Linda Mitchell Davis: The Fourth-Generation Rancher Who Ran New Mexico's CS Ranch

Who Was Linda Mitchell Davis?

Linda Mitchell Davis was born Linda Mitchell on July 11, 1930, in Denver, Colorado, and spent most of her long life on the high plains and mesas of northern New Mexico. By the time she died on February 18, 2024, at age 93, she had been recognized by the cowgirl, cattlemen and western heritage communities alike. Her Wikipedia biography describes her as a fourth-generation rancher, and the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum profile uses the same words.

The public record on her, summarized in an online encyclopedia entry, is strongest on her upbringing, her marriage and partnership with Les Davis at the CS Ranch, her volunteer leadership and her honors. It is thinner on business numbers. The pages reviewed for this profile give no acreage or herd size for the CS Ranch, so none is stated here.

Growing Up on the Tequesquite and Bell Ranches

Her mother died when Linda was four. She had two brothers, and her grandmother could not look after all three children, so Linda was sent to the Bell Ranch, where her father was managing. She was raised largely on the family's secluded Tequesquite Ranch, a setting remote enough that she was schooled by correspondence through the Calvert school system in Baltimore. In 1941 she and her brother attended Manzano Day School in Albuquerque.

Ranching was her real education. She studied it with her father during the drought of the 1930s, and during World War II, when labor was scarce, she worked alongside him and her brother. Her grandfather had put her on a horse early. Those years gave her a working knowledge of grass, water and cattle under stress long before she held a college course in the subject.

Cornell, a Family Emergency and the Return to the Ranch

Davis went on to Cornell University and majored in agricultural economics, a practical choice for someone headed back to a ranch. She did not finish the degree. A family emergency pulled her home, and she returned to run the family ranch. Sources describe this as a decision of duty rather than a break from her plans, and it set the course for everything that followed.

Running the CS Ranch at Cimarron

In 1953 she married Les Davis. The couple ranched together at the CS Ranch in Cimarron, Colfax County, New Mexico, and raised six children, all of whom grew up to be ranchers. Les Davis died on May 12, 2001, after which Linda managed the ranch on her own.

The ranch earned a notable horse-side distinction in 2000, when the CS Ranch received the American Quarter Horse Association's Best Remuda Award. A remuda is the string of working horses a ranch keeps, so the award points to the quality of the horse program that supports the cattle work. Les and Linda were also inducted together that year into the Hall of Great Westerners at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.

Service Beyond the Fence Line

Davis put steady effort into the institutions that tell ranching's story. In 1985 she helped form the foundation for the New Mexico Farm and Ranch Heritage Museum in Las Cruces and served as its first secretary; Bill McIlhaney was the first president. She was a founding member of the Annie Oakley Society and also volunteered as an emergency medical technician. She took part in state and national agricultural concerns, according to her biography, and her pattern was consistent: show up, take a job and keep it going.

Honors and Recognition

Her honors span the cattle and cowgirl worlds. She received the Golden Spur Award from the National Ranching Heritage Center in 1992 and was inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in 1995. In 2000 she and Les entered the Hall of Great Westerners. Later recognition included the International Women's Forum Women Who Make a Difference honor in 2014, Leadership New Mexico's Distinguished Leadership Award in 2019, and the Western Heritage Awards lifetime achievement award in 2022. She was also named National Cattleman of the Year, though the source gives no year for that one.

Legacy

The simplest measure of her legacy is that the work continued. Six children in ranching means the knowledge she absorbed on Tequesquite and Bell, and practiced on the CS, kept moving forward. For readers who want to follow the ranching culture of the Southwest, the ranching section of farm.FM is a good next stop, and a farm.FM story about New Mexico ranch women offers another look at women who worked the same country.