Wingert Playdon - John Gaw Meem at Acoma: the restoration of San Esteban Del Rey mission

2012 by the University of New Mexico Press

All rights reserved. Published 2012

Printed in the United States of America

17 16 15 14 13 12 1 2 3 4 5 6

The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

Wingert-Playdon, Kate, 1960

John Gaw Meem at Acoma : the restoration of San Esteban del Rey mission / Kate Wingert-Playdon.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-8263-5209-5 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-8263-5211-8 (electronic)

1. San Estevan del Rey Mission Church (Acoma, N.M.)

2. Adobe churchesConservation and restorationNew MexicoAcoma Pueblo.

3. Spanish mission buildingsConservation and restorationNew Mexico Acoma Pueblo.

4. Meem, John Gaw, 18941983. I. Title.

NA5230.N62A289 2012

726.50978991dc23

2012024068

My first memorable encounter with Acoma was in the early spring of 1999 when ten-year-old Pat Playdon and I accompanied Beth Johnson, then executive director of Cornerstones Community Partnerships, and Dennis Playdon, Cornerstones program manager, to a meeting between Acoma governor Lloyd Tortalita and staff members for First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton. The meeting was called to plan for the impending visit of Hillary Clinton to announce a Save Americas Treasures planning grant for Cornerstones. Cornerstones was focused on using the grant money to carry out preservation planning for San Esteban del Rey Mission at Acoma. I had been to Acoma before, but this was different. Pat and I waited a long time that day. We later learned that waiting a long time was a form of being introduced to the way things happen at Acoma. That day, like many, there was no rush. Things needed to be talked through and worked out between Governor Tortalita and the rest in the group, so Hillary Clintons visit was right for Acoma.

The Save Americas Treasures grant was a powerful tool for fostering collaboration between Cornerstones and Acoma and served as a catalyst as well as a primary means of support for carrying out necessary work on the church for a period that lasted more than ten years. I had the good fortune to engage in some of that work, for example serving as a volunteer with Cornerstones Community Partnerships and members of the Pueblo of Acoma in the effort to put a new temporary roof on the church in the summer of 1999, an act of emergency stabilization that was aimed at a short-term solution to the long-term problem of keeping water out. The temporary roof served the mission for longer than expected. This is not unusual in work on San Esteban; for a number of reasons the degree of difficulty for building surpasses what one expects while engaged in the process. I also coordinated the preservation planning for Save Americas Treasures in 2000. The effort was an interesting one, as it involved a broad partnership of Acoma tribal members and Cornerstones consultants and paved the way for a preservation effort that was guided by a culturally based preservation process first and foremost.

My involvement was small compared to that of others who have worked in the Acoma-Cornerstones partnership, but the combination of on-site work and archival research about San Esteban gave me a unique objective view and led to observations about how things are carried out at Acoma that had a profound effect on my understanding of the practice of preservation in particular and architecture in general. In 2007 I had a chance to read the Meem architectural archive more carefully. I began to understand that the effect the San Esteban del Rey Mission and working at Acoma had on me has been shared by many. The Acoma-Cornerstones project and all involved are important background to this book.

I have continued to stay in contact with a number of individuals at Acoma. They include Damian Garcia, Brian Vallo, and Theresa Pasqual, each of whom has served in the role of director of the Acoma Historic Preservation Office, all of whom join with others at Acoma in the important work of finding new ways to collect, protect, and share tangible and intangible aspects of their cultural heritage. Fred Vallo was just ending his time as governor when I began this work; he and other governors and members of the Tribal Council are important to the continued efforts at cultural conservation at Acoma. These efforts are well supported by entities like the Acoma Historic Preservation Advisory Council.

Those from Cornerstones who must receive more specific acknowledgment for their contribution to this research include Ed Crocker and Ann Lockhart who, when I was a newcomer to New Mexico, introduced me to the great archival resources available. Bill Cowles and the late George Clayton Pearl both served as Cornerstones board members, and as architects always gave insight from the particular view of the design professions. Nancy Meem Wirth has provided guidance, knowledge, encouragement, and leadership that serve as a model for fashioning this book. I have come to believe that she understands the built environment and cultures of New Mexico in a way similar to that of her father, John Gaw Meem.

Information for this book in the form of photos, drawings, and written documents came from a number of sources, including the Museum of New Mexico, Palace of the Governors, Fray Anglico Chvez History Library; the Denver Public Library, Western History Collection; and the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division. I am grateful for the help and insight from individuals in the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, and in particular Dedie Snow of the Archaeological Records Management Section and Pilar Medina Cannizzaro from the Historic Preservation Division. The most important source of information was the John Gaw Meem Archives of Southwestern Architecture at the Center for Southwest Research, University of New Mexico Libraries. In particular, a multiyear conversation with Audra Bellmore, curator of the Meem Archives, has been influential in the researching and writing of this text. Photos in the Meem photo collection and letters from B. A. Reuter led to a source for Acoma that was new to me. A collection of photos taken by Beatrice Blackwood are housed at the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford. Some are also in John Gaw Meems job photo collection, but Phillip Grover of the Pitt Rivers Museum alerted me to two that I had never seen, photos of the mission with both towers disassembled.

El Palacio magazine, celebrating its hundredth year in 2013, is an important source for any book about the American Southwest in the first part of the twentieth century. I am grateful to the staff, in particular the managing editor, Cynthia Baughman, for help with details about information from a number of El Palacio volumes in the final stages of this book.

Substantial support for this book has come from Temple University. Much of the organization and research was carried out during a sabbatical semester and supported through a summer research grant. Further support for the mechanics of the book has come from Tyler School of Art Deans Grants and University Grants-in-Aid of Research.

Any researcher is indebted to editors and peer reviewers. I am grateful to Rebekah Buchanan, now at Western Illinois University, for editing and coaching me through the manuscripts awkward phases and to Desiree Guastella for providing an index. Comments from peer reviewers selected by the University of New Mexico Press served to find the obvious omissions from the textI am grateful for their contribution. I also thank all at the University of New Mexico Press who worked to publish this book.