tradicion revista fall 2012 - LPD Press & Rio Grande Books

9 remained. Although not as hot
as most improved varieties, García
judged New Mexico No. 9 to be hot
enough.
Although García’s professional
life was thriving, his personal life
was again touched by tragedy. Julieta
Amador de García died at the
home of her sister, Mrs. A. N. Daguerre,
in El Paso on Sunday, December
5, 1920. 15 Although she was
suffering from bronchitis and her
condition was considered grave,
her death came suddenly and unexpectedly.
García never remarried,
and his involvement in the activities
of New Mexico A&M seemed to occupy
most of his time.
In 1927 New Mexico A&M conferred
an honorary doctorate of agriculture
on García in recognition
of his “outstanding work in developing
New Mexico agriculture.” 16
The U. S. Department of Agriculture
invited García to participate
in a trip to Mexico where he led a
lecture course on agricultural education
and education. In 1943 he
received an honorary doctorate of
science from the University of New
Mexico.
At their meeting on March 24,
1945, the A&M Board of Regents
retired García. 17 Dean John William
Branson announced that the action
was taken because of García’s failing
health. García had been ill for seven
months with Parkinson’s Disease
and was receiving treatment at Mc-
Bride Hospital in Las Cruces. When
he was retired García was given
emeritus status at the college. By
formal resolution the experiment
station’s horticulture farm was given
the name Fabián García Farm.
Fabián García died on August 6,
1948. 18 He is buried in the Masonic
Cemetery in Las Cruces. His will
provided $89,000 to pay part of the
$400,000 cost of construction of a
men’s dormitory and provide scholarships
to worthy Hispanic students
that would enable them to live in
the new dormitory. After subtracting
the costs of liquidating his estate,
the college realized between
$84,000 and $85,000. 19 The new
dormitory, Fabián García Memorial
Hall, was dedicated on Monday, October
17, 1949.
Through his work at the experiment
station, García was credited
with having added to the economic
value of New Mexico agriculture,
particularly with his research and
development of chile, sweet potatoes,
pecans, yellow and white Grain
onions, and improved varieties of
cotton. He authored twenty experiment
station bulletins and co-authored
another fifteen with Joseph
W. Rigney and Austin B. Fite. In addition
he wrote numerous newspaper
and magazine articles.
In 2005 the American Society for
Horticultural Science Hall posthumously
elected Fabián García to its
Hall of Fame. His plaque at the society’s
headquarters in Alexandria,
Virginia, reads “Dr. Fabian Garcia, a
man of humble origins, but a gentleman
of extraordinary achievements.”
20
Roy Minoru Nakayama
Although the circumstances
are unknown, Fabian García must
have met the young man who was
destined to carry on his legacy of
chile research. That individual, Roy
Minoru Nakayama, was born on
September 11, 1923, to John K. and
Tome Nakayama, both of whom
had been born in Japan. At the time
of his birth, Roy was the fifth of seven
children. He would eventually
have one more sibling, bringing the
total number of children to eight. 21
Roy’s father was born Kaichiri Nakayama
in 1879 in Toyama Prefecture,
which is on the coast of the Sea
of Japan on Honshu Island. 22 He left
Japan in 1908 in search of opportunity.
After arriving in Seattle, Kaichiri
added John to his name. Partnering
with a German immigrant
named W. W. Peters, he relocated to
a farm near Mitchell, Nebraska. After
he was settled, John sent to Japan
for Tome Miaguchi, the younger
sister of his former traveling companion,
to come to Nebraska to be
his bride. When she arrived in 1915
Tome was twenty years old and
sixteen years younger than John. 23
The daughter of a doctor, Tome was
used to a life of privilege and status.
The first child of John and Tome
Nakayama was a boy they named
Carl, who was born in Nebraska.
While working on the farm John
injured his ribs, and after he healed
was no longer able to tolerate the
cold the Great Plains. So the family
departed for southwest Texas
to look over some land belonging
to Peters. Near El Paso, Tome, who
was expecting her second child, became
seriously ill. Her long recovery
required money, so John rented
farmland that had belonged to the
utopian community called Shalam
Colony, eight miles north of Las
Cruces. Roy was born there in what
had been the Children’s House.
By 1925, John had save enough
money to purchase land, but he
had to register it in Carl’s name be-
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