Romero Cabin, Pajarito Road, Los Alamos, Los Alamos County, NM

Significance: The Romero Cabin is located on the Pajarito Plateau at 7,300 feet near the city of Los Alamos, New Mexico. The plateau supported a large prehistoric population, but human activity decreased until the latter part of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. At that time cattle and crop raising became important, primarily by Hispanic farmers who lived in the valleys to the east. Permanent settlement was unusual during this period because of the high altitude, typically severe winters, and possibly because of increased mobility. Historical documentation and local tradition indicates that the Romero Cabin was normally occupied from April until November. The cabin was constructed ca. 1913 and was described as originally having two windows and a gable roof. Extensive alterations in 1932 resulted in the shed roof and single window which exist today. In addition to the cabin, present on the immediate site were another simple log structure, stacks of notched logs, barbed wire, partially fenced enclosures, fence lines, an abandoned road, numerous trash dumps, and domestic vegetation such as fruit trees and irises. The cabin and site were abandoned in 1942 along with other similar sites when the United States government saw another value in such a remote area. The Pajarito Plateau became the site for the development of the world's first atomic bomb. The Romero Cabin and its immediate site is one of a very few remaining physical examples of an important but often overlooked portion of the history of northern New Mexico.
Survey number: HABS NM-148
Building/structure dates: ca. 1913 Initial Construction
Building/structure dates: 1932 Subsequent Work