A Southwestern Oasis: The Roswell Region, New Mexico

Abstract

-^.._ ._1d6 _._ _^ One of the more remarkable of this country's artesian basins, lying just west of i ?^ant, a jFe the Pecos River in southern New Mexico, .i Albuquerque/ has, since the turn of the century, been Ij N E W M E X IC 0 Ix known as the Roswell artesian basin, ~j ^ riLINCOLN >i deriving its title from the state's second :i ?/ ^^ lHa er largest city. The present flow area, smaller i f_ jsAt bad a than when first surveyed by Fisher1 in ,< i_ (.?^-L-1904, is confined to a narrow belt roughly -! oX .... s parallel to the Pecos for 60 miles. The C~M E X~ 'irrigated area is narrower still; and it is not FIG. I-The situation of Roswell. continuous from end to end. In reality the basin is divided into half-a-dozen segments recognizable by cultural features and separated from one another by unirrigated areas. The Roswell region, the largest and most representative of these segments, is that part of the basin which is tributary to the city. It includes some hundred square miles of productive land irrigated chiefly from flowing artesian wells. As a region it is likewise distinguished by compact settlement, varied racial stocks, and a general maturity of cultural development.