Dr. Nathan Boyd's Sanatorium
Near the Van Patten Mountain Camp, the visible wood frame structures were constructed around 1910 by Dr. Nathan Boyd, a medical doctor and international businessman. Dr. Boyd came to Las Cruces in the 1890's as a representative of an English engineering firm planning to construct a dam on the Rio Grande River. For a short time, in the early 1900's these buildings were used as a tuberculosis sanatorium. Short term, or ephemeral, structures for housing patients were built on terraces and the remaining foundations are shown in the images below.
In the early 1900's Dr. Boyd's Rio Grande Dam project was halted as a result of various legal maneuverings. Dr. Boyd depleted his funds in these court cases. Elephant Butte Dam was eventually built in 1916 by the U.S. Government. Four years later, in 1920, the sanatorium was sold to Dr. T.C. Sexton, a medical doctor from Las Cruces and continued to be operated intermittently as a sanatorium and resort area. In the early 1930's, Nathan Boyd's son, Earl, purchased the area again and lived in the main structure. In 1940, Earl Boyd joined the military and the buildings were vandalized. In 1957, A.B. Cox purchased this area and utilized the springs for cattle ranching operations until 1988 when it was acquired by the BLM with the assistance of The Nature Conservancy.