The waymark coordinates are for the historic 1904 Mission Revival Atchison Topeka & Santa Fe Depot, which is part of the Raton Downtown Historic District.
From the Raton Downtown Historic District nomination form (boundary increase and information): (
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"Developed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Raton Downtown Historic District contains fine examples of the Romanesque Revival, Italianate, and Queen Anne styles, as well as the later Decorative Brick Commercial and Mission and Spanish Colonial Revival styles of the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. The majority of commercial buildings in the district were built between 1880 and the mid-1960s.
The current nomination is a boundary increase and update to the original Raton Downtown Historic District, which was listed in the National Register in 1977 (NR#373085). The boundary increase is comprised of four separate areas referred to as Areas A, B, C, and D. The new boundary for the district is irregular in shape, roughly bound by Parsons Avenue on the north, Apache Avenue on the south, the railroad right-of-way on the east, and the east side of 3rd Street on the west.
The new boundary includes parts of the Original Townsite, platted in 1880, and Maxwell North Addition, platted between 1882 and 1887 (Figure 1). The boundary increase adds approximately 17 acres to the original 20-acre district. Of the 105 resources within the district,75 buildings are contributing today, 54 of those were previously listed in the National Register. In addition, stamped sidewalks and the town plan are counted as two contributing structures. Today, there are a total of 27 non-contributing resources. Overall, 75% of the resources contribute to the district.
The boundary increase includes four blocks to the north – Blocks 1, 2, and 8, as well as a section of 7 in the Maxwell North Addition. The increase also includes portions of Blocks 10 and 18 in the Original Townsite Addition to the south. It also adds a .43-acre parcel to the south end of the district along the railroad tracks (Area D). These areas were omitted from the original nomination, likely due to the age of the resources. In 1977, the fifty-year mark would have been 1927. The majority of buildings in the boundary increase were constructed between the late 1920s and 1960; they are part of the commercial downtown core – both from an architectural and historical standpoint – and should be included within the commercial historic district.
Located at an elevation of 6,660 feet, Raton was built at the base of a major landform known as Goat Hill, which continues to serve as a landmark for the community with its neon “Raton” sign, which dates to the early 1930s. The town site was developed on a grid system with tree-lined streets that climb to the west, rising 100 feet in elevation. The rolling topography of the residential district to the west, listed in the National Register as the Original Townsite Historic District in 2007, counters the rigidity of the gridded commercial district.
Located at the foot of the Raton Pass, the town grew alongside the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad. Bartlett Mesa frames the town on the north. Prior to 1911, the major north – south streets in town were named for the AT & SF, a fitting practice since the railroad laid out the town. Today, the commercial district roughly includes First Street (formerly Railroad Avenue), Second Street (formerly Santa Fe Avenue), and the east side of Third Street (formerly Topeka Avenue), which run parallel to the railroad tracks, between Apache and Parsons avenues. This area encompasses part of Maxwell North Addition and the Original Townsite. Within the business district, First Street developed in the late nineteenth century, with substantial, mostly brick, commercial buildings, constructed in styles such as Romanesque Revival and Italianate. By 1911, the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps show that blocks 1, 2, 7, and 8 of the Original Townsite had been predominantly developed. Today, Second Street (Highway 64/85) functions as the major traffic corridor through town, and Highway 25 skirts Raton to the east.
The commercial lots measure 25 feet wide by 140 feet deep. Rear service alleys, measuring 20 feet wide, run north-south and are paved with a combination of gravel and asphalt. Paved streets, measuring approximately 100 feet wide, with low curbs and concrete sidewalks are laid throughout the district. The district includes various stamped concrete sidewalks, which are considered contributing structures. Examples are found on North 3rd Street across from the Colfax County Courthouse where “ERA” stamps are clearly visible, as well as round Mendenhall Contractor stamps on South First Street. There is also a Raton Cement Construction Co. Raton, NM stamp on Rio Grande Avenue. The commercial district includes numerous street trees, many of which were planted post-1976.1 Ripley Park, a landscaped city green that originated between 1911 and 1919, is located at the north end of the district.
In recent years, there was one significant loss to the historic district. In 2012, a fire destroyed the former Seaburg European Hotel, which was listed as a contributing building in the early nomination. At the turn of the century, Swedish immigrant Hugo Seaburg expanded an old livery stable into a fashionable hotel, which was later popularly known as the El Portal. In 2013, the site and remnants of the building were cleared from the lot.
Early residential sections were developed to the west, south, and northeast of the main thoroughfare and commercial district. Historic residences intermingle with commercial resources at the district’s western boundary of Third Street. The area to the west and south includes the more stylistic and substantial houses built by railroad executives, coal company owners, and merchants. The area to the northeast includes vernacular dwellings and Hipped Box cottages, many of which were moved into town from the coal camps once they were disbanded.
Raton may be compared with Las Vegas, New Mexico, a plaza and railroad town about 90 miles to the southwest. Similar late nineteenth-century development patterns and architectural styles are found in both communities, and the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad arrived in both communities by 1880. Raton also warrants comparison to Telluride, Colorado, only 20 miles north across the state line. Both towns, founded only two years apart, share a similar climate and geography. Historically, Telluride was also a mining town, extracting zinc, lead, copper, gold, and silver ore."