Rabbit Ears
a.k.a. Clayton Complex
NW of Clayton, Clayton, NMNo landmark on the Cimarron Cutoff of the Santa Fe Trail was more important than the Rabbit Ears, the conspicuous, double-peaked mountain which for four days of the journey guided the wagon trains from the Upper Spring of the Cimarron across the Oklahoma panhandle to the series of campsites that promised constant water and fine meadows. These camps and landmarks are conveniently grouped as the Clayton Complex and they still exist in a well-preserved condition just to the east, north, and west of the present town of Clayton, New Mexico.
History
To the travelers on the Cimarron Cutoff, Rabbit Ears was the sole guiding landmark across more than thirty miles of trail, slashed by ravines and broken by abrupt ridges. As they labored across the arid plains, where springs were about a day's journey apart, they knew that the Rabbit Ears promised campsites with plentiful water, wood, and grass. Frequently at the Rabbit Ears Creek Camp, the trains would lay over for a day to refresh the animals after the long water scrape and poor forage during the march from Middle Crossing. It was also customary upon reaching the Rabbit Ears area to send runners ahead to Santa Fe to scout the market and make arrangements with Mexican customs officials. Seldom did a train pass through this country without at least one Indian alarm, and although the traders and Indians generally met and parted peaceably, at McNees Crossing occurred one of the first fatal incidents between the two races, on the Trail. In the fall of 1828 two young traders, McNees and Monroe, who had gone in advance of a returning caravan, were shot here by Indians, almost in sight of the lagging caravan. After burying McNees, the traders carried the expiring Monroe to Cimarron, where he finally died. As the burial service for McNees ended, six or seven Indians, probably not of the hostile party, appeared on the opposite bank and the revengeful traders shot down all but one of them. This incident sparked the retributory outrages on the Trail that led to military escorts in 1829. On July 4, 1831, a memorable Independence Day celebration, recorded by Josiah Gregg, was held at McNees Crossing—the first documented Fourth of July observance on the plains.Bibliography
Kate Gregg, ed., The Road to Santa Fe (Albuquerque, 1952).
Kate Gregg, Field Notes of Government Surveyor Joseph C. Brown, reprinted in Kansas State Historical Society (n.p.,n.d.).
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1966.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.