User:D.H. Lawrence Ranch Initiatives

The purpose of the Ranch Initiatives is to preserve the legacy of novelist D.H. Lawrence and his wife, Frieda Lawrence. The Ranch Initiatives program will seek to place the operation of the property on a firm financial basis and to restore and develop the site so that it can support educational, cultural, and research activities for students, faculty, and the greater New Mexico community. This mission honors the directives of Frieda Lawrence’s will, which stipulated that the property “be used for educational, cultural, charitable, and recreational purposes.”​

A Brief History of the D.H. Lawrence Ranch§ D.H. Lawrence was an English novelist, poet,playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter. He is most known for his novels ″Sons and Lovers,″ ″The Rainbow,″ ″Women in Love,″ and ″Lady Chatterley’s Lover.″ He and his wife, Frieda, lived abroad for many years, moving from Britain to Australia, Italy, Mexico, France, and the United States. During their visits to New Mexico, Mabel Dodge Luhan gave the Lawrences what is now known as the D.H. Lawrence Ranch outside of Taos, NM in 1924. Even though Lawrence only spent a total of 15-months at the ranch, Frieda called it home for 26 years after her husband’s death. Both Lawrence and Frieda are buried at the ranch, just 100 yards from the cabin where they lived. Throughout their combined time at the ranch, they established a tradition of hospitality, especially to creative individuals. During their lifetime, the ranch’s guests included Aldous Huxley, W.H. Auden, Georgia O’Keeffe, Stephen Spender, Tennessee Williams, and Leonard Bernstein among many others. Frieda Lawrence bequeathed the property to the University of New Mexico in 1955 and the D.H. Lawrence Ranch was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2004. The site remains an area of interest for D.H. Lawrence enthusiasts as well as writers, historians, researchers and scholars worldwide.

A Vision for the Future§ The D.H. Lawrence Ranch has the potential to become the arts center and retreat of the southwest. The vision is to build a visitor’s center and other facilities so that the ranch can be used for educational and cultural activities as well as scholar and artist residencies. The 160-acre ranch could offer numerous programs ranging from anthropological field school to art studio courses, biology workshops to literature workshops, water resource programs to sustainability study courses. Donations are intended to help restore historic structures, upgrade the property, and construct new facilities allowing the ranch to host these envisioned activities and programs. The goal is to to ensure the property is preserved for future generations and is updated to foster educational, artistic, and cultural activities for students, scholars and many others.