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LAS CRUCES - On the Sunday afternoon of Dec. 7, 1941, readers of the Las Cruces Sun-News got an unexpected special afternoon edition on their doorstep.
They were soon reading of the surprise attacks that morning on American bases in Pearl Harbor and the Philippines.
Over the next weeks, the paper reported the status of local men serving in the Pacific, including those with New Mexico's 200th Coast Artillery, sent in the summer of 1941 to defend the Philippines in case of war with Japan.
And like every other American city and town, Las Cruces seemed to mobilize overnight.
By the end of December, hundreds had signed up to serve. School children began collecting scrap metal and aluminum, as cash-strapped county residents donated thousands of dollars to the Red Cross, and quadrupled the local purchase of war bonds.
More than 2,600 men and women from Do-a Ana County would ultimately serve in World War II, in every branch and theater of the war, joining 16.3 million fellow Americans in the greatest event of the 20th century.
In the early 1990s, with the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, a small group of Pearl Harbor veterans approached city officials about installing a memorial at a city park.
On Dec. 7, 1998, dirt was finally turned on a sandy parcel near the base of the Las Cruces Dam just off Roadrunner Parkway in the new High Range development.
Over the years, the Las Cruces Veterans Park has evolved into one of the largest and most significant
A city memorial
The veterans' park has its roots in that initial meeting with Pearl Harbor veterans, but it began to formulate in meetings in 1993 of the newly established city capital improvement advisory committee on impact fees, which were intended to fund new parks.
City officials and the veterans group agreed placing the proposed Pearl Harbor memorial in an existing park was not desirable, and that a dedicated park location would be best (the marker would actually end up at the Mimbres Museum in Deming).
What followed was a partnership led by the Las Cruces Home Builders Association and developer George Rawson, and including veterans advisory groups and city landscape architect and current state representative Joni Gutierrez.
The veterans' park had to compete for funding and priority with other ongoing city projects. But by 1998, local builder Eddie Binns provided a parcel of undeveloped land abutting an arroyo on the west side of Roadrunner Parkway.
Veterans Advisory Board chairwoman Elsa Baker came up with a concept design, developed further by Gutierrez, making use of the natural landscape and sloping incline of the parcel.
Eight years of effort
Work began on the morning of the 57th anniversary of Pearl Harbor.
A dome-topped ceremonial gazebo featured medallions of military branches and veterans groups, and public park features, including a playground, sidewalks, and playing field, were installed.
The city provided materials and the Home Builders furnished the labor and machinery, completing the park in time for a formal dedication the Friday before Memorial Day 1999.
Since then, the veterans' park has only expanded its scope.
The first memorial to the Bataan Death March, funded partially with federal dollars, was dedicated at Veterans' Park in 2002 upon the anniversary of the fall of Bataan in April 1942.
The memorial, the funding for which was secured by Bataan veteran descendants, features an eight-foot tall statue "Heroes of Bataan," crafted by local sculptor Kelley S. Hestir. The statue overlooks a concrete walkway in which are imbedded the cast footprints of actual Bataan March veterans, including several from Do-a Ana County.
Also in 2002, the local chapter of Disabled Veterans of America dedicated the Memorial Walk, a winding paved walkway featuring memorials installed by veterans of China-Burma-India and Korea, as well as the Special Forces and the U.S. Marines.
Memorial wall
The most prominent addition to the park is the Do-a Ana County Veterans Memorial Wall, dedicated Nov. 10, 2005.
According to Sun-News archives, the idea at first was to list the names of all area World War II veterans, but soon project researchers and veterans Tony Barncastle and Paul Roach realized it should include all wars going back to the Civil War.
Limiting the scope to those who were from Do-a Ana County, the research group led by Barncastle and Roach combed county and military records and produced 6,394 names of county veterans.
Las Cruces architect Richard Haas designed an almost 200-foot long half-circle, built of marble and granite, with the names divided by the war in which they served. It cost $733,000 for Las Cruces firm Highland Enterprises to build, most of which came in federal and state funding, as well as private donations.
Names have been added to the wall through the years, including the veterans of the first Persian Gulf War.
Other additions include the Walk of Honor, in which anyone who has served in the military may have a brick installed in their name or a family member's name - the bricks cost $35 and are obtained through the city parks department.
Future plans include memorials for Vietnam veterans and women veterans of war, though current budget conditions and declining private donations have reportedly temporarily delayed the development of those memorials.
The Las Cruces Veterans' Park is not the first memorial for local World War II veterans. Within the first year of war, an effort was already under way at New Mexico College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts to raise money for a future memorial for Aggies who died or served.
That effort culminated in 1950 with the first Aggie Memorial Stadium, which featured a memorial tower with the names of former Aggies who had died in wars.
Freelance writer Christopher Schurtz can be reached at cschurtz@zianet.com.
