HOPE, N.M. – The history of this town reflects how grand dreams have been thwarted by unforeseen circumstances.

There was the railroad promoter who perished on the Titanic, the banker who absconded to Mexico with the town’s funds, and an unexpected freeze that severely damaged the orchards that once thrived here—apple, pear, and apricot trees that woke residents with their splintering branches.

“That happened around the time the sap was flowing down in the trees,” recalled Bill Fletcher, Hope’s 85-year-old mayor, comfortably seated in his one-room cabin. “One old-timer … said it just shattered those trees.”

The worst misfortune for Hope happened when the river that flows through the town vanished underground, leaving residents to suffer in the arid desert landscape.

“When I arrived here,” Fletcher, who came in 1981, said, “the wind was howling fiercely, stirring up dust. I thought, ‘There’s no way I can stay here.’”

Yet, he chose to remain. And despite everything, Hope has persevered.

The pelt of a mountain lion decorates one wall of Fletcher’s cabin, a reminder of his time as a predator hunter in a government initiative primarily serving Anglo farmers and ranchers. A parrot named Monkey Bird chirps away on the porch.

“It grows on you,” Fletcher reflected, having relocated from Texas hill country. “I honestly didn’t expect it to. But the people here are remarkable. You know, Texas has nice folks too. But all these ranchers just embraced us. They’re genuinely the kindest people I’ve had the pleasure of working with.”

According to the 2020 U.S. Census, Hope had a population of 113, but even Fletcher questions if it’s really that many.

The town boasts 84 active municipal water connections and brings in about $5,600 from property taxes each year. The last school closed in the 1970s, and both the gas station and the only café closed their doors six years ago. There are no businesses remaining in the town, and homes from Artesia, the nearby city, seem to inch closer with each passing year.

However, the spirit of the community remains unyielding when it comes to Hope’s future.

This small community, located on the outskirts of one of the world’s most lucrative oil fields, represents one of 19 towns in America that share its name. YSL News visited six of these towns this summer, during a time when divisions within the country seem to undermine America’s aspirations.

Everyone we spoke with here in Hope, New Mexico, shared tales about the town’s legacy, all highlighting a common theme: resilience.

Encouraging Population Growth

Varelas made his way to Hope from Durango, Mexico, five years before Fletcher, in 1976. At just 15, he walked around 200 miles with his father across the U.S.-Mexico border to work on a cattle ranch north of the town. He earned $1 a day on that ranch, while his father received $7—far below the expected minimum wage of $18 at the time.

“The Peñasco River used to run nearby,” Varelas recounted. “But the river gradually disappeared, not through some big event, just little by little.”

Nearby, a barn buzzed with young participants and their families preparing their steers: painting hooves, blow-drying coats, and styling tails with hairspray. Varelas’ relatives, including his cousin and several nieces and nephews, gathered to support Mabel.

This family represents some of the newest residents in Hope and is one of the few in the area still raising children. They are also among the few families speaking Spanish as they prepare for the fair.

Across the United States, two-thirds of rural counties faced population decline over the decade leading up to 2020. Nonetheless, social and economic changes brought by the pandemic have led to some growth in rural areas, as many Americans opted for remote work and relocated to less populated regions. However, Hope’s changes have been driven more by local factors.

The Federal Law Enforcement Training Center’s expansion 20 miles east in Artesia has attracted Border Patrol and federal agents to Hope, according to Fletcher. The oil industry has also influenced the area, as although Hope lies just outside the Permian Basin, both Eddy County and neighboring Lea County contributed nearly a third of the region’s crude oil and natural gas production last year.

Yet, perhaps the most significant factor for the recent rise in population has been Varelas’ family.

His mother and brother moved to Hope two decades ago. In the last five years, his cousin got married to a local resident and brought her four children from Mexico to settle in Hope, meaning that now 6% of the Census-listed population are Varelas’ relatives.

‘Scratch one of us, we all bleed’

The monthly city council gathering, led by Fletcher, commenced at 6 p.m. on a Wednesday in late July.

Outside, the sun blazed, accompanied by a warm breeze. Desert ants hustled across the gravel while a rooster announced the morning among hens that clucked around someone’s porch.

Inside, fans were working hard to cool the steel-clad municipal building that housed the council chambers and three offices: one belonging to police chief Shane Baker, one to municipal judge Jeremiah Fletcher, who is also the mayor’s son, and one to city clerk Sonia Carbajal.

“We operate like a family here,” Fletcher remarked while greeting each council member. “None of us are blood relatives, but it feels like family. If one of us gets hurt, we all feel it.”

Lupe Varelas, the first Latina city councilwoman in the town’s history, took her seat to Fletcher’s left. She was raised in Artesia, born to a Mexican American family. She met Catarino Varelas at a dance in 1983. Despite her dream of moving to the mountains, she never ventured beyond Hope.

“He asked my parents for my hand in marriage after just three months,” she shared. “My mom said yes, my dad agreed, but then my mom changed her mind. So we eloped instead.”

At that time, Mexican laborers faced discrimination, both in town and within the local government. “My husband wanted to join the fire department,” she recalled, “but they wouldn’t allow him because he was Mexican.”

Nevertheless, he advocated for nearly a decade to gain admission to the all-Anglo volunteer board and finally succeeded in 1991. He eventually became the department’s leader.

“Catarino has been fire chief,” Fletcher noted. “He’s done almost every role you can imagine. He is a genuinely good man.”

Ladder truck in a one-story town

The council members were arranged at a semicircular dais, symbolizing a touch of municipal formality. However, the chambers themselves felt more casual, resembling a community hall, cluttered with years of accumulated odds and ends – seeds from lima beans and radishes on an old metal desk, a well head, reading glasses, and garage door remotes.

Baker, the 67-year-old police chief, was the only local resident present for the annual budget discussion. He arrived in uniform, placing his white cowboy hat on a table.

Carbajal explained the details of the town’s approximately $1 million budget, primarily financed through state and federal grants. The council members questioned a line item related to the acquisition of a used fire truck from Florida, costing $39,000, plus an additional $71,000 for refurbishment.

“They had to install everything on it,” Carbajal stated. “We just got it back from Houston.”

“Do we really need a ladder truck in our community?” Matt Bowerman asked, a council member who began his term after the truck purchase. “Those trucks are typically utilized for buildings that are two stories or taller, which we don’t have here.”

“We’re planning to use it for painting the flagpole,” Fletcher replied with a laugh. “All in favor of approving the budget?”

Life in Hope

Hope garnered brief national attention in May 1950, when Life magazine highlighted it. Voters had elected a female “mayoress” and an all-female council, which the magazine referred to as the “Petticoat Council.”

A framed article from the magazine hangs in the municipal building.

“Once the women (aged 56, 54, 45, 32, and 28) took charge, they didn’t hold back,” Life noted. “The town had no taxes and therefore no funds, but on May 13, the women organized a huge barn dance that raised $800. This money will sit around, worrying people until it is spent on some community improvement. Previous male administrations never did anything like that.”

The tales of Hope, cherished by its residents, aren’t always easy to verify. For instance, the story about the railroad investor who went down with the Titanic while carrying gold? Nobody remembers his name. The same goes for the banker who fled to Mexico. But for residents, these narratives are not mere myths; they are treasured oral histories passed down through generations.

The saga of how Hope came to be, after its incorporation in 1910, has also gained its own legend.

Robert Julyan, author of “The Place Names of New Mexico,” published by the University of New Mexico Press, provides the following account:

“The most commonly accepted explanation for the town’s name is that two early settlers, Elder Miller and Joe Richards, were debating who would name it, and they flipped a coin and shot at it with guns to resolve the dispute. ‘I hope you lose,’ said Richards.

When Miller lost, Richards chose the name Hope,” Julyan writes.

A river ran through

Alyson Young, 67, spent her summers in Hope during her teenage years and recalls witnessing Catarino Varelas and other Mexican cowboys at work. She reminisces about the orchards behind her grandmother’s house, the river flowing through a deep canal, and how it used to rain like clockwork every afternoon at 2 p.m.

“Big, old trucks would arrive to pick the apples,” she recalled. “They were so abundant. Now, there’s not even a trunk left. It’s been many years.”

She is familiar with the stories of the railroad money lost on the Titanic and the event known as the big freeze when the river vanished underground.

Everyone knows these stories, as if the accounts of the community’s endurance amid a turbulent past could anchor the town and keep the essence of Hope alive.

Her grandfather’s family settled in Hope during the 1800s, when the area was still referred to as Badgerville, before Richards decided to rename it to reflect his perspective.

“There used to be a lot of rain,” she reminisced. “Water flowed like a river from the mountain. Mother Young would allow us to play freely. Right behind my grandmother’s house was a large reservoir. We would enjoy it while it was full, and afterward, Daddy Young would irrigate the crops, and we’d wait for the next rainfall.”

People no longer refer to it as climate change here, yet clouds pass over Hope without dropping any rain. A warm breeze tousled Young’s gray hair as she spoke with Varelas outside the now-closed gas station and cafe owned by him and his wife.

Hope is enough

Varelas relaxed beneath the sprawling branches of a tree on the ranch he has tended for nearly forty years. He is so familiar with the land that he can point out what has disappeared over time: the sites of past water flows and wells that used to support homes that are not there anymore.

Even with everything that has changed over the years, Hope has gifted him more than he ever envisioned as a young man.

“I put in a lot of effort for everything I own,” he stated. “I am always on the lookout for a good opportunity, as they come around infrequently.”

Although he spent most of his life working on someone else’s land, Varelas now owns two homes, one in the town and another in the countryside. He also has a farm and grazing land for his cattle and goats. He mentioned having two successful adult children and two grandchildren who come to visit Hope twice a year.

“My aspiration was to have a little piece of land big enough to ride my horse or take my four-wheeler out without needing anyone’s approval,” he said. “Now I have 2,500 acres, and I believe that’s ample space.”

contributing to Lauren Villagran