This is a new page for the MCCM website - a place to put our publicity and stories! We will add items chronologically with most recent on top and see how that goes!

The Following Story, “The Lamontine Hummingbird” was published in the Roswell Daily Record on-line edition on Friday, Dec. 5, and in the print edition on Saturday, Dec. 6, 2025 (Thank you RDR!). Printed copies of the story are available (free) at the museum. The Lamontine Hummingbird is on view until February 14, 2026, in the Glorious Class exhibition at MCCM. Come see it!

"It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end." — Ernest Hemingway

Story by Nancy Fleming based on interviews with Beth Isler, Lori Dattola, Margarite Sanchez, Adele Hartman, Regina Moore, and Mary Stickford; with appreciation to the other stained-glass class regulars: Ruth Ann Brown, Lillian Nyhoff, and Faith Johnson.

A 23”x18” stained-glass artwork hangs on white pegboard in the Eastern New Mexico State Fair’s Arts & Crafts pavilion. Three ribbons adorn its name tag: a dark blue First Place, a light blue Section Winner, and a purple Best of Show. The image is a hummingbird positioned lower left of center with iridescent outstretched wings behind it. The beak points upward as if it’s gathering nectar from the dusty rose-colored flowers adorning a leafy vine that takes the viewer’s eye around the picture. It’s an appealing circular composition with its organic lines of solder breaking up the clear glass background, but it’s the tiny feathers of the wings and tail that takes the prize. What’s not visible to the viewer, however, is the story of how the Lamontine Hummingbird ever got to the Fair in the first place (pun intended!).

Suzanne Lamontine is the originator of the now prize-winning artwork. In the obituary photo, Suzanne wears a flowery shirt and bucket hat. The foliage of nature is in front and behind her – she is the hummingbird. The funeral home website says you can send flowers or plant a tree in Suzanne’s memory, and reading further, she enjoyed birdwatching, gardening, stained-glass and genealogy research. She died in Roswell, New Mexico, on Christmas Eve, 2018, at the age of 77. Suzanne left behind two children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and an unfinished stained-glass hummingbird.

Beth Isler remembers Suzanne being one of the regulars at the Roswell Adult Center’s stained-glass class in the early 2000’s when Beth signed up for her first summer session under instructor Janice Melton. Art educator Beth came with stained-glass experience, so she and Suzanne quickly became good friends. In addition to being classmates, they shared a booth at the local Farmer’s Market for many years. In class, Suzanne – the birdwatcher – would create stained-glass pictures of birds, and at the Farmers Market, Suzanne – the master gardener – would sell a variety of vegetables and fruits, including jams she made from her blackberries and raspberries.

The Process

A stained-glass piece like the hummingbird begins as an enlarged paper pattern resembling a coloring book page. The spaces between the thick black lines get numbered and two copies are made - one is kept whole, colored for reference, and used for the base pattern. The second copy is cut up into the numbered sections and will be traced onto the corresponding colored or clear glass. A third copy is “insurance” in case any of the cut-out pattern pieces need replacing. The hummingbird pattern has 212 pieces, from the smallest ¼” wing feather to a larger 10” background shape. Suzanne cut all the pieces out of glass with a hand-held glass cutter, then used a stained-glass grinder to perfect the size and smooth the edges. She then wrapped copper foil carefully around each of those 212 pieces to prepare for soldering, which holds them all together. Suzanne was as close to finishing the hummingbird as is a baseball player rounding third base on the way to a home run. But Suzanne’s health was failing, and for two years before she died, the hummingbird lingered on a card table in her living room. It was too large and had too many pieces to risk bringing it back and forth to the Adult Center.

A Snowstorm Named “Goliath”

Winter Storm Goliath dumped a record 15.6” of snow in Roswell the two days after Christmas 2015. The Roswell Adult Center’s typical Southwestern flat roof did not fare well with the weight and wet, and the building suffered massive leaks and subsequent mold. The stained-glass classroom was deemed unsafe. But it’s hard to deter determined crafters. Suzanne, Beth, and their fellow classmates would gather up their materials and tools from the “unsafe” classroom, head down the hall to the Lapidary area, and reverse the cumbersome process when class was over. Instructor Melton at some point resigned from teaching the class. Beth stepped up as the instructor on record, with minimal pay, and continued offering stained-glass classes to the Roswell community. Suzanne kept coming to class regularly even when her legs were swelling with edema and it was hard to walk. After Suzanne succumbed to her failing health, her daughter knew where to deliver her mother’s stained-glass supplies, tools, patterns, glass, and last, large, unfinished piece.

Lori

Lori and her husband Dan drove into Roswell to attend their first stained-glass class in early Fall 2019. The drive took almost two hours as “home” to the Dattolas is on their ranch in Pinon, New Mexico. It borders the Lincoln National Forest and is unmistakenly beautiful…and unquestionably remote. One needs a full tank of gas and an empty bladder to travel to or from there. Lori signed up for the stained-glass class thinking it was something she and Dan could undertake together. She hoped it would take his mind off the physical restrictions which necessitated Dan’s cutting back on woodworking. He tried, but the stained-glass process was too tedious for him. Lori, however, was instantly hooked – and had quite the knack for its precision and flair for its possibilities. Genetics perhaps played a small part in her newfound passion, as her grandfather had picked up the hobby when he was 84, and she has a stained-glass lampshade he created shining brightly in her home as an inspiration.

Covid….and Time Out

Even though Lori and new students registered for stained-glass during the time sharing the Lapidary classroom was mandated, the Adult Center was making it hard for their new instructor to keep her stiff upper lip. The stained-glass regulars had weathered the pandemic, got back into the groove, but in 2021 when Beth’s “required” class load didn’t make by two students, the Adult Center staff canceled the class. It was Beth’s time to say “enough was enough,” and she and the students pulled out. Everything purchased by Beth and the students – which was pretty much everything but the old grinders and even older scrap glass – was packed up by the truckload and brought to Beth’s home and barn southwest of town. Suzanne’s hummingbird was in the mix. It was time for a time out.

The Re-Start

More than a year later, Beth was wooed back to teaching stained-glass at the Adult Center. She was offered a pay increase and a dedicated classroom - now next to Lapidary. Beth brought back her supplies, tools, and books of patterns. The stained-glass class regulars returned. Suzanne’s unfinished hummingbird came back. And it didn’t take long before Beth’s single stained-glass class had too many students and she divided it into two sections. Then three. Then four. Space was tight with the increase of people and projects. The shelving was inadequate and the walls needed painting, but stained-glass was going strong at the Roswell Adult Center.

The Hummingbird Resurfaces

It was summer 2024, and the stained-glass classroom was finally going to be painted. Beth and her students readied the room. The walls were stripped of pictures and the shelves of projects. Former students who had left unfinished projects were called to come pick up their work. When Lori removed stacked projects from the top of the northwest corner cabinet, Suzanne’s hummingbird appeared. Pieces were missing, the copper had tarnished, the pattern had frayed, but Lori knew even before Beth had finished telling her about Suzanne, that she could and would finish that intricate stained-glass artwork.

In the newly painted classroom (tackled by the stained-glass students because the Center’s painters never materialized), Lori set upon finding glass for the missing pieces. This proved a bit tricky as the dichroic glass Suzanne had used in the hummingbird’s iridescent wings was no longer available. The copper foil so carefully wrapped around each piece had oxidized and Lori was either going to have to remove and replace or hopefully clean it off. A classmate suggested using Simple Green and scrubbing off the oxidation, which saved Lori from re-foiling, but a new problem arose when she placed all of the pieces to soak in the cleaning solution. She had not numbered them. The pattern was not matching up. Classmates were solicited – and successful – in puzzling out where all the pieces went and what was missing. Remediation work was intermittent but progressing, and the hummingbird project was yet again in a state of being “almost finished.” Concurrently, the stained-glass classroom was benefiting from additional improvements – mostly donated from an anonymous benefactor. New shelving, new grinders, and a brand-new stainless-steel sink. First-time stained-glass students were completing their mandatory introductory project – a tulip – and returning students were underway on projects of their choice. For Beth, this was all a long-time coming, and felt great.

The Flood

When it rains in Roswell, it’s common to “row, row, row your car down Main Street” as street drainage is almost nil and every intersection becomes a lake. No one, however, was singing on October 19, 2024. The rain was epic – 5.78” in less than six hours. Roswell sits in a basin that tips eastward toward the usually almost-dry Pecos River 10 miles east of Main Street. When a thunderstorm kept dumping water from the West of town and over Roswell itself, it all flowed – fast – toward the Pecos, taking with it anything in its way. The mud, plants and trees, dumpsters, even cars…all moved eastward. The water entered structures and torrents of debris broke doors and windows. The destruction was frightening. The widespread damage to homes, businesses, and City infrastructures is still being assessed and remediated.

The Roswell Adult Center fared badly during the Flood. It sits adjacent to the Spring River Corridor, a channel that traverses five miles through town. Water flowed into the building leaving a debris line 6-feet high. Returning to Roswell having been out of town during the flooding, Beth was heartsick at the visible destruction. The Adult Center was boarded-up and the grounds were a shambles. She was told by staff she would not be let into the building to assess her stained-glass classroom or its contents. Beth kept showing up anyway, forcefully reminding the Parks and Recreation Director that the contents were her and the students’ property. She was finally given a day in which she could enter, about a week after the Flood. She brought her trailer and many of the students came as well. They waited. When they were told to go home, Beth planted her feet firmly in the mud and declared she was not leaving without her stuff. She knew it would all be thrown into the trash if she did not intervene. It was a Western Standoff. She won. Escorted into the building through the front door, Beth recalls, “The clean-up crew was shoveling everything to get it out…mud, debris, unknown objects…room by room by room. They had already taken a lot of the larger pieces of furniture and office equipment out. You could see the flood debris line, you could feel the sticky mud sloshing around your feet. The smell was strong, and it was dark since there was no electricity. A random railroad tie had somehow made its way into the hallway. It was just weird.” Reaching the stained-glass classroom, the door would not open.

The floodwater’s torrents had displaced everything in the stained-glass classroom and swirled it around like a big stew. Furniture from the back of the room now blocked the door to the hallway. Again, Beth was told she could not get into it to the room, and, again, Beth would not give up. The classroom had a back door which opened out onto the west side of the Center. She waited until workman pried open the door. “They said I had to stay on the sidewalk. But there was no way I was staying on the sidewalk.” Water and mud glopped over Beth’s shoes as she finally entered the room, but she didn’t care. Starting in one corner, she grabbed what she could lift and handed it off to her crew who helped her determine if it should go into her trailer or was ruined beyond repair. Everything that had a possibility of being salvaged was saved. Some of the rescued items eventually also were discarded, but, Beth said, “At least I got to make that decision.”

The cabinet with the soldering irons and supplies was face down in the mud and could not be righted, so it was abandoned. The workmen laughed when Beth produced the key to another cabinet, but it actually worked to get it open. “The water had swirled around inside the cabinets too. Things on the top shelves were good, but things even at my height were full of water and mud,” said Beth, “but I just knew that there were items that could be cleaned and saved.” Most all the glass stored in the classroom and in another room was rescued. Some student projects were found in tact, but others just couldn’t be found. The mud made everything the same brown-colored thickly-coated muck. The cardboard flats which stored individual projects were so saturated with water and debris they had collapsed and let loose their contents.

And Suzanne's hummingbird? It was on the very top of the cabinet that hadn't fallen over. It was rescued and taken home by one of the students as Beth’s trailer was filled to the brim. Lori later retrieved the hummingbird and took it on the long drive back her home studio. It was still unfinished and on its fourth move.

The Angel

Prior to the Flood, it was not uncommon for Mary Stickford to show up at Beth’s advanced stained- glass class, but not as a student. Once she brought more than a dozen small apple pies from her prolific tree to distribute to the class. She had assisted with the painting of the classroom that past summer. Mary’s passion is fused glass – a completely different process than stained-glass, but she admired what Beth was doing to keep stained-glass classes going at the Adult Center without much help from the City.

The Flood had shut down not only the Roswell Adult Center but also the Roswell Museum. Mary’s ceramicist neighbor who had been a regular at the Roswell Museum’s Tuesday morning clay class for more than 25 years, came knocking on her door. She didn’t beat around the bush. She exclaimed that Mary should have the 13 ceramic students continue their Tuesday morning clay ritual at Mary’s house. Seeing the need, Mary agreed, and quickly realized Beth’s stained-glass class was in the same situation. She contacted Beth to offer her and her advanced stained-glass students her open-plan dining-living-studio area for stained-glass class, but on Fridays – since the “clay ladies” were now booked for Tuesdays. Beth was relieved and honored.

It’s been almost a full year now for both groups to meet and create at Mary’s house. She has not only provided the space in which to work, but new tools and supplies appear regularly so the 20+ artisans can keep up their creative production. The grateful women’s vehicles fill up Mary’s driveway twice a week …except her neighbor’s, as she still just walks across the street.

Comradery

Mary’s gift became more than just a place to work for the stained-glass crew. It was much-needed time to support each other and deal with the Flood’s emotional impact. Beth started a text thread for the group which finds them sharing their latest finished project or giving health updates on sick members. When the deadline for the 2025 Eastern New Mexico State Fair craft entries became known, a notice was posted to the group to get motivated and enter. Lori got out her soldering gun to finish the hummingbird. “When you start soldering the copper foil, you can’t stop until you are finished,” explains Lori. “The flux that prepares the metal to accept the solder and meld the adjoining pieces together will start to harm the copper if it’s not washed off.” It took a full day for Lori to do the soldering on all the 212 pieces, back and front, and get the flux washed off. She put the hummingbird in the window to dry, figuring she’d patina and wax it when she got home from a jaunt up to Colorado. Unfortunately, the day after she returned home, she badly hurt her right hand and would not be able to lift or finish the piece. Dan came to the rescue in order not to miss the Fair entry deadline. He applied the patina chemical which darkens the solder color, polished the front and back, waxed and buffed the piece until it was – finally – finally – finished. The entries were due the next day.

Nine years had passed since Suzanne Lamontine first chose that hummingbird pattern as “her next stained-glass project.” Now it was hanging as the Grand Prize stained-glass entry at the Fair. The community marveled at its beauty and details. To Beth, Lori, Mary, and the stained-glass regulars, however, there was so much more to the story….so much more.

The Future

The timing of the Hummingbird’s completion could not have been better. After its week of being showcased at the Fair, it now hangs at the Miniatures & Curious Collections Museum in Roswell to be part of the “Glorious Glass” exhibition, running November 1, 2025 through February 14, 2026. The Museum, however, will not be the Hummingbird’s final home. That decision had already been made when Lori first took on the finishing of Suzanne’s project – it will go back to the Lamontine family. Full circle. Just like the Hummingbird’s composition.

Postscript: The Roswell Adult Center’s building future is still uncertain. Some of the exercise classes have moved to the new Aquatic Center, but Roswell has lost its dedicated classrooms and tools for stained-glass, lapidary, and woodworking. Determined artisans, however, are keeping watch to the time when these traditional skills can again be offered to the community.