Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument (17717943249)

The Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument is a

United States national monument In the United States, a national monument is a protected area that can be created from any land owned or controlled by the federal government by proclamation of the President of the United States or an act of Congress. National monuments prot ...

in the state of

New Mexico ) , population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano) , seat = Santa Fe , LargestCity = Albuquerque , LargestMetro = Tiguex , OfficialLang = None , Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...

, managed by the

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands. Headquartered in Washington DC, and with oversight over , it governs one eighth of the country's la ...

as part of the

National Landscape Conservation System National Conservation Lands, formally known as the National Landscape Conservation System, is a collection of lands in 873 federally recognized areas considered to be the crown jewels of the American West. The monument is located in the

Mesilla Valley The Mesilla Valley is a geographic feature of Southern New Mexico and far West Texas. It was formed by repeated heavy spring floods of the Rio Grande. Background The fertile Mesilla Valley extends from Radium Springs, New Mexico, to the wes ...

in southern New Mexico, surrounding the city of Las Cruces in

Doña Ana County Don (; ; pt, Dom, links=no ; all from Latin ', roughly 'Lord'), abbreviated as D., is an honorific prefix primarily used in Spain and Hispanic America, and with different connotations also in Italy, Portugal and its former colonies, and Croatia ...

. The protected area includes several mountain ranges of the

Chihuahuan Desert The Chihuahuan Desert ( es, Desierto de Chihuahua, ) is a desert ecoregion designation covering parts of northern Mexico and the southwestern United States. It occupies much of far West Texas, the middle to lower Rio Grande Valley and the lower P ...

. The five identified as being within the national monument are the

Robledo Mountains The Robledo Mountains are a mountain range in Doña Ana County, New Mexico just northwest of Las Cruces. They are an uplifted block of Paleozoic rocks on the west side of the Rio Grande Rift. The range was named for Pedro Robledo, who died on Ma ...

Sierra de las Uvas The Sierra de las Uvas or Grape Mountains are a mountain range in Doña Ana County, New Mexico. The John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act The John D. Dingell Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act of 2019 i ...

Doña Ana Mountains The Doña Ana Mountains are a mountain range in Doña Ana County, New Mexico. The highest elevation in the range is Doña Ana Peak at 5835 feet / 1779 meters, at . Description The Doña Ana Mountains are a small, rugged mountain range in the dese ...

Organ Mountains The Organ Mountains (also known as La Sierra de los Órganos) are a rugged mountain range in southern New Mexico in the Southwestern United States. Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument was declared a national monument on May 21, 2014 ...

and Potrillo Mountains. The

Prehistoric Trackways National Monument Prehistoric Trackways National Monument is a national monument in the Robledo Mountains of Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States, near the city of Las Cruces. The monument's Paleozoic Era fossils are on of land administered by the Bureau ...

is nearby. The monument protects a large variety of geological, paleontological and archaeological resources.Presidential Proclamation – Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

The White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...

, 21 May 2014 President

designated the monument on May 21, 2014. Half of the monument is designated

wilderness Wilderness or wildlands (usually in the plural), are natural environments on Earth that have not been significantly modified by human activity or any nonurbanized land not under extensive agricultural cultivation. The term has traditionally re ...

and closed to development or motorized use.

Protected areas

Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks protects many archaeological and cultural sites of interest. Before the

Gadsden Purchase The Gadsden Purchase ( es, region=MX, la Venta de La Mesilla "The Sale of La Mesilla") is a region of present-day southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico that the United States acquired from Mexico by the Treaty of Mesilla, which took effe ...

of 1853, this land included the border between Mexico and the United States. The

Aden Lava Flow Wilderness Aden Lava Flow Wilderness is one of many Wildernesses operated by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in New Mexico. It is in size. The John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act, signed March 12, 2019, designates the Wi ...

is here and there are 243 known archaeological sites within the monument,New National Monument Created in New Mexico
National Geographic, retrieved 9 June 2014 including some of the earliest Native American settlements and

petroglyph A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...

s known from three different tribes. The land also includes

Shelter Cave ''Shelter Cave'' is an archaeological and paleontological site located in Doña Ana County, New Mexico. Description The site is a rock shelter well up on the western side of Bishop's Cap, an outlier of the Organ Mountains. It lies about 450 ...

and Conkling Cavern.Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument Fact Sheet
organmountains.org, retrieved 9 June 2014 Fossils of

ground sloth Ground sloths are a diverse group of extinct sloths in the mammalian superorder Xenarthra. The term is used to refer to all extinct sloths because of the large size of the earliest forms discovered, compared to existing tree sloths. The Caribbe ...

s have been found in the area. More recently the land was used by William H. Bonney, better known as the outlaw

Billy the Kid Billy the Kid (born Henry McCarty; September 17 or November 23, 1859July 14, 1881), also known by the pseudonym William H. Bonney, was an outlaw and gunfighter of the American Old West, who killed eight men before he was shot and killed at t ...

, and

Geronimo Geronimo ( apm, Goyaałé, , ; June 16, 1829 – February 17, 1909) was a prominent leader and medicine man from the Bedonkohe band of the Ndendahe Apache people. From 1850 to 1886, Geronimo joined with members of three other Central Apache ba ...

, a leader during the

Apache Wars The Apache Wars were a series of armed conflicts between the United States Army and various Apache tribal confederations fought in the southwest between 1849 and 1886, though minor hostilities continued until as late as 1924. After the Mexic ...

, both of whom lived in various parts of New Mexico in the 19th century. It is said that Billy the Kid visited "Outlaw Rock", and there is a cave known as "Geronimo's Rock". The monument also includes of the historic Butterfield Stagecoach Trail. The monument includes sites where

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

bombers practiced their targeting, as well as

Kilbourne Hole Kilbourne Hole is a maar volcanic crater, located west of the Franklin Mountains of El Paso, Texas, in the Potrillo volcanic field of Doña Ana County, New Mexico. Another maar, Hunt's Hole, lies just two miles south of Kilbourne Hole. Kilbour ...

in the

Potrillo volcanic field The Potrillo volcanic field is a monogenetic volcanic field located on the Rio Grande Rift in southern New Mexico, United States and northern Chihuahua, Mexico. The volcanic field lies southwest of Las Cruces, and occupies about near the U. ...

, where American astronauts trained for lunar missions in the 1960s.Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument to be Protected
nwwild.org, retrieved 9 June 2014

Campaign for establishment

The area was given national monument status following a campaign by conservation advocates that lasted several years. Several bills were introduced in Congress to protect the area through legislation, but they were blocked by House Republicans. In contrast with some previous monument designations, communities and governments of

were supportive of the application for designation. A poll found that 60 percent of the local voters favored establishing this land as a 500,000-acre national monument.Poll finds strong support for larger Organ Mountains proposal
Phil Taylor, ''Environment and Energy Publishing'', 23 January 2014

References

External links

BLM.gov: official Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument website

BLM.gov: Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument photos album

Friends of Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument
– ''public group''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument National Monuments in New Mexico Bureau of Land Management National Monuments Bureau of Land Management areas in New Mexico Protected areas of Doña Ana County, New Mexico Units of the National Landscape Conservation System National Monuments designated by Barack Obama Protected areas established in 2014 2014 establishments in New Mexico Protected areas of the Chihuahuan Desert