Reserve is a village in

Catron County, New Mexico Catron County is a county in the U.S. state of New Mexico. As of the 2020 census, the population was 3,579, making it New Mexico's third-least populous county. Its county seat is Reserve. Catron County is New Mexico's largest county by area. ...

, United States. The town population was 293 at the 2020 census. It is the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

of Catron County. Currently the village has two grocery stores, a hardware store, a bar, fairgrounds, and a health clinic. It is the site where Elfego Baca held off a gang of Texan

cowboy A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the ''vaquero'' ...

s who wanted to kill him for arresting cowboy Charles McCarty.

History

In the 1860s,

Mexican-American Mexican Americans are Americans of full or partial Mexican descent. In 2022, Mexican Americans comprised 11.2% of the US population and 58.9% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% of Mexican Americans were born in the United State ...

s established a string of villages along the San Francisco River, naming them the Upper, Lower, and Middle San Francisco Plazas. In the late 1870s

Anglo Anglo is a prefix indicating a relation to, or descent from England, English culture, the English people or the English language, such as in the term ''Anglosphere''. It is often used alone, somewhat loosely, to refer to people of British d ...

settlers began arriving. They renamed Upper Frisco Plaza as Milligan's Plaza, naming it after a merchant and saloon owner. Catron became a county in 1921. It was named after an attorney and political leader from Santa Fe, Thomas B. Catron. Milligan's Plaza was the site of the Frisco shootout of Elfego Baca.

Geography

Reserve is located in western Catron County in the valley of the San Francisco River. New Mexico State Road 12 passes through the village, leading west to U.S. Route 180 near Reserve Airport and northeast to U.S. Route 60 at Datil. NM 435 leads south through the communities of San Francisco Plaza and Lower San Francisco Plaza before ending south of Reserve.''Reserve, New Mexico,'' 7.5 Minute Topographic Quadrangle, USGS, 1965 (1986 rev.) Reserve is situated in the Gila National Forest about east of the

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

border. The area includes ruins from the Mogollon and

Anasazi The Ancestral Puebloans, also known as Ancestral Pueblo peoples or the Basketmaker-Pueblo culture, were an ancient Native American culture of Pueblo peoples spanning the present-day Four Corners region of the United States, comprising southea ...

tribes, as well as

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 and historic Old West sites. According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the village has a total area of , all land.

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 387 people, 177 households, and 103 families residing in the village. The population density was . There were 238 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the village was 80.10%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.52%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.52% Native American, 13.95% from other races, and 4.91% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 40.57% of the population. There were 177 households, out of which 25.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 41.8% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 14.1% had a female householder with no husband present, and 41.8% were non-families. 39.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 16.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.14 and the average family size was 2.84. In the village, the population was spread out, with 24.5% under the age of 18, 7.5% from 18 to 24, 20.9% from 25 to 44, 28.2% from 45 to 64, and 18.9% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 43 years. For every 100 females, there were 95.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 89.6 males. The median income for a household in the village was $24,750, and the median income for a family was $30,536. Males had a median income of $30,833 versus $16,000 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the village was $14,612. About 14.2% of families and 17.8% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 22.6% of those under age 18 and 9.1% of those age 65 or over.

Climate

Reserve has a

Mediterranean climate A Mediterranean climate ( ), also called a dry summer climate, described by Köppen and Trewartha as ''Cs'', is a temperate climate type that occurs in the lower mid-latitudes (normally 30 to 44 north and south latitude). Such climates typic ...

of the warm-summer type (

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (1951–2014), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author ...

: ''Csb''), unusual in

. Despite having mild to hot daytime highs year round, temperatures substantially cool off during nighttime due to Reserve's high elevation and aridity. Even in the summertime, 90 degree days can cool off into the 40's. A freeze has been recorded every month of the year except August. Reserve receives most of its rainfall in the form of

thunderstorm A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustics, acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorm ...

s from mid-summer into fall from the North American Monsoon, which can produce hazardous

flash flood A flash flood is a rapid flooding of low-lying areas: washes, rivers, dry lakes and depressions. It may be caused by heavy rain associated with a severe thunderstorm, hurricane, or tropical storm, or by meltwater from ice and snow. Flash f ...

s very quickly. Snow usually falls once or twice a year, but melts quickly due to the high daytime temperatures.

Education

The city is served by the Reserve Independent School District.

Reserve prehistoric pottery

This Ancestral Pueblo pottery type was named for the Reserve area, where it was first found, and is a major subdivision of the Cibola Whiteware group. Common designs are opposed solid and hatched motifs that are interlocked with each other. Usually the hatching is diagonal, but parallel hatching in late examples occurs as well. Squiggle hatching may occur on some early examples. Usually the hatched motifs average two to four times as wide as the solid motifs but occasionally approach the same size. Framing and hatching lines are usually the same width. "Bulls eyes" are common in Reserve Black-on-White.Reserve Black-on-White
Pottery guide and photo index

References

{{authority control Villages in Catron County, New Mexico Villages in New Mexico County seats in New Mexico