st. john's lodge no 2 - The Trestleboard

executed a warranty deed and placed it in escrow in the Taos Bank, until such time as the required balance of $600.00 could be raised. To complete the purchase the Grand Lodge, on November 4, 1910, appropriated $500.00 for the Carson House itself, and an additional $1,000.00 to obtain the adjacent property. On January 20, 1911, Bro Alexander Gusdorf reported the successful purchase of the Montoya portion of the Carson property in the name of the Grand Lodge of New Mexico.

In 1916, Bent Lodge members recognized that a major restoration program would be necessary to properly preserve the old buildings. Since the Grand Lodge actually owned the property, Bent Lodge requested $600.00 from them for restoration. The Grand Lodge donated the requested amount, and also gave the local Bent Lodge the deed to the property subject to certain restrictions and provisos-that we could never dispose of the property and that we preserve it as a memorial to Bro Kit Carson. With the restoration of the property completed (which cost much more than $600.00), it became self-supporting through rentals and also became a prime source of revenue which helped Bent Lodge pay of its indebtedness. At a meeting in December of 1916, the Lodge formed a committee to formulate plans for using the Carson home as a museum,a dream that was not to become reality until much later.

Before becoming a museum, the Carson House served many as a place of residence or business. Bro Francis T. Cheetham, a lawyer and historian who wrote several articles on Bro Carson, lived in the home from 1917 to 1928. Mrs. Kit Carson II and her son Kit III rented the home from 1929 to 1931. From 1937 to 1953, Bro Floyd Morrow rented the home and used it as a leather shop. Using only the West wing of the property for his shop, Bro Morrow set up the other rooms facing the main street as Carson Museum, and charged a small fee to visit them. This was the beginning of the Carson property as museum, with Bro Morrow serving as the first curator. During the 1940s, Boy Scout Troop 98 met in the back room.

In 1949, a group of prominent Taos citizens as well as member of the Lodge Museum Committee formed the Kit Carson Memorial Fund Inc. to perpetuate the memory of Kit Carson and to assist in further developing the Carson Museum.