Preserve Sacred Ground ~ For 400 years, this adobe church has held the stories, spirit, and soil of our community. Built by hand. Sustained by faith. Now, it’s our turn to preserve it—forever.
Give to the Chapel's Perpetual Preservation Project. Your gift makes history last.
"THE OLDEST CHURCH" ~ COMMUNITY ~ FAITH ~ HISTORY ~ MUSIC
About Us
RESOURCES - NM HISTORY - FICTION & NON-FICTION
RESOURCES
BOOKS:
FICTION:
Death Comes For The Archbishop - Willa Cather
The Wind Leaves No Shadow - Ruth Laughlin
Laughing Boy - Oliver Lafarge (Pulitzer Prize)
The Pot Thief Mystery Series - J. Michael Orenduff
Books set in Santa Fe:
https://www.goodreads.com/places/289-santa-fe-new-mexico
The Bright Edges of the World: Willa Cather and Her Archbishop - Garrett Peck (2026)
NON-FICTION
The Night Journal - Elizabeth Crook
By Joe Sando (Native Author):
- Pueblo Nations: Eight Centuries of Pueblo Indian History
- Po’pay: Leader of the First American Revolution
- Nee Hemish: A History of Jemez Pueblo
- The Pueblo Indians
- Pueblo Profiles: Cultural Identity Through Centuries of Change
Isabella of Spain: The Last Crusader - William Thomas Walsh
At the End of the Santa Fe Trail - Blandina Segale
Caballeros: The Romance of Santa Fe and the Southwest, Facsimile of the Revised 1945 Edition - Ruth Laughlin
Indian Boyhood - Charles Eastman
Conquistadores: A New History of Spanish Discovery and Conquest - Fernando Cervantes
Kiva, Cross & Crown - Kessel
My Penitente Land - Chavez
The Last Conquistador - Marc Simmons
The Pueblo Revolt - David Roberts
The Pueblo Revolt of 1680 - Knaut
The Rediscovery of America from Native perspective - Ben Nighthawk
White Water Shell Place - Anthology of Native American Reflections on the 400th Anniversary of the Founding of Santa Fe
Down Country - New Mexico, Galisteo Basin History
1491 & 1493, Two books by Charles C. Mann
BOOKS BY ANA PACHECO ~ SANT FE HISTORIAN, TOUR-GUIDE
All Roads Lead To Santa Fe - LaFarge
Turn Left At The Sleeping Dog - La Farge
Blood & Thunder
Scholar of the City Different
Sustaining The Divine in Mexico Tenochtitlan - Jonathan Truitt
Miera Y Pacheco, A Renaissance Spaniard in Eighteenth Century New Mexico - John L Kessel
Adobe Conservation - stones.org
When Montezuma met Cortez - Matthew Restall
The Conquest of New Spain - Bernal Diaz
Converging Streams -
Seven Myth of the Spanish Conquest - Matthew Restall
FILMS:
Milagro Beanfield War (Robert Redford, fiction)
The Genizaro Experience (Gary Medina Cook) - PBS documentary 2023
However Wide The Sky: Native Places of Power - PBS documentary
Salt of the Earth (1954 film)
History of the Buffalo - Ken Burns - PBS
Youtube: Canes of Power
Youtube series: Robert Martinez, NM State Historian, 10 minute episodes
New Mexico Documentaries on YouTube: https://www.google.com/search?
client=safari&sca_esv=583077499&rls=en&tbm=vid&q=documentaries+about+ne
w+mexico&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiYrdmumcmCAxUHOTQIHQMGAUcQ8ccDegQIF
RAJ&biw=882&bih=528&dpr=2
Official website for the chapel, with an introduction to the chapel’s history, art, and
preservation projects. This website is a good introduction to the chapel.
https://www.sanmiguelchapelsantafe.org/
National Park Service history of San Miguel, with historic pictures.
http://www.npshistory.com/publications/kessell/nm-missions/san_miguel.htm
In addition to a high-level overview of the chapel, this page includes current and future
events and plans for the chapel.
https://santafeselection.com/blog/2020/03/12/san-miguel-chapel-history-community/
Succinct description of the history of the San Miguel Chapel.
https://santafe.com/san-miguel-chapel/
A New Era for Santa Fe’s San Miguel Chapel? by Julianne Burton-Carvajal, Ph.D.
Magazine article highlights of the chapel history and art.
https://issuu.com/greenfiretimes/docs/gftdec2018 pages 7-9
Barrio de Analco Historic District.
The National Park Service introduction to the history of the Barrio de Analco.
https://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/american_latino_heritage/
barrio_de_analco_historic_district.html
The San Miguel Mission Bell. by Ana Pacheco, author and descendent of Diego de
Vargas.
https://historyinsantafe.com/san-miguel-mission-bell/
San Jose Bell—Cast of Copper, Silver and Gold. Recounts the legend of the bell’s
origins.
https://blog.artgeek.io/2019/03/23/san-jose-bell-cast-of-copper-and-silver-and-gold/
Discover the Oldest Church in the US. The second half of this article describes each of
the major pieces of art in the chapel. Written by an artist.
https://blog.artgeek.io/2019/03/23/discovering-the-oldest-church-in-the-u-s-san-miguel-
chapel-santa-fe-nm/
Early Spanish Expansion into Indigenous Lands
THE ENCOMIENDA IN NEW MEXICO,
1598-1680 by H. ALLEN ANDERSON
This article describes the “encomienda”, imperial Spain’s colonial policy that
institutionalized slavery by allocating ownership of subjugated people and lands to those
who participated in the conquest. The article examines the impact of the encomienda on
Pueblo Indians and the part the encomienda played in their subsequent revolt in 1680.
https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2691&context=nmhr
“WE MEXICAS WENT EVERYWHERE IN THAT LAND”: THE MEXICAN INDIAN
DIASPORA IN THE GREATER SOUTHWEST, 1540-1680 by Travis Jeffress
Dissertation on the indigenous experience of imperial Spain, with a reexamination of the
relationship between meso-american “allies” and Spanish colonizers. Chapter five
addresses events in the Barrio Analco and discusses the possible relationships between
the Spanish and Nahua.
https://rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu/rutgers-lib/59088/PDF/1/play/
Tlaxcalan (“tlash- calan”)
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