Otero-Bergere House

Constructed in the 1870s by the US Army on the Fort Marcy Military Reservation, the Otero-Bergere House functioned as an officer’s residence. When the army decommissioned the post in 1894, the house was offered rent-free to prominent local politicians. In 1901, Alfred Maurice Bergere, an English immigrant, local businessman, and district county clerk, occupied the house with his family. After the property was conveyed to the City of Santa Fe in 1904, Bergere’s wife, Eloisa Luna Otero-Bergere, sister of Territorial governor Miguel Otero, purchased it in 1905 for $270. The house remained the family home until the death of Otero’s daughter, suffragist Adelina “Nina” Otero-Warren, in 1965. Appointed head of the New Mexico chapter of the women’s suffrage organization and the Congressional Union, Otero-Warren also served as Santa Fe County’s superintendent of public schools, New Mexico’s chairman of public health, and worked for the Red Cross. Today, the house is owned by the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, which uses the property as a research center and archives.

From Old Santa Fe Today, 5th edition by Audra Bellmore with photographs by Simone Frances.