Located on Paseo de Peralto, between Old Taos Highway and Washington Avenue (at the corner, Washington becomes Bishops Lodge Road). An 1882 map shows that the location was Capitol Avenue (which not longer exists), between Grant Avenue and Washington Avenue. The Masons and Odd Fellows Cemetery was incorporated by the Territorial Legislature in 1853 and is the earliest non-Catholic burial ground in Santa Fe. During the Spanish Colonial and Mexican periods (1598-1846), Roman Catholicism was the only non-Indian religion openly practiced in New Mexico. When a more diverse population began to settle in Santa Fe, the Masons and Odd Fellows established a burial ground north of the former Spanish presidio grounds to serve the non-Catholic population who arrived mostly by traveling the Santa Fe Trail. The graveyard was a rectangle surrounded by a high adobe wall. The single entrance facing the city was intended for foot traffic through a folding doorway, which was later replaced by an iron gate, which is now at Fairview Cemetery. Some thirty years later, Fairview Cemetery and a new Odd Fellows Cemetery were founded on what is now Cerrillos Avenue. As a result, the old burial ground fell into disuse. In 1895, the removal of burials began to the Santa Fe National Cemetery, Fairview Cemetery, and the new Odd Fellows Cemetery. The process was declared over at the beginning of 1903, but was apparently never completed, as bodies have been unearthed in later excavations at the site. The cemetery was condemned by 1900, five years after "the removal of burials" began. "Attention is being called to the dilapidated and disgraceful condition of the old cemetery in the rear of the federal building," The New Mexican reported on July 12, 1899. "The adobe wall is crumbling, several gravestones have been dragged around, and burros browse among the weeds that cover the ground. The cemetery might be turned into a beautiful park or else cultivated to advantage." By 1903 the allowance of time for the removal of bodies ended, and presumably, all remaining grave locations were lost. Hower, a construction crew building a home for a retired Presbyterian minister on the property in 1960 found six graves when their machinery tore into the pine caskets, four of which had Masonic symbols on them, according to a Sept. 20, 1960, article in The New Mexican. In 2020, human remains and other deposits were discovered during construction of La Secoya de El Castillo retirement community on the corner of Paseo De Peralta and Old Taos Highway. Part of the southeast corner of the El Castillo property falls within the boundaries of what was once the site of the Masonic and Odd Fellows cemetery. The section of the cemetery encountered appears to have included mostly adult males, laid out in an orderly row, mostly in coffins, some of which may reflect the status of the men as being prominent in their communities and of some means. The uncovered remains include men who "are not of advanced age, and who may even have been subjected to post-burial cremation," indicating people buried there in the late 19th century included those who died prematurely, and possibly as the result of infectious disease. Additional gravesites are believed to be in the area. The profile of the area revealed a series of burial pits, which if continuously distributed in the same manner as observed could contain the remains of as many as 24 more people. Research is underway to identify who was buried at this cemetery.