Cecilia Bell receives state L. Bradford Price Award

Category: Front Page News Front Page News
Published: 22 April 2016 22 April 2016

From left are Dr. John Bell, awardee Fort Bayard Historic Preservation Society President Cecilia Bell, , and long-time FBHPS members Liz Mikols and Gerald Schultz.

On Saturday, April 16, Cecilia Bell, president of the Fort Bayard Historic Preservation Society, received the L. Bradford Prince Award for significant work in the field of preservation in New Mexico at the 2016 New Mexico History Conference Awards Banquet in Farmington, New Mexico. This award was not just a paper certificate to hang on the wall, but rather a medallion.

 

The Historical Society of New Mexico was organized on December 26, 1859 by prominent citizens of Santa Fe, including Captain Robert A. Wainwright. Wainwright, chief of ordance at Fort Marcy created the seal of the society, which was used on certificates of membership and other documents. The HSNM Award Medallion is based on this seal.

A member of the Society for the Preservation of Spanish Antiquities and Territorial Governor from 1889 to 1893, L. Bradford Prince became president of the New Mexico Historical Society in 1883. The Society's collections of artifacts and papers from New Mexico's past led to the founding of the society's museum in the Palace of the Governors.

Reflecting on the activities of the HSNM 's early years and the mission and goals Fort Bayard Historic Preservation Society, Bell said she sensed a similarity. The Fort Bayard Historic Preservation Society was founded in 1997 to celebrate the centennial of the U.S. Army's military role at Fort Bayard. Since the site was named a National Historic Landmark in 2004, the focus of the society continues to be the preservation of the viability of Fort Bayad as both a military and medical site. Preservation includes landscape, property, and most importantly the story.

Landscape by weather and human efforts changes daily. A Colter Pine planted circa 1906 by the staff of Commander Bushnell remains. The Kneeling Nun and Twin Sisters Peaks have eroded. Artifacts have been carried away. During the early military years, property was not built to last.

Today the buildings of the early 1900s are being demolished by design and destroyed by neglect. Perhaps only a few buildings such as the 1910 Commanding Officer's Quarters (now the museum) and the 1939 New Deal Theater will be saved. The story, both of the military and medical years, obtained by research and the gifts of many relatives whose families were a part of the story will preserved.

"The L. Bradford Prince Award Medallion is an award not just to me," Bell said, "but to all who have been, are, and who will be a part of the preservation of Fort Bayard National Historic Landmark."

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