Roots of Edgewood

By Rick Holben, Photo Historian, East Mountain Historical Society

July 2024 marks the 25^th anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Edgewood, an area that covers nearly 57 square miles and boasts a population of about 6,000 people. These 57 square miles include portions of the historic homestead communities of Barton, Venus, Bachelor, Pine Grove and the 19^th century Hispanic community of Martinez.

The community name “Edgewood” was first established in 1936 when the Barton post office was moved about two miles east to the W.I. Davis Mountainview store, near what is now the southeast corner of Old Highway 66 and Santa Fe County Road 7.The postmaster at the time, Helen Reeves, and Ray Bassett are credited with choosing the new name because the area was at “the edge of the woods.” The commercial center of Edgewood began to grow in this area along the then-recently completed Highway 366 (which became Highway 66 in 1937). Prior to the construction of Highway 366, the main east-west corridor through the Edgewood area was what is now Dinkle Road from Barton to Bachelor, where it turned south on what is now Martin Road to Martinez Road into old Moriarty.

The early 20^th century communities in the Edgewood area were settled by homesteaders just as the Estancia Valley was after 350,000 acres of the Bartolome Baca and Estancia Land Grants were determined to be public domain in 1904. The fertile lands of the Estancia Valley were promoted heavily in the Midwest, from which many of the area’s settlers originated. The Santa Fe Railroad encouraged these settlers by providing an entire boxcar that could be filled with all their possessions, including household items, farm equipment and even livestock, which would be delivered to the train station in Moriarty. A homestead was generally 160 acres of public land that for which a claimant would apply; they then had to improve and live on the land at least five years before gaining a legal patent. Many early homestead families arrived on their claim and lived in a primitive dugout or tent before building a more permanent structure. 

The homesteaders who arrived in the early 20^th century were a mix of farmers, ranchers and entrepreneurs, though most were farmers. A predominant crop produced in the Edgewood area and throughout the Estancia Valley was the pinto bean. In the 1930s, it was estimated that 90 percent of cultivated land in the East Mountains was planted in pinto beans, grown without irrigation by the dry farming method. Dry farming relied on a predictable rainy season in order to capture rainwater to irrigate crops through the growing season. By the early 1950s, weather patterns had changed and dry farming was no longer a viable option, causing many homesteaders to leave the area. 

Those who stayed turned to other ways to sustain a livelihood. Many of the old homesteads were bought up by those who stayed, creating large parcels of land that largely sat unused.  After Interstate 40 was completed in the 1970s, the entire East Mountain area suddenly seemed closer to Albuquerque with many people wanting to live a rural lifestyle while making the commute to work in the city. In the 1980s and 1990s many of the old homestead properties around Edgewood were being developed and subdivided into building lots, giving birth to the mostly residential community we have today. Some of the pioneer homestead family names are memorialized by Edgewood area roads, including Horton, Madole, Hill, Nugent and Dinkle.