Roy, New Mexico
7 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1954 and the latest in 1981. It stands in the North Harding census division. It lies in ZIP code area 87743. The Survey maps it on the Roy quadrangle. 193 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 5,896 feet above sea level.
Research this city
Population over time
2 figuresRoy fell from 234 to 193 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 234 | |
| 2020 | 193 | -41 (-18%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
4 surveys from 7 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1954 USGS Santa Fe quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
- 1958 USGS Santa Fe quadrangle1:250000
- 1974 USGS Roy quadrangle1:24000
- 1981 USGS Roy quadrangle1:100000
Photographs
1 photograph, 1935Taken for the Office of War Information and the Farm Security Administration, who photographed the country between 1935 and 1944. Works of United States government photographers, with no known restriction on use. Each opens its catalogue record.
Lange, Dorothea, photographer, 1935. Library of Congress
Fires near this place
7 since 1993Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 7 fires within 5 miles of Roy between 1993 and 2016, burning about 154 acres in total. 1 started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 4 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 1 |
| Natural | 1 |
| Debris and open burning | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 September 2011 | Natural | 2.0 acres | New Mexico State Forestry Division | ALAMITO |
| 26 May 1996 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2.0 acres | New Mexico State Forestry Division | CATES |
| 27 April 2016 | Equipment and vehicle use | 30 acres | Las Vegas District | TRACTOR |
| 14 April 1997 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | New Mexico State Forestry Division | ANDERSON |
| 21 March 2015 | Debris and open burning | 5.0 acres | New Mexico State Forestry Division | HICKS RANCH |
| 23 November 1993 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 35 acres | New Mexico State Forestry Division | COSTA |
| 10 January 1994 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 80 acres | New Mexico State Forestry Division | SC0TT |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
7 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 7 workings within 5 miles of Roy: 5 producers, 2 unknowns. 5 still produce. What was taken out: Calcium, Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Materials Pit 56-67-F | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer | ||
| Unnamed Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Unknown | ||
| Unnamed Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Unknown | ||
| Materials Pit 56-64-S | Calcium | Producer | ||
| Materials Pit 56-66-S | Calcium | Producer | ||
| Materials Pit 66-30-S | Calcium | Producer | ||
| Materials Pit 76-4-S | Calcium | Producer |
Storms near this place
44 since 1995Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Roy in 44 storm reports between 1995 and 2023: 37 hail, 3 thunderstorm wind, 2 flash flood, 1 lightning. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 1995 | Thunderstorm Wind | Roy | $200,000 | Several severe thunderstorms passed over western Harding County producing large hail and damaging winds, some of which were tornado-like. A mid-evening storm damaged or destroyed five barns at the Chicosa Lake State Park northeast of Roy. A second storm just before midnight tore a porch off a park bunk house and blew over a radio communications tower. Total damage from the two storms was estimated at $200,000. |
| May 2021 | Hail | Roy | $50,000 | A trained spotter west southwest of Roy reported 1 inch hail from a severe thunderstorm moving southeast through the area. The observer also reported that their home roof was leaking as a result of hail damage. Damages are estimated for the roof damage. |
| July 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | Quarter size hail was reported. |
| June 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail was mostly dime size but some were up to half dollars. |
| June 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail fell for at least ten minutes. |
| July 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | Quarter to golf ball size hail was reported. |
| June 2022 | Hail | Roy | - | A storm chaser near Roy reported quarter size hail. |
| May 2020 | Hail | Roy | - | Half dollar size hail reported near Mills Canyon. |
| May 2017 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail up to the size of golf balls in Roy. |
| June 2017 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail up to the size of quarters near Roy. |
| June 2017 | Thunderstorm Wind | Roy | - | Peak wind gust to 60 mph near Roy. |
| May 2017 | Tornado (EF0) | Roy | - | Brief tornado touchdown six miles north-northeast of Roy. |
| May 2017 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail up to the size of half dollars near Roy. |
| September 2016 | Hail | Roy | - | Half dollar size hail in Roy. |
| September 2008 | Hail | Roy | - | Hail ranged from marble to nickel size. |
| July 2004 | Flash Flood | Roy | - | Heavy road flooding reported in Roy. |
| July 2000 | Flash Flood | Roy | - | State Road 120 was flooded after 2 inches of rain fell in 30 minutes near Roy. |
| May 1995 | Hail | Roy | - | ,,,,,,,,Hail (1.25) |
| July 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2023 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| September 2011 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| April 2010 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| September 2006 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2005 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| September 2003 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| September 2003 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Thunderstorm Wind | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 2002 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| May 2001 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 1999 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| August 1997 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| April 1996 | Lightning | Roy | - | no account filed |
| August 1996 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
| June 1995 | Hail | Roy | - | no account filed |
Newspapers printed here
5,075 digitised pages1 paper published in this town, digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read: 509 issues, 5,075 pages. Every page is searchable, so a name or a street can be looked for directly in what the town printed about itself at the time.
| Newspaper | Published |
|---|---|
| The Spanish American | 19?? |
What the paper printed
12,711 wordsFront pages of the local paper, read from the Library of Congress scans: 6 issues spread across its run from 1905 to 1922, 12,711 words in total. Each is reproduced on its own page, exactly as the recogniser returned it.
These pages read less well than anything else here, and the number is worth stating: about three words in four come through cleanly, against nine in ten for the building records. An 1896 broadsheet sets eight-point type in seven columns on microfilm, which is the hardest thing in this archive to read by machine. We tested our own recognisers against the Library's and they were not better, so the Library's text is what appears, with the wholly unreadable columns removed. Read it as a guide to what the paper covered, and follow the link to the scan before quoting anything.
| Issue | Paper | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1905-02-06 | The Spanish American | 2,686 words |
| 1908-09-12 | The Spanish American | 2,154 words |
| 1908-09-19 | The Spanish American | 408 words |
| 1910-05-07 | The Spanish American | 2,170 words |
| 1910-07-23 | The Spanish American | 2,073 words |
| 1922-12-30 | The Spanish American | 3,220 words |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Roy | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2086695 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 894203. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.



