Matías Martínez’s property on Upper Canyon Road operated as a family farm until World War II. The site includes a farmhouse, barn, garage, land for orchards and planting, and pens for keeping animals. The farmstead stands as the only property located on the east side of Santa Fe to retain its historic agricultural identity. Matías Martínez descended from early Spanish settlers who traveled to New Mexico from Mexico with Juan de Oñate in 1598. The Martínez family built their home in 1900, an adobe with a pitched metal roof constructed in the typical Northern New Mexico vernacular style, and the L-shaped adobe barn in 1914, with additions in 1925 and the 1930s. His daughter Cesaria Rivera and her family remained in the adobe house, and her descendants still own and live in the home. In 1998, a local grassroots group calling themselves Friends of the Rivera Barn, raised money to repair and re-roof this important structure, the last surviving adobe barn in Santa Fe.
From Old Santa Fe Today, 5th edition by Audra Bellmore with photographs by Simone Frances.