Rio Grande by Tom Lea, oil on canvas, 1954
Back when I was a boy growing up in El Paso, KTSM produced a show that I believe was called "Look to the Mountain". El Paso icon, Conrey Bryson, hosted the Christmas Star program each year when the star on the mountain was lit for Christmastide. That was when the star meant something besides an energy burning fetish and the sacred cow of El Paso politicians. Famed American artist/author and El Paso resident, Tom Lea, read from his essay, "Old Mount Franklin". Lea wrote this inscription to Bryson when the essay was published in 1968: "There is a deep happiness in sharing this old town and this old mountain with friends like you." All of us who have or who now treasure the mountain and enjoy its trails, ridge and arroyos, know that deep happiness.
Lea concluded his essay this way:
"Above the Rio Grande's ribbon of green, forming one side of the portal of the Pass of the North, Mount Franklin is a presence and a personality. Standing above us, above the build of our town, Mount Franklin is the landmark and the trademark of where we live."
Our "landmark and trademark". Preserve or develop?
May we preserve this "landmark and trademark" and protect its beauty which is the home and habitat of a myriad of plants and animals. May we continue to have the deep happiness of sharing our old mountain together.
Thanks for the post - the Tom Lea scene, with the Yucca elata, cactus and view, speaks of the natural areas between Albuquerque and El Paso I travel.
ReplyDeleteI just shared that with someone I know in NM, and how that plant is now gone from natural areas of Abq because of thoughtless urbanization, though we at least have countless Soaptree in city landscapes.
Something that people take for granted, is quickly gone under the hands of thoughtless development