THE PAST 100 YEARS

From The Santa Fe New Mexican:

March 6, 1924: It will be some time before the forest service project between Canoncito and Pecos is completed. The grading is abut half finished, but the contract for the surfacing is yet to be let.

March 6, 1949: Beneath neat rows of white granite stones in the National cemetery lie the remains of 2,313 persons, some prominent in forming history, and many others who carried the load of America’s wars.

The graves are “at formation” covered with Kentucky bluegrass, and are nestled on a slope overlooking Santa Fe and under the rim of blue mountains.

March 6, 1974: The Volunteers for Santa Fe slate led by Mayor Joseph E. Valdes swept its second straight election Tuesday and now has control of all eight council seats as well as the mayor’s chair.

One race, the council contest between Joseph P. Allocca and Gerald Ortiz y Pino, was a cliffhanger.

The lead seesawed between the candidates — and at one point the two were tried at 2,567 votes — before two Dale Bellamah precincts gave victory to Allocca by 157 votes.

March 6, 1999: So many mothers accompanied their children to the funeral where Pauline Chavez had to say goodbye to her only son.

On a breezy, hushed Friday morning, Chavez buried 11-year-old Eric Garcia, one of two people killed Tuesday when a Shuttlejack bus crashed on its way home from a school ski trip.

Three days later, at Rosario Cemetery, Chavez was surrounded by more than 100 tearful elementary-school children who released balloons into the cloudy sky with a written message for Eric: From the heart.