Popular three-time former New Mexico first lady Alice King died Sunday night after suffering a stroke last week. She was 78. "She was a wonderful mother and we got to share her with lots of other kids in New Mexico," said her son, Attorney General Gary King. "She cared about all the other kids in New Mexico. She spent most of her time and energy working on to improve kids' lives in New Mexico." King was married to former Gov. Bruce King, who was with her at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque when she died, along with sons Gary and Bill. King, a major supporter of the Carrie Tingley Children's Hospital, was also chairwoman of the New Mexico Children's Trust Fund. She is credited with creating the state's Children, Youth and Families Department. King, whose 1948 Moriarty High School class had just 13 people, is probably one of the few New Mexicans to go straight from her farm to the governor's mansion. In a recent interview with The New Mexican at the King Ranch near Stanley, she said the adjustment at first proved a little tough. "At the time, I was a young farm girl that had not been off the farm, to tell the truth," she said. "And (I was) changing from living on a farm and rural life. "New Mexico was very rural at the time; we had less than a million people. ... It was very wide open, a long ways in between every town, but there were lots of little towns," she said. "People did things as a community a lot more than they did now. They didn't get far out of the area where they lived." "They" included Alice. And her arrival in Santa Fe from Stanley with Bruce raised more than a few eyebrows. "Well, they didn't just understand ranch life, and they thought a rancher always had dirt on his boots and this sort of the thing, and that was some of the things we'd hear people say, that we don't want someone carrying cow manure in on the rugs in the governor's residence and things. It was just a kind of an attitude that people felt like you just didn't know the city life, I guess. I'm not sure what they felt," she said. "But anyhow, they soon got over that...
Monday, December 08, 2008
Alice King, 1930-2008: Former first lady said children were her legacy
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Popular three-time former New Mexico first lady Alice King died Sunday night after suffering a stroke last week. She was 78. "She was a wonderful mother and we got to share her with lots of other kids in New Mexico," said her son, Attorney General Gary King. "She cared about all the other kids in New Mexico. She spent most of her time and energy working on to improve kids' lives in New Mexico." King was married to former Gov. Bruce King, who was with her at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque when she died, along with sons Gary and Bill. King, a major supporter of the Carrie Tingley Children's Hospital, was also chairwoman of the New Mexico Children's Trust Fund. She is credited with creating the state's Children, Youth and Families Department. King, whose 1948 Moriarty High School class had just 13 people, is probably one of the few New Mexicans to go straight from her farm to the governor's mansion. In a recent interview with The New Mexican at the King Ranch near Stanley, she said the adjustment at first proved a little tough. "At the time, I was a young farm girl that had not been off the farm, to tell the truth," she said. "And (I was) changing from living on a farm and rural life. "New Mexico was very rural at the time; we had less than a million people. ... It was very wide open, a long ways in between every town, but there were lots of little towns," she said. "People did things as a community a lot more than they did now. They didn't get far out of the area where they lived." "They" included Alice. And her arrival in Santa Fe from Stanley with Bruce raised more than a few eyebrows. "Well, they didn't just understand ranch life, and they thought a rancher always had dirt on his boots and this sort of the thing, and that was some of the things we'd hear people say, that we don't want someone carrying cow manure in on the rugs in the governor's residence and things. It was just a kind of an attitude that people felt like you just didn't know the city life, I guess. I'm not sure what they felt," she said. "But anyhow, they soon got over that...
Popular three-time former New Mexico first lady Alice King died Sunday night after suffering a stroke last week. She was 78. "She was a wonderful mother and we got to share her with lots of other kids in New Mexico," said her son, Attorney General Gary King. "She cared about all the other kids in New Mexico. She spent most of her time and energy working on to improve kids' lives in New Mexico." King was married to former Gov. Bruce King, who was with her at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque when she died, along with sons Gary and Bill. King, a major supporter of the Carrie Tingley Children's Hospital, was also chairwoman of the New Mexico Children's Trust Fund. She is credited with creating the state's Children, Youth and Families Department. King, whose 1948 Moriarty High School class had just 13 people, is probably one of the few New Mexicans to go straight from her farm to the governor's mansion. In a recent interview with The New Mexican at the King Ranch near Stanley, she said the adjustment at first proved a little tough. "At the time, I was a young farm girl that had not been off the farm, to tell the truth," she said. "And (I was) changing from living on a farm and rural life. "New Mexico was very rural at the time; we had less than a million people. ... It was very wide open, a long ways in between every town, but there were lots of little towns," she said. "People did things as a community a lot more than they did now. They didn't get far out of the area where they lived." "They" included Alice. And her arrival in Santa Fe from Stanley with Bruce raised more than a few eyebrows. "Well, they didn't just understand ranch life, and they thought a rancher always had dirt on his boots and this sort of the thing, and that was some of the things we'd hear people say, that we don't want someone carrying cow manure in on the rugs in the governor's residence and things. It was just a kind of an attitude that people felt like you just didn't know the city life, I guess. I'm not sure what they felt," she said. "But anyhow, they soon got over that...
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