Abo, New Mexico
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Abo, New Mexico | |
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  Abo, New Mexico | |
| Coordinates: 34°27′21″N 106°19′59″W / 34.45583°N 106.33306°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | New Mexico |
| County | Torrance |
| Time zone | Mountain (MST) |
Abo is an unincorporated community in Torrance County, New Mexico, United States, located on U.S. Route 60. It is the nearest community to Abo, a pueblo and mission ruin of the same name that is a National Historic Landmark. A post office was operated here from 1910 to 1914.[1]
The geography around Abo is defined by the red sandstone in low mesas and stream cuts.[2]
There is natural gas in the rocks below Abo; trimethyl-arsine and organoarsine sulfides are contaminants in the pipelines.[3]
History
A Spanish mission church was built at Abo in about 1630, but destroyed circa 1670,[4] or possibly as late as 1678, and named for San Gregorio by Father Acevedo.[5] The Rev. Francisco Acevedo was a missionary to the Pueblo people nearby, who abandoned the Abo area for the Rio Grande valley after a drought and attacks by the Apache.[6] Little is left of Native American presence except the ruins of the church, and a few petroglyphs, including several of kachinas,[7] and one of Kokopelli.[8][9]
A railroad arrived in 1912, and for almost three decades, Abo was a small but thriving town with its own post office and school, but by 1940, was abandoned again.[10] In 1933, a posse of over 200 men was unable to locate a fugitive hiding in the arroyos and badlands around Abo.[11]
Maud S. Hawk Wright Medders (1889-1980) was kidnapped by Pancho Villa in 1916; she died at her ranch in Abo on Christmas Day, 1980.[12]
