The Mob's Favorite Old West Bars in New Mexico (Still Open Today)

I tour nine historic New Mexico saloons that served outlaws, cowboys, and lawmen, and are still open for business today. From the high pines of Pinos Altos to the plaza in Santa Fe and the plains of Cimarron, I trace the trails, mines, and rail lines that created these legendary drinking spots. I meet figures including Billy the Kid, Clay Allison, Roy and Sam Bean, Black Jack Ketchum, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Chief Justice John Slough, and Theodore Roosevelt. I also look at the bootleggers, miners, Buffalo Soldiers, and saloon owners whose bullet holes are still preserved on ceiling tin and bar rails. Along the way, I investigate: the Cimarron saloon ceiling with over two dozen bullet holes, and the fifty-dollar fine for a triple killing the Santa Fe hotel bar where a territorial chief justice was shot dead by a legislator who walked free the Socorro judge who kept a jail in the back of his bar, and the atomic scientists who drank there later the Clayton bar won in a poker game, with spur scratches still on the foot rail the town vote that saved the Buckhorn Saloon by a margin of exactly twenty-six votes Watch to the end to find out how a 19th-century saloon that closed in September 2024 was saved and reopened just three months later. Which saloon are you watching from? Tell me in the comments. If you have ever had a drink on a New Mexico plaza or at one of these historic bars, name the town and tell me when you visited. If your family remembers drinking at the St. James, the Buckhorn, the Eklund, or Silva's, tell me your story. Every story in this video comes from named sources: New Mexico Magazine, the Albuquerque Journal, Esquire, Route 66 News, American Cowboy, KTSM News, Legends of America, state historical accounts, local newspaper archives, and hotel and museum histories. Where records and town lore disagree, the video says so. A saloon counts for this list only if it served outlaws or historic figures in its original era and remains open to the public today. WATCH NEXT ▶    • 10 Places in New Mexico The Mob Used to Co...   SUBSCRIBE ▶ [   / @oldatlasuncovered  ](https://www.google.com/search?q=https...) Sources: New Mexico Magazine ("Capitol Bar", "Silva's Saloon", "Hotel Eklund", "No Scum Allowed", "St. James Hotel") Albuquerque Journal (Capitol Bar speakeasy history; St. James Hotel ceiling bullet holes) Route 66 News (July 2026 update on Silva's Saloon listing) Esquire magazine & American Cowboy magazine (Bar rankings and history) Silver City Enterprise (1915 Pinos Altos dry vote reporting) KTSM News (Billy the Kid trial history in Mesilla) Legends of America & New Mexico State Historian's Office (Chief Justice John Slough shooting at the Exchange Hotel) Los Alamos National Laboratory (La Fonda WWII history and physics rumors) Wikipedia, used only as a pointer Images and film: archival photographs, postcards and historical-marker photos from the Library of Congress, the National Park Service, Wikimedia Commons and other public sources, credited on screen where required, plus licensed stock footage. --- old west saloons, new mexico saloons, billy the kid, historic bars new mexico, st james hotel cimarron, la fonda santa fe, classic cowboy bars, new mexico history, black jack ketchum, roy bean, capitan bar socorro, silvas saloon bernalillo, hotel eklund clayton, buckhorn saloon pinos altos, no scum allowed white oaks, el patio cantina mesilla, wild west history, outlaws of the west, old atlas uncovered #NewMexico #WildWest #Outlaws #AmericanHistory #OldWest #History #BillyTheKid #OldAtlasUncovered #texas #texashistory