Armer-Reid papers

Collection

Identifier: Ms-0461

Staff Only

Scope and Content

The Armer-Reid Papers contains the collection of the Reid family and the papers relating to their Angora goat ranch in Kingston, NM. The papers have been divided into three series: Business papers, Personal papers and Photographs. The material includes correspondence, personal papers, breeding logs, certificates of registry and entry, and photographs.

The collection provides a detailed description of Angora goat ranching in the region through the business papers, dating from the late nineteenth century and into the middle of the twentieth century. The papers detail specific animals, as well as the running of the ranch first by Mrs. Armer and then her son and daughter-in-law, Bob and Mary Reid. The family’s history and their involvement in pioneering goat ranching in the area are revealed through the ‘autobiographical’ segments of writing of Mary Reid. Her reminiscences provide a personal insight into the family business.

Dates

1884-1982

Language of Materials

English

Access Restrictions

Open. All materials in this collection are available for research under supervised conditions in the Research Room.

Copy Restrictions

Copyrights associated with materials in this collection have not been transferred to New Mexico State University.

Biography / History

Margaret McEvoy was born May 23, 1864 in Monterrey, CA to Henery Etta [sic] Grose (1826-1889) and Joseph McEvoy (1828-1902). She married Simpson Percy Reid, born November 23, 1845, in September 1878 with whom she moved to New Mexico in 1884 to pursue his mining and ranching interests. They had six children: Joseph, Henretta (Wilton), Robert, Percy, Thomas, and Simpson. Simpson Reid died in 1892 of typhoid fever leaving Margaret with six children all under the age of eight. In order to support herself, she turned to Angora goat breeding, buying her first goat in 1887. The ranch soon became a success and at one of the first meeting of the American Angora Goat Breeders Association (an association of which she would eventually become president) she was dubbed the “Angora goat queen.” Margaret married again in December of 1894. Her new husband was an engineer by the name of Leven Edward Armer. She had three children with Armer: Edith (Rankey), Mary (Earwood) and Edward who died in childhood.

Margaret and Simpson’s son Robert W. Reid, or Bob as he was known, was born in Lake Valley, NM February 6, 1884. Reid attended Ohio Northern University in Ada, OH, graduating in 1905. He joined the Forest Service in New Mexico in 1908. On August 27, 1912 he married Mary Sparks. She was born in Golias, TX on February 9, 1891 to Ellen Sparks Marble (1871-1949) and Henry F. Sparks (1864-ca. 1920). Ellen Sparks married Edward Thornton Marble (1871-1940) in January of 1908. Reid continued his career in the Forest Service until 1916. He was in charge of the Mogollon Fire Division starting in 1913 and worked at various posts, including at Mimbres, NM. They raised two children, their nieces Margery and Gertrude, whom they officially adopted. Gertrude married Benjamin Casey in 1946 and Margery married Carlton McGregor in 1947.

In 1916, Mrs. Armer asked them to help her to run the ranch and family business. Mrs. Armer passed away suddenly while visiting her sister in California on December 22, 1933. Bob and Mary Reid continued the Armer-Reid Goat Ranch business until 1962 when they sold the ranch to Robert Cox of Winston, NM.