Governor celebrates state librarian for International Women's Day

SANTA FE — In 1912, Doña Dolores “Lola” Chávez de Armijo, state librarian of New Mexico, filed a lawsuit when Gov. William C. McDonald tried to remove her from office.

McDonald claimed that women were unqualified to hold office according to the Constitution and laws of New Mexico.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham trumpeted Armijo’s courage and resolve during a presentation Wednesday marking International Women’s Day, and celebrating New Mexico’s Historic Women Marker Program.

Armijo won her lawsuit, which allowed her to keep her job and paved the way for legislation that gave women the right to hold appointed offices in New Mexico.

“All of us are making history in our own way,” Lujan Grisham, the second woman elected governor of New Mexico, said during the program in the Capitol Rotunda. She called the Women Historic Marker Program an incredible movement that must be moved forward in a multitude of ways.

Armijo is one of the more than 100 women whose contributions to New Mexico in areas ranging from the arts and education to government and science and beyond, are recognized on historic markers throughout the state.

Those honored include San Ildefonso Pueblo potter Maria Martinez (1886-1980); Meta L. Christy (1895-1968), who operated a medical clinic in Las Vegas, N.M., and is recognized as the first Black osteopath in the country; and Sally Rooke (1843-1908), an heroic telephone operator who died at her switchboard while calling people in Folsom, N.M., to warn them of approaching floodwaters.

Betty Downes, chair of the Historic Women Marker committee, said the idea for the program was born on the CS Ranch at Cimarron during a visit with ranch owner Linda Davis.

“Linda said, ‘You know, you are standing in the tracks of the Santa Fe Trail,’ “ Downes recalled during Wednesday’s program. She said that set the visitors to wondering about women on that historic trail, and caused them to come to terms with the fact women were just footnotes in New Mexico’s history.

In 2006, members of the International Women’s Forum-New Mexico secured state funding for the Historic Women Marker project. The first markers went up in 2007.

Now, the project is focusing on public outreach, traveling exhibitions and a women’s history curriculum in kindergarten through high school in state schools.

Lisa Nordstrum, a seventh-grade history and honors-program teacher at Santa Fe Prep, is already fully engaged in developing the school curriculum.

Nordstrum said there’s a big need to teach students about the contributions of women — not only in this state, but also throughout the country.

“According to the National Women’s History Museum, women are referenced less than11% in state history books, kindergarten-12,” she said.

New Mexico Sen. Siah Correa Hemphill said it’s time to fix that.

“We want to make sure we are honoring women across the world who are on the front line fighting for social justice,” she said.