The Two New Mexico Tartans - Clarification

[macwilkin]

There was more to Kathy's email that was just a tad too controversial and naming of names that I didn't feel was appropriate for the forum. Know that there are strong differences of opinion and charges of skullduggery.

It is believed by the fans of NM Land of Enchantment that the Secretary of State proclamation declaring the Stevenson NM tartan official is a blantant forgery - and even if it were authentic - only the governor of New Mexico can proclaim a tartan the official state tartan.

Bottom line, it appears to be the St. Andrew Scottish Society of New Mexico vs. Mr. Stevenson.

Ron,

It has always been my understanding that it takes a resolution through the legislature to designate an official state symbol -- is there something in NM constitutionally that allows the governor this broad power?

All of the state tartans I am familiar with were adopted in the legislative branch of state government.

T.

[budd4766]

Very interested in this thread. My in-laws live in NM and I'm going out there next month.

Just curious if anybody has a pic of the Land Of Enchantment tartan they could post?

[macwilkin]

Very interested in this thread. My in-laws live in NM and I'm going out there next month.

Just curious if anybody has a pic of the Land Of Enchantment tartan they could post?

I'll see if I can find my swatch that Brad sent me -- when I lost my study to our new "wee bairn", I packed it up and now I can't remember where I put it.

T.

[MacMillans son]

On Kathy's home page, right below the photo of her working, there is a link to a small photo of the tartan. It appears, as usual, much different than that shown on the STA website.

[Zardoz]

Very interested in this thread. My in-laws live in NM and I'm going out there next month.

Just curious if anybody has a pic of the Land Of Enchantment tartan they could post?

Here's a digital version of both;
http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/New_M...NewMexico.html

[swcelt]

Greeting's - this is the first of the honest facts of the State of New Mexico Tartan and the one propped up by the yahoos called the land of enchantment tartan. - your Brother on the level, Ralph Stevenson, Designer of the State of New Mexico Tartan and Primary Co-designer of the (City of) Albuqerque Tartan. Read on...ith: PS: The State of New Mexico Tartan was given to all citizens of the this great State. [Photos later]

After several years of putting up with the purveyors of the Land of Enchantment Tartan and their creation through a “contest” in the St. Andrew’s Society, doubters finally investigated their claims. One person made contact with one executive in the woolens mills that wove their tartan.

We first must make a time line. The Society’s “contest” was on Sept. 21st 1997 at the Watson residence (this is taken from the Thistle Epistle, the club’s newsletter, and edited by Cathy Lare Watson). They boosted that they had 31 submissions! They said it was really close in voting, though no one ever has seen the counting of votes. That close. The winner was an employee of the woolen mills that wove the newly christened “Land of Enchantment Tartan”. It will be available through any “tartan company or kiltmaker that carries” that woolen mills materials, the article states, and “in two or three months”.

Several months before the “contest”, an honest person took a step foreword and provided his witness that he had overheard that some of the officers of St. Andrews had already had a tartan designed. A society officer at a pipe band practice made the statement. It is now that this notarized statement bears real truth. In the April 2000 edition of Southwest Scots magazine, Cathy Lare Watson had an article published making a stand for their “Land of Enchantment” tartan. In it was a photo of State Representative and St. Andrew’s member, Mimi Stewart in Scotland at the woolen mills. It was taken in 1997 – the summer of 1997, months before the “contest” (see inset w/unedited text). [In a NM House of Rep. meeting, a House Committee member asked her who registered the tartan – Mimi said, “My sister did”.]

Recently, an executive of the woolen mills (innocent and unaware of what plans the society officers and Rep Mimi Stewart had set) responded to inquiries. The response was in bullet form and to the point.
• “The firm was approached in 1997 to design a tartan for Mimi Stewart. It was suggested to us that this might become the official tartan for your state. As Ms. Stewart was a member of your legislature there was no reason not to take this at face value.”
• “A number of design suggestions were put forward. We were not however aware these were entered into a “competition”.”
• “Subsequently an order was received for a bolt of the fabric from our customer.”
• “At our customer’s request, the tartan was registered as detailed … (New Mexico, Land of Enchantment) with the note that the tartan may in due course be accepted as the state tartan.” [which it was not, by any party!]

The woolen mills also stated that the enchantment tartan “is not available…for purchase by third parties”. So, is it propriety, and still owned by Rep. Mimi Stewart, and to get it you have to go through her or a kilt maker? Of course.

Looking at this matter in retrospect, Rep. Stewart, a kilt maker and some boardmembers of the St. Andrews have cheated and harmed their own members, some individuals that saw this fix and spoke out from the onset, and the citizens of New Mexico, and doing great harm to our Celtic cultural image and blemished the character of honest persons. Remember, how the Enchantment tartan was modeled after the Calhoun clan tartan? (as the first NM territorial governor being a Calhoun) and drawing in the good couple of James and Connie Calhoun, rest their souls, in the attempt to make their enchantment tartan historical, but actually a fabrication to create a broader support base. Well, the woolen mills never mentioned that as a prerequisite when Rep. Stewart asked them when creating a design! And they can’t blame it on her sister, that was the nefarious marketing of the intercircle of the St. Andrew group.

With this announcement, action should be taken with Rep. Stewart, for using her elected position for influence and to create a commercial enterprise. If the St. Andrew’s society is a non-profit organization, their papers better be in order as they say they are part of this thing, too. If you have passion for being honest and not corruptible, communicate this truth so this community may have closure to this shameful and dishonorable event.

[Riverkilt]

Whoa, that's one incredible, and intense, initial post....welcome. You don't say who you are on your profile or on your post - but doesn't take a lot of imagination to make a good guess...or rereading it ARE you Mr. Stevenson?

Haven't met you. Have met and know Kathy Lare. Hard to swallow all you claim when I also believe and trust her claims and recounting of events. Don't know that this controversy will ever hash itself out. Sounds like both sides are dug in deep.

[Bugbear]

All right, we want to see photographs of the UFO, and have them analyzed at in dependant labs.

[Andy Proffitt]

Hmmm...what to take away? No OFFICIAL New Mexico State tartan, just two sides lobbying two fashion tartans.

[Pagan]

Whoa, that's one incredible, and intense, initial post....welcome. You don't say who you are on your profile or on your post - but doesn't take a lot of imagination to make a good guess...or rereading it ARE you Mr. Stevenson?

Haven't met you. Have met and know Kathy Lare. Hard to swallow all you claim when I also believe and trust her claims and recounting of events. Don't know that this controversy will ever hash itself out. Sounds like both sides are dug in deep.

Yes, it is Ralph. And please don't believe everything he says. As a native New Mexican, I'd like to point out a glaring historical error on Ralph's part. Charles Bent was the first territorial governor, not James Calhoun. If you really want to split hairs, the first governor of the area was actually Don Juan de Oñate in 1598.

None of this surprised me. Rob Wright is right (ha!), just New Mexico politics as usual. Hell, there's still fighting over the Spanish Land Grants going on!