome today!

So whether you love hanging at the Los Alamos Little Theater or you want to support SALA events, you’re on target as a Los Alamos Local! I’d like to think that part of our long standing local tradition involves supporting our LAMS Hawks, the Hilltoppers, attending theatrical and dance productions from DALA and many of the other wonderful and varied dance studios in town, catching an art exhibition, attending a Brown Bag Lunch lecture at Fuller Lodge, and pretty much being part of life here on the hill! This is how we developed as a community and it’s what we do best. And when you’re ready to join our community, give me a call! I’m a hometown girl who LOVES to chat real estate in Los Alamos. Whether you’re looking to buy or sell your home or even commercial property, I’d love to chat about it!

Why do people stay here in Los Alamos? I think that’s something newcomers or visitors often wonder. As you might imagine, I hear a lot of first impressions of the town from my clients as they search for a home to fit their needs. Many of the initial thoughts aren’t that flattering. The first thing that begins to shift their perception is how beautiful it is here. No matter how much you dislike the lack of restaurants or shopping, very few people have anything negative to say about the scenery. But the natural beauty of this place seems to soak slowly into the newcomers. While they are house hunting, they might be uncertain about whether or not they plan to stay. Oftentimes when I meet up with them again in months or even years, their opinion has changed.

Enchanted

What happens to change opinions about life in Los Alamos between first impressions and the decision to stay in town for pretty much the rest of someone’s life? I think the image below explains a lot! For the record, this is a photo of the Valle Caldera. Folks living in Los Alamos weren’t allowed access to this area for recreation or any other reason until the year 2000 when Congress purchased the Baca ranch and created a National Park.

Steak Parties

Okay. I’ll admit. I was a bit baffled by this concept. According to Images of America: Los Alamos 1944-1947, when the residents in Los Alamos were a bit frustrated with living on top of each other and being stressed about making progress on the Manhattan Project, they liked to drive, ride horseback, or hike a short way into the surrounding area to get away. And often this event included steak.

Sports on the Plateau

I’ve spoken in the past about the long history of baseball in Los Alamos. But you don’t have to hang about in town for long to see that we really enjoy our sports. In fact, Los Alamos has always been a place for sporting.

During the war years, the Army encouraged organized sports as much as they encouraged their GIs and civilians to set up pickup games of softball and football. Once the war was over, there was an organized softball league. Men and women set up teams with names like the Exploders, the Plutons, the Bombers, and even the Sad Sockers. Each week the Los Alamos Times would publish batting averages and team standings.

Los Alamos has always enjoyed winter sports. The Ranch School had already made a place to ice skate and had cleared some runs for skiing, activities that have never ceased to be favorites in the winter months. In the second winter of the project, as more Europeans joined the community, skiing took on a whole new importance as the Sawyer’s Hill Ski Tow Association was created. Eventually this group developed into the Pajarito Ski Club, which many people still know today.

While our golf course and horse stables are not in any way connected these days, that didn’t used to be the case. The original stables/golf course was the giant meadow which later became Western Area. Notice the split rail fencing in the background of the photo of the two golfing gentlemen? It was agreed upon that most of the course was sand trap…because it was a horse pasture…and golfers had to climb onto the “greens” as they were fenced off to keep the horses from munching the better grass. I often picture the horses watching humans smacking little balls around their pasture with great amusement!

Just about everyone rode horses in the early days of Los Alamos. The military acquired the ranch school stock when they purchased the land, buildings, and machinery. These horses were for public use, but it didn’t take long for many families to purchase their own horses. Horses were acquired in much the same way they are today. Someone tells someone else they have one they’re selling and a deal is made! Eleanor Jette tells in her book of finding maps in one of the abandoned cabins which opened the entirety of the trails to riders and hikers. Residents weren’t allowed to drive to Santa Fe but once a month. If you wanted to ride the trail to Caballo Mountain every day of the week, nobody would tell you no. In much the same way they do for local equestrians today, horses equalled freedom to the residents of Los Alamos!

Exploring the Past

Another popular activity was a continuation of something the boys of the ranch school had also enjoyed. Nowadays we are encouraged to view the native ruins dotting our landscape. You can head to Bandelier, Tsankawi, or the Puye Cliffs to hike and climb the ladders as long as you stay on the path. Back in the 1940s, folks were free to hike out, climb around, experiment with amateur archaeology, and generally poke about in whatever manner interested them!

As with any population of young men and women, Los Alamos soon became a hotbed of dating, marriage, and babies during the Manhattan Project era. It actually reminds me a bit of the “romances” that seem to happen all throughout history on the wagon train trails, long voyages on ships, and in tiny communities all over the world. Being thrown together for a single purpose (work!?) never stops the social scene from happening in the background. Evidently, the male to female ratio in those days wasn’t all that unlike the one today. The was reported to be one woman for every ten men!

Wedding Fever!

It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that weddings happened in Los Alamos about as often as sunrise and sunset! Sources say weddings were typically held in Theaters No. 1 and No. 2, the chapel, the chaplain’s office, in churches in the surrounding communities and even in private homes! The couple below is preparing for communion during their Catholic Wedding Mass in Theater No. 1.

One of the popular beverages in Los Alamos back in those days was called Tech Area Punch. This mixed concoction was usually flavored heavily by grapefruit juice. But we’ll talk more about that in a future post. You can see from the happy faces, the elegant little wedding cake, and the enormous punch bowl that weddings were a wonderful social event!

I hope you’ve noticed that the topic of “things to do in Los Alamos” hasn’t actually changed all that much between the ranch school days and right now. Next time we’re going to take a dive into the Los Alamos Nightlife! (Yes, that’s actually a thing!) Until then, I hope you get outside with your favorite family, friends, coworkers, fellow club members, and anyone else who shares your passion for this place and all it has to offer. And when you’re ready to talk homes and real estate in Los Alamos, give me a call! I’m a hometown girl who always has time to talk housing in Los Alamos!

As you might imagine, I have a LOT of conversations with clients about the commute up to Los Alamos and ways to get around town. These are all big questions that make a huge impact on folks’ decision to purchase a home in the county. As I’ve been thumbing my way through so many of the cool books on Los Alamos History you can find in our local Historical Museum Shop, I came across some interesting photos and information about that same topic. I think what strikes me most is that we have far more independence and even options today than the those who were contemplating these things in the mid to late 1940s.

The Commute

First of all, getting up to Los Alamos wasn’t exactly a picnic. The military was making improvements to the access roads on an almost constant basis. The Otowi suspension bridge across the Rio Grande required a nearly 90 degree turn from the road to access. The roads were dirt and gravel and prone to washouts and all kinds of weather related mess with potholes and mud. If you’ve ever driven into Rendija Canyon, that’s probably a similar experience to what the first drivers were dealing with.

The Bus to Los Alamos!

Not unlike our NM Park & Ride, the bus to Los Alamos which carried workers up to the Hill traveled a 50 mile trip through Espanola, Chimayo, and the San Ildefonso, Santa Clara, and Tesuque Pueblos. There was also a bus to Santa Fe. Anyone traveling the road to Los Alamos had to have identification and approval from the military. MPs were responsible for checking ids and sources suggest that by 1946 there were approximately 500 people on 43 buses making daily trips to both Santa Fe and the surrounding areas!

What sort of workers were bussed in from these areas? Commuters in those days were the folks who might not have been project connected, but were critical to operations in the Secret City. Clerks, cooks, food service workers, mechanics, custodians, and other important folks were given free bus service so that they could commute from their homes in outlying areas to the Hill on a nearly daily basis. But if you were working for the Manhattan Project in any way, you weren’t eligible to live off post. You needed to be on site. Whether you had a family or were single, your job determined where you could live. Single person wanting a little piece of quiet property and a small casita in the valley? Too bad! You got a cramped room in a dormitory.

White Rock

We’ve actually talked about White Rock in the past. You can check out that blog post HERE. It was first slapped together as a place to house construction workers beginning in 1949. That meant if you were attached to those construction projects, you couldn’t pick a commute either. White Rock was where you were and that was that!

Traffic in Los Alamos

Check out this photo from Images of America: Los Alamos 1944-1947. The Los Alamos Trading Post can be seen on the left. This is actually a photo of Central Avenue in 1946. Public opinion was that a MP was needed to direct traffic at this, the busiest intersection in Los Alamos. If you think lunchtime traffic is tricky in 2025, imagine what it was like back then! There was zero distance between the technical areas, (located at Ashley Pond) and downtown Los Alamos.

It’s important to remember that, “this little town was just full of young women and men. As the population soared toward 6,000 in 1944-1945, small groups of GIs, WACs, and civilians were visible everywhere, heading out together for one social event or another”(Los Alamos 1944-1947).

This statement actually sounds very familiar. Los Alamos is nothing if not eclectic when it comes to the distribution of age groups here in town. A distribution that is heavily affected by things like summer students and snowbirds! And all of these folks are looking for something fun to keep them occupied when they aren’t working.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this trip down memory lane. Our community here in the Secret City is unique in so many ways. But a lot of things we consider quirky about life in Los Alamos have been going on for so long, it’s hard to imagine life any other way! When you’re ready to talk housing in Los Alamos, give me a call! I’d love to chat Quads, Duplexes, and Modified Westerns with you as you discover all of the amazing living options Los Alamos has to offer!

I think when I look at photos of the original Fuller Lodge design and compare it with the building I know and love today, it’s sometimes difficult to identify exactly how it changed. Then I take a look at the picture below and pretty much have my “holy cow!” moment.

If you’ve read any of my other posts regarding architecture in Los Alamos in the post war era, you’ve likely read the name W.C. Kruger and Associates. They worked with the Atomic Energy Commission many times on buildings in Los Alamos and are responsible for designing many of the homes we still have in town today.

The Zia Company took over management and operations of Fuller Lodge in 1947. The plan was still to utilize the lodge as a hotel because it was the only building that could actually pull that off in 1947. The major difficulty was trying to maintain the rustic charm of AJ Connell’s “outpost of civilization” while accommodating the AEC’s purely functional desires. While we look at the lodge today and aren’t particularly shocked. The decision to add onto the lodge in three directions utilizing native stone was met with quite a lot of disapproval from the locals at the time.

Going from the above look of Fuller Lodge to the one below was quite a change. The biggest change being that the front of the lodge became the back and the back became the front. All because of CARS.

In an effort to “match” the new with the old, native stone was used in order to complement the existing rock of the fireplaces and chimneys inside the lodge. Guest rooms were crammed into the new wings added to the north and south ends of the building. This allowed the lodge to host 75 guests at a time!

The south wing got 14 new rooms which included a two room suite with a private sitting room. The first floor of the north wing became the home of the “modern” lobby which used the back of the original fireplace. The first floor of the north wing also gained a manager’s office, a receiving office, and even a barbershop! With seven rooms upstairs in the north wing, they also added two small suites which eventually became the Nambe Room.

Of course, the kitchen needed a real overhaul in spite of it’s ability to turn out a top notch steak dinner all throughout the war years. The new kitchen completely overtook the old stone one on the west side of the building. They also made rooms for storage and even a bedroom for hotel employees. Above the new kitchen were six additional guest rooms which had been packed in and were therefore pretty small.

The original building was still the heart of the hotel. The Curtis and Zia Rooms became banquet halls and the original dining room got new and more comfortable chairs to replace the old slatted ones seen in the photo below.

The whole structure was rechristened “The Lodge”, which you can see scrawled down the chimney in the photo showcasing the fancy new parking lot entrance. It opened in early 1949 and the Zia Company named R.E. Carraway as the new manager.

Staying at The Lodge would cost you $7 per night for a single room or $9.50 for a double. As you might imagine, the first thing guests complained about was the lack of a cocktail lounge. Not long after opening, the AEC gave permission for the Curtis Room to be renovated into a cozy bar.

The Zia Company operated The Lodge until 1966. When the whole town began going through phases of privatization, the AEC authorized the construction of the Los Alamos Inn around 1966. The agreement was that The Lodge would be closed within 10 days of the new Inn being open for operation. The purpose was to cut down on competition. I think many of us now wish The Lodge was still a hotel considering we often have a great need locally for short term housing!

The AEC first thought to tear the building down, but a local movement to Save the Lodge gained momentum almost immediately. Locals were keen to prevent Fuller Lodge from meeting the same fate as The Big House, (which you can read about HERE). The AEC decided to give Los Alamos County a one year contract to operate the Lodge as a cultural center and museum. The first public event held at Fuller Lodge happened on August 26, 1967 when the Los Alamos County Fair was hosted at Fuller Lodge for the first time. Though the whole thing was considered a huge success, it took the AEC until October 24, 1974 to navigate the red tape and transfer ownership of Fuller Lodge to Los Alamos County.

Today, Fuller Lodge could be called the Heart of Los Alamos. It’s rooms host events, conferences, historical talks, music exhibitions, and even the annual Pumpkin Glow happens on the lawn! The building has been renovated yet again to make space for the Los Alamos Art Center and gallery, the Los Alamos Historical Archives, and offices for the Los Alamos Historical Society and the Los Alamos Arts Council. The Pajarito Room still hosts everything from lectures to weddings and a good number of us have had our senior photos taken somewhere on Fuller Lodge Property. It’s a piece of our history that should be cherished and loved. I sometimes think that AJ Connell would be pleased with how it’s turned out. One might even argue that Los Alamos itself has become an Outpost of Civilization!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this tour through the history of Fuller Lodge. The building fascinates me just as much as the rest of the rustic architecture of Bathtub Row. Whether you’re itching to purchase a historic home or a regular home here in Los Alamos, give me a call! I’m a hometown girl who loves to talk about life in Los Alamos!

When General Leslie Groves and Robert J Oppenheimer made their choice regarding potential sites for Project Y, Groves considered Fuller Lodge to be a bonus to the Los Alamos Ranch School’s desirability as a location. According to Craig Martin and Heather McClenahan’s book, “Of Logs and Stone”, Groves considered Fuller Lodge “immediately ready for use as ‘transient housing and messing of post and technical personnel”.

I had a good chuckle at the wording. “Messing” of post and technical personnel? In the military lingo, “messing” refers to feeding. And apparently Fuller Lodge was averaging 13,000 meals served each month during the Project Y years! If you lived or stayed in the Lodge or the Big House, you ate your meals at Fuller Lodge. However, if you wanted to show up for a steak on a Friday night at Fuller Lodge, you paid just a dollar per person for your dinner.

That’s right. It seems like a deal worthy of a casino buffet, but a full meal ticket covering 3 square meals per day was $60/mo. Breakfast was $.50; Lunch was $.65; and dinner would cost you a dollar no matter what they were serving. As you might imagine, a lot of Project Y personnel lined up when the lodge was serving their steak dinner, (something Eleanor Jette speaks about in her book, Inside Box 1663).

The most distinguished guests in Los Alamos were billeted at Fuller Lodge during their stays, and if you were a bachelor you were likely to be at the Lodge or the Big House. Considering the necessity of feeding both guests and the science guy bachelor population, local legend suggests Fuller Lodge was often hosting at least six past and future Nobel Prize laureates at a time for meals. Apparently Otto Frisch of the British Mission loved to eat breakfast at Fuller Lodge just to watch the sun come up over the Sangre de Cristos.

Of course, that wasn’t the only thing going on at Fuller Lodge during Project Y. The Pajarito Room saw just as many dances, gatherings, celebrations, and public meetings as it did during the Ranch School years! Even the Town Council used the Pajarito Room as their chambers during some evenings.

Enrico Fermi allegedly square danced one evening at Fuller Lodge and could not be convinced to join the dance until he had memorized with mathematical precision every one of the moves he would need to perform. Can you imagine trying to square dance with a boatload of mathematically gifted individuals obsessed with the geometrical “correctness” of the movements? I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall on those nights! While our brains probably cannot see a night of square dancing as “trendy” and “exciting”, the square dance was to turn of the century America what the Minuet was to Regency England. All the rage! And sincerely a better way to get to know a potential new friend than a bunch of instant messages from a dating app…

The Army didn’t modify Fuller Lodge very much during the Project Y years. The biggest renovation was to create guest quarters where the infirmary had been. The post commander requested sleeping and bathing areas in the space. The most interesting feature of this upgrade was a quirk in the plumbing which required the toilet to be in a rather peculiar position. Guests had to actually step up to the toilet, which was located on a platform. This particular accommodation eventually became known as “The Throne Room”. The picture below shows exactly why, and the sign was for laughs as it would be unusual for anyone to suggest a meeting in the bathroom!

Happy 2025 Los Alamos! Take a drive by Ashley Pond and Fuller Lodge while the wonderful holiday lights are still lit up in the evenings and enjoy this amazing landmark of the Pajarito Plateau. And when you’re ready to buy or sell your property here in Los Alamos, give me a call! I’m a hometown girl who would love to chat about living in Los Alamos with YOU!

Once Fuller Lodge was completed and the ranch school “moved in”, AJ Connell was able to indulge in what was almost a fantasy of rough outdoor living combined with an elegant evening schedule of dressing for dinner and an almost Oxford like “high table” manner. Connell was quoted more than once in saying The Los Alamos Ranch School was meant to be an “Outpost of Civilization”. Fuller Lodge was the pinnacle of that outpost in the mind of Connell and many of the school masters.

It isn’t difficult to see why they’d think that. Keep in mind that what we currently tend to think of as the “front” of Fuller Lodge was originally the back. The wide porch which faces the rose garden, the sweeping lawn, and unfortunately the back of the post office, was the “front” of Fuller Lodge. As viewed in the photo below, it was a gorgeous facade back in the day. Without the barrier of Central Park Square, the east facing portico of Fuller Lodge provided an unfettered view of the sunrise over the Sangre de Cristos. If you stand on the lawn nowand close your eyes you’d still probably have a tough time imagining acres worth of irrigated fields stretching from Fuller Lodge toward the edge of the mesa as far as the eye could see.

While it is still striking, it’s hard for a modern mind to imagine an entire troop of mounted boy scouts pulling up their horses on the road in front of the portico to strut their stuff for graduation day!

Evenings began with the bell perched atop the roof calling the boys and the masters for the evening meal. With clean faces and pressed uniforms, the boys would gather in front of the stone fireplace in the anteroom. There they could read or chat as they waited for the houseboys, (yes, Connell hired young boys from the surrounding pueblos to perform this role) to open the big sliding doors between the anteroom and the dining hall. When the doors opened, the boys would calmly and with decorum (always, I’m sure!) go to their assigned tables. Each table of 8 boys was presided over by a master who was also in charge of the conversation topics. Let’s say the table conversation was probably NOT what you’d usually expect of grade school boys.

There was considerable worry about kitchen fires in log cabin structures. With an eye toward safety, the kitchen at Fuller Lodge was located just off the dining hall in a stone structure which can be seen in this rear view below. That wasn’t an uncommon way of handling kitchens in general until sometime in the late 1900s.

When the dining hall wasn’t being used for meals three times each day of the week, the staff would stash tables and chairs in the surrounding rooms and host other events. The LARS band often played and Connell would invite girls from other schools in Santa Fe to come up and give his rough riding boy scouts experience in the finer points of dancing, conversation, and probably even flirtation!

The photo below of a Valentines Day dance in the Pajarito Room (as the dining room has always been called) shows the original enormous elk head which used to hang above the big fireplace. I’ve always found it amusing that the elk head eventually got moved at the request of the housekeeper who apparently found it near impossible to keep the moths from setting up house inside the thing! You can read more about the girls’ school in Santa Fe in a previous post HERE.

One of the coolest offerings at Fuller Lodge was the frequency of theater productions. In fact, the founder of the Santa Fe Opera made his theatrical debut here in Los Alamos on the stage at Fuller Lodge in 1940. John Crosby performed admirably, by all reports, in H.M.S. Pinafore! Seriously, sometimes we are just so trendy without realizing it. After all, years later Oppenheimer performed with the Los Alamos Little Theater in one of their wartime era productions. I suppose this is only a taste of what AJ Connell envisioned as life on the Pajarito Plateau being the cradle of civilized entertainment and pursuits in Northern New Mexico!

Another interesting piece of the original Fuller Lodge layout was a room just adjacent to the entry hall. The bright space has gone by several names over the decades, but it’s original name was the “Smoking Room”. Believe it or not, ranch school students were allowed to smoke as long as they observed a few rules.

1. Smokers had to be a minimum of 17 years of age.
2. Parents had to give written permission verifying the student was allowed to smoke.
3. Smoking would be allowed only after meals.
4. Smoking should NEVER be done in front of younger boys, (presumably younger than 17), who were not allowed inside the smoking room to begin with.

The name of the Smoking Room was eventually changed to the “Sportsmen’s Room” as it was the official meeting space for the Angler’s and Shooting Clubs. Then Connell finally named the room after Fayette Curtis who was the first teacher and headmaster of the ranch school.

The second floor of the lodge was more of a mezzanine style because the Pajarito Room was two stories. The headmaster and the school matron both had suites on the second floor. The school nurse had a small suite up there and the school infirmary was located in a room above the main lobby at the north end of the building which is now referred to as the “Throne Room”, (more about THAT next time!).

Connell had a sitting room and sleeping quarters on the north end of the third floor of Fuller Lodge. This third floor location offered Connell incredible views of the countryside through the windows, but during the hottest months he would sometimes occupy one of the seasonally vacant master’s quarters in order to avoid sweltering in the summer heat! Can you imagine being up on the third floor at night with no air conditioning or electric fans? Yikes!

The bell of Fuller Lodge was made by the Meneely Bell Company of Troy, New York. The bell pull dropped down from the bell tower on the roof to a spot just outside the kitchen. When it was time to summon the boys for meals, one of the kitchen staff would just reach over the pull the braided cord. It seems sort of sad that this outpost of civilization and such a unique experience for growing up young men only lasted 14 years before a whole new outfit came to Los Alamos.

As we come to the end of the ranch school days at Fuller Lodge, I encourage you to take a walk around Ashley Pond to enjoy the beautiful lights. Then have a look at Fuller Lodge and imagine it filled with holiday gatherings and excitement. Then you might want to take a moment and be amazed that Fuller Lodge has seen around 97 holiday seasons. And when you’re pausing to appreciate the beauty of the first homes in Los Alamos, give me a call! I love chatting about the unique and sometimes quirky homes here in Los Alamos. It’s even better when I can help folks find their dream home here on the Pajarito Plateau!

Happy Holidays, Los Alamos!

I always find the holidays to a be the perfect time to wax poetic about Fuller Lodge. I think this painting by Secundino Sandoval helps illustrate why. The lodge just looks cool in snow, and it’s even better lit up for Christmas!

I think the first question most of us wonder is why Fuller Lodge? Why not Connell Lodge, or Pond Lodge (except that sounds a bit odd), or even Pajarito Lodge? The short answer is that the Fuller family provided most of the funds needed to build the lodge. They also heavily supported the school when Ashley Pond’s circumstances were such that he no longer could. Philo Fuller, Edward P Fuller’s father, wholeheartedly took on the role of primary shareholder and supporter.

Edward P Fuller died in 1923. He’d first come to Los Alamos in 1917 as a guest of Ashley Pond at the Pajarito Club when the school was still a guest ranch. Edward had struggled with Polio for most of his life and the climate in New Mexico agreed with him far more than that of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Fuller’s family had made their fortune in furniture manufacturing. Philo had been glad his son found so much satisfaction in healthy living and being on horseback for most of each day. While Edward wasn’t healthy enough to do physical labor and struggled with physical movement, he was fond of horses and was highly proficient in the saddle. He also proved to have a good way with the younger boys and became both supervisor and father figure to the youngest students so far away from home.

I think a modern mindset looks at Fuller Lodge and feels like it belongs to Los Alamos, as though it’s always been here and always will be here. But in the beginning, Connell had to argue pretty hard for the need to build such an enormous structure. He had issues with the mortgage holder, but once he slogged through the legal issues and got the go ahead from Philo Fuller, the next step was to find an architect.

Connell consulted Hazel Pond, who immediately recommended John Gaw Geem. The Brazilian born architect had a civil engineering degree from the Virginia Military Institute and had a passion for New Mexico that he brought with him to his designs. Meem’s detailed plans for the lodge included the bell tower, designs for the lamps which would be needed in the portico, and even the specific dimensions for all 771 logs needed to complete the building!

Can you imagine? 771 logs. Each log specifically hewn to fit in precise order. Connell and Meem gained permission from the Forest Service to cut logs and quarry stone from the Jemez Mountains. The stonework at Fuller Lodge is actually made from the lightweight Bandelier tuff we see so frequently in our region.

Connell and a representative from the Santa Fe National Forest spent a good deal of time in the foothills west of the school choosing each tree. I find it so interesting that Connell actually made a habit of unmarking certain trees like a sort of Robin Hood of the forest because he felt the trees were necessary to the landscape and aesthetic of the school. So if the forest ranger marked a tree for use that Connell disagreed with, Connell would sneak out after dark and unmark it so he could choose one he thought was a better fit!

Trees were felled in the summer of 1927 and a sawmill of sorts was set up on the school property in order to get the building materials ready for the lodge construction.

I find these images of the construction absolutely fascinating. These photos and more are available for you to have in Craig Martin and Heather McClenahan’s book, Of Logs and Stone, which you can pick up at the History Museum shop. I highly encourage you to pick up a copy of this book for your collection if you have any interest in the history of our area.

Later in 1927, Connell received a message from a man named George Teats. Teats was a contractor in Rocky Ford, Colorado. His crew had just completed a recreation hall at the Conejos Recreation Association and had experience with the construction of log structures. Meem went to check out Teats recently completed project and declared this to be a good match for Connell’s vision. In May of 1928, Teats and his crew moved to the Pajarito Plateau and that’s when things took off!

Meem periodically visited the site to make adjustments to design and methods. He seemed especially concerned with the interior. Meem even had several of the logs sawn in half and hollowed out to create recessed areas for conduits and other piping and structural necessities.

Construction was completed in 1929. Teats sent a bill to Meem for $33,450.00. Meem paid the bill and added a 5% fee to cover his firm’s costs for planning, engineering, and supervision. The total bill from Meem was $1600.00. Which means Fuller Lodge “cost” under $35K to build, though I cannot imagine what materials would have cost then and now. The fact that the school could draw materials from the surrounding land is probably the only reason we now have a beautiful public facility which is still in use almost a hundred years later!

The construction of Fuller Lodge was truly a labor of love. While John Gaw Meem didn’t make a ton of cash off the deal, the lodge became a hallmark of his style and capabilities and really boosted his career in architecture. The building perfectly blended AJ Connell’s vision of a rustic school which excelled at developing intelligent, academically gifted outdoorsmen. Classical education meets rustic living at it’s finest! And of course, Fuller Lodge continues to be a symbol of our history here in Los Alamos. We’ll talk a bit more about the Lodge through the years in the next few weeks. What other “house” in Los Alamos deserves such a special place in our holiday season?

If you’re ready to find your holiday dream house here in Los Alamos, give me a call! I love it when fall shifts to winter, the mornings are brisk and cold, and the nights are perfect for hanging out in front of the fire or the woodstove. So while your chestnuts are roasting, give me a shout! I’d love to talk real estate in Los Alamos with you!