The Chronicles Of Grant County
An aerial view of Cliff, New Mexico. (This map was provided courtesy of the United States Geological Survey, 2021.)An aerial view of Cliff, New Mexico. (This map was provided courtesy of the United States Geological Survey, 2021.)
Cliff is a small community northwest of Silver City. Settlement by non-Native people appears to have begun in the late 1800s. The Daily New Mexican on December 28, 1894, reported that the Governor of New Mexico Territory named a notary public (the term used at that time) in Cliff, while the same newspaper included a note on April 10, 1895, that a new postmaster had been appointed in Cliff.
A type of delivery that would likely be unusual today – but wasn't necessarily considered odd in Territorial days – arrived in Silver City from a new resident of Cliff in the beginning of 1910. The Santa Fe New Mexican reported on January 4, 1910, that J. B. Crammer, formerly of Lincoln County, "...brought a wagon load of pelts to Silver City...there being 192 pelts in the lot, half coyote and the other half grey fox. The pelts were from animals shot the past two months on the Gila forest."
The Federal government tried to enhance wildlife in the Gila River near Cliff in 1921. A news article in the Santa Fe New Mexican dated January 29, 1921, stated that the U S Bureau of Fisheries supplied bass that was placed in the river as "...an experiment to make the Gila a bass stream."
Educational services have been provided to children in the Cliff area for generations.
On May 1, 1913, the Santa Fe New Mexican reported that the State Superintendent of Education "...received notice that the new school building at Cliff, Grant County, built and furnished at a cost of approximately two thousand dollars, had been completely demolished by a tornado on April 23. No other damages of consequence was done by the tornado in that vicinity and the loss of the school building is somewhat in the nature of a freakish trick by the storm. The new building was completed in December last and was reported to be a substantial and commodious one. School had been dismissed, so there was no loss of life."
The El Paso Times reported in a news article dated September 20, 1937, that a new school building was constructed in Cliff at the cost of $17,000. This structure was built as part of the Works Progress Administration of the New Deal.
Fires occurred at the Cliff Schools, according to news reports, in both April of 1941 and April of 1951.
The roadway connecting Cliff with Silver City – U S Route 180 – has been upgraded several times during the years.
On December 28, 1917, The Western Liberal of Lordsburg reported that the New Mexico Department of Agriculture had approved a road project with Federal aid "...to be built in 1918 and 1919, seventeen miles of Silver City-Gila River Road between Silver City and Cliff, Grant County..." The cost for this project was listed as $55,484, according to the edition of The Deming Graphic dated September 16, 1919.
The route of this roadway was altered slightly in Cliff in 1965. News reports in that year detailed the rebuilding of 10.2 miles of Route 180 at a cost of $1.25 million.
The Cliff Census-Designated Place included 284 residents in 2020 as compared to 293 people in 2010, according to the U S Census Bureau. This represented a 3.1% decrease in population during that ten-year time period. Of the population in 2020, 9.5% of the residents self-identified as Hispanics. There were 160 homes in Cliff in 2020, according to the U S Census Bureau. Of that number, 29 of the houses were vacant; this represented 18.1% of the residences in this community.
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© 2021 Richard McDonough