TULAROSA : AN AMERICAN DREAMTIME

multidisciplinary performance series

*Design by* *Derrick Beasley*
*Photography by Derrick Beasley & Leilani Himmelstein*

Inspiration

Kamara began her ongoing obssession with Tularosa in 2005 when she happened upon the book "Tularosa: Last Frontier of the West" by C.L. Sonnichsen, which contained a plenitude of the small New Mexico region's stories, like the one below about the Fountain family. The book reignited Kamara's fascination with the Wild West, rooted in a childhood soaked in reruns of “The Lone Ranger”, “The Cisco Kid”, and Clint Eastwood westerns.

Songs were inspired by the mix of historical characters who populated both the book and American history, ranging from the well-known— the Donner Party and Billy the Kid, who met his fate in Tularosa in the form of U.S. marshal Pat Garrett— to the more obscure Eugene Manlove Rhodes, nicknamed the "cowboy chronicler" for his dime novels about the cowboy's way of life.

A True Story…

In 1890 Albert Fountain and his eight-year old son Henry set out in a horse-drawn carriage from Lincoln, New Mexico toward their hometown of Mesilla. They expected a three- to four-day, 140 mile journey through the Tularosa desert basin-- a foreboding terrain of pine forest, desert shrubland, mountain passes and gypsum sand dunes. The man and his young son were never seen or heard from again.

Fountain-- a lawyer and politician-- had undertaken this trip to Lincoln, the county seat, to secure indictments against his arch rivals-- Albert B. Fall, another lawyer and politician, and Oliver Lee, an outlying rancher and cattle rustler. The two sides had been engaged in contentious opposition for as long as they had known each other-- over land, over water, over all the things one might imagine to cause strife between very different men possessing very real desires for the same scarce resources of an inhospitable land.

His family and many friends had warned Fountain against this trip, expecting something sinister might be afoot from Fall and Lee. Fountain's wife Mariana Perez Fountain was distraught, and in fact his daughter Maggie had been the one to suggest he take Henry, thinking the youngster would deter foul play.

The night after the Fountains set out toward Mesilla, home of the county's courthouse, Maggie was plagued by nightmares and visions of her ghostly father and brother. Albert and Henry never made it to their destination, they were never heard from again, and their bodies were never found. To this day, between the descendants of the Fountains and Falls, there still exist the remnants of the feud, and arguments abound over what really happened to Albert and Henry Fountain on their fateful journey.

*Tularosa, NM - White Sands Desert - photo by Leilani Himmelstein*

Steam Engine used for building Texas railroads

*The Trial of Albert Fall and Oliver Lee*

*Eugene Manlove Rhodes - The "Cowboy Chronicler"*