The Public Library announces an upcoming book discussion and signing with authors Dr. Christopher J. Huggard and Terry Humble for their book Santa Rita del Cobre: A Copper Mining Community in New Mexico. The program will be held at the Silver City Public Library on Tuesday, March 20 at 5:00 pm.    

Santa Rita del Cobre: A Copper Mining Community in New Mexico was written by Dr. Christopher J. Huggard and Terry Humble. The history of Santa Rita, Hurley and the Chino Mines is covered in this book, covering the period from the prehistoric days to the community's demise in 1970. On the cover, there is a beautiful picture of downtown Santa Rita taken in 1942. The 250 pages contain more than 130 photographs, drawings and maps. The appendices in the back of the book show production records, profits, wage rates and fatalities at Chino Mines as well as listings of the shovels, drills and haul trucks used at the mine.

Dr. Chris Huggard is a professor of history at NorthWest Arkansas Community College. He earned his PhD in history from the University of New Mexico in 1994 and has published extensively on the history of mining and the environmental impact in Grant County and elsewhere in the American West. Dr. Huggard has been visiting Silver City and vicinity for more than 20 years to complete research on the area. He published an article in the Journal of the West on the history of Tyrone in 1996 and also published a history of the Gila Wilderness Area in another book, Forests under Fire: A Century of Ecosystem Mismanagement in the Southwest (2001).

Terry Humble was born and raised in Santa Rita. He worked more than three decades at the Chino Mines as a diesel mechanic and foreman, retiring in 2001. He has been active in the preservation of Santa Rita documents and oral histories for more than forty years. Humble has published several journal articles on the history of his hometown.

Books will be available for purchase at the program. Books are also available at the A.I.R. Coffee House in Bayard and the JW Art Gallery in Hurley. Terry Humble can be reached by phone at 575-537-2441 and 575-313-4329.