Old Taos Trade Fair — Sept. 24-25

COME TO THE OLD TAOS Trade Fair this Saturday and Sunday (Sept. 24 and 25). All are invited to the Hacienda de los Martinez at 708 Hacienda Way in Lower Ranchitos (on State Road 240) on the banks of the Río Pueblo de Taos, where you can participate in this year’s revival of our true historical and yet-living Taos region’s multicultural premiere foundational event, which had been ‘on hold’ for the past few years due primarily to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Old Taos Trade Fair will feature a wide and deep exposition of our Taos-area heritage and tradition spanning pre-Columbian, 16th and succeeding centuries, to the present. For the ‘native-born’ and generational descendants of the old area family blood lineages, the event will be an affirmation of their cultural legacy; and for relative ‘newcomers,’ it will be a rare opportunity to learn and to understand the foundation and story of this very special place in the world.

The Old Taos Trade Fair is produced and presented by the Taos Historic Museums organization, thanks to the guidance and leadership of the THM Board of Directors with Board President Daniel Barela.

Participants and attendees at the Fair will take in a variety of experiences that will include Taos cultural and artistic demonstrations; blacksmithing; wool spinning; woodcarving; Santos wood sculpture; reenactments of the old Mountain Men activities; storytelling; histories and legends; transcultural music; Native and Genizaro dancing; fresh-baked breads and pastries and more.

The Trade Fair will commence with a Blessing and Welcoming Ceremony, accompanied by our Taos-area Los Comanches dancers, and a Processional walk into the courtyards of the Martinez Hacienda and the Trade Fair’s events.

The hours for the Fair are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and on Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. Cost is $5 per person, and children under age 12 are admitted free. The Taos area has been a ‘crossroads’ of people’s contact over the centuries, and in fact ‘since time immemorial’ as the saying goes around here. The area has drawn together the great variety of indigenous people even through times of intertribal interactions, through conflicts and peace for example; but every so often there would be a pause even in the most frenetic activity, and the people would gather in Taos, around the Pueblo lands and later in certain places like the Hacienda de los Martinez, in the early 18th century.

There was trading of goods, agricultural products, and exchange of captives. The old fairs would be a period of truce; and as time went by the fairs grew to include American and French fur trappers; the Spanish people; Plains Indians; Pueblo peoples; Mexican traders from Chihuahua and other cities; Taos-area citizens as well and more.

The old Trade Fairs were exciting, exotic, and sometimes extreme, and lawless affairs. But they were also imbued with the habits, customs and ways of the different peoples, including their expressions of spirituality, faith and religiosity. There were codes and protocols of respect to which participants adhered and followed during the truce of the Trade Fairs.

The Old Taos Trade Fair now upcoming will present some reenactments and stories of those earlier times; and will also present other aspects of our Taos cultural legacies, including that of also being a crossroads for many spiritual paths.

The story of the life and spiritual legacy of this land is also amazing. The great Taos Pueblo San Geronimo Feast, for example, like the other Pueblo feast celebrations, by now are also high examples in the world of how seemingly diverse sacred traditions can be joined, as combinations of very ancient Native spirituality and Christianity, and other religions. They are like a sign of the triumph of the most common essential spirituality in humanity.

The Old Taos Trade Fair, 2022 ‘edition’, promises to be a super, exemplary exposition of what is, and continues to be, the deep foundational story of this beautiful, powerful, inspiring place like no other: Taos Bienvenidos a todos ... Come one, come all!

FYI

For more information, call: Martinez Hacienda, 575-758-1000; Taos Historic Museums, 575-758-0505; Daniel Barela, THM Board President, 575779-5720; David Fernández de Taos, THM Board Member, 575-758-7608.