Georgia O'Keeffe: A refuge from society's constraints

Georgia O'Keeffe, 41, was already famous when she took her first extended trip to New Mexico in the spring of 1929, following shows at the Brooklyn Museum and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

She stayed at La Posada with the wife of photographer Paul Strand, Rebecca "Beck" Strand, with whom O'Keeffe might have had an affair, then headed to Taos to stay with arts maven Mabel Dodge Luhan, who had promised her a studio to paint in.

"Beck had cut her prematurely gray hair as short as a man's and preferred trousers to Georgia's skirts and dresses. With her pale skin, brilliant blue eyes and shapely figure, she was a complement to O'Keeffe's dark skin, green-brown eyes, and black hair," wrote Jeffrey Hogrefe in his 1992 biography, O'Keeffe: The Life of An American Legend.

"To some, they doubtless appeared to be lesbian lovers. Santa Fe had become a Mecca for women who wanted to live openly with other women — and it was not uncommon to see women paired with women there. During the 1920s and 1930s, Santa Fe and Taos were to American lesbians what Capri was to British homosexuals at the same time — a place away from the constraints of organized society, which discouraged homosexual unions."

J. Robert Oppenheimer: Love of physics and New Mexico

After three years studying physics and making a name for himself in Europe, J. Robert Oppenheimer, 25, returned to the United States in the summer of 1929 to take a job with the faculty of the University of California at Berkeley.

He spent the latter part of the summer riding horses, hiking and camping with his 16-year-old brother, Frank, in the Valle Grande and in the Pecos Wilderness near their cabin, nicknamed Perro Caliente, while their parents stayed at a lodge in Santa Fe.

"After a particularly grueling day on horseback, Robert wrote a friend wistfully, " 'My two great loves are physics and New Mexico. It's a pity they can't be combined,' " wrote Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin in their 2005 biography, American Prometheus, The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

"At night, Robert sat by the light of a Coleman lantern, reading his physics books and preparing his lectures. On one trip, fully eight days long, they rode all the way to Colorado and back, a distance of more than 200 miles. ... These were Prohibition years, but Robert always had plenty of whisky on hand. 'We'd get sort of drunk,' Frank recalled, 'when we were high up (in the mountains), and we'd all act kind of silly.' "

Bronson Cutting: A momentous time for politicians

Bronson Cutting, 41, began 1929 as a U.S. senator. He had been appointed in 1927 and had won election in 1928 in the Republican landslide that resulted in the election of Gov. Richard Dillon and President Herbert Hoover. But Cutting, a member of the GOP's Progressive wing, soon found himself at odds with both these former political allies.

Cutting had grown up in a wealthy New York family, graduated from Groton and Harvard, and had come to New Mexico at statehood to buy the Santa Fe New Mexican.

In the months leading up to the stock market crash, Cutting made a name for himself as an opponent of censorship over the U.S. Post Office blocking importation of D.H. Lawrence's provocative novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. He was vigorously opposed by U.S. Sen. Reed Smoot, R-Utah, who maintained, "America needs censorship." Cutting countered, "Americans are intelligent."

"By any standard, 1929 was momentous for Cutting," wrote Richard Lowitt in his 1992 biography, Bronson M. Cutting: Progressive Politician. "Cutting became a disgruntled Republican, the leader of a powerful and growing faction within the party. His following included labor, Hispanics, veterans and progressive-minded citizens and independent voters."