Friday Fotos is on hiatus the next two weeks. In its place this week are a letter and photos we received from reader and author Gaye Morgan-Walton (who sometimes writes as Gwynn Morgan) of Alamogordo, New Mexico, about our November and December issues. She writes:

I've been a "fan" of Arizona Highways almost forever. I came to Arizona as a wee tyke with my parents in 1946, and Raymond Carlson was a household name all the time I was growing up! Wonderful to read his words again in the holiday issue [December 2014]. He had so many great phrases. Truly an institution in Arizona's past.

The November issue was especially interesting -- particularly This Old House [November 2014]. I lived in Jerome from 1946-1953, and I think the huge flood of 1953 decided my parents to move down to the valley floor that fall. I've attached a few photos my dad took after the flood. He (as Charles or Chuck Morgan) actually had a few articles and pictures in the magazine at about that period and I still have the copies -- somewhere! Anyway, the one with the child is me, looking in amazement at the destruction! It was catastrophic. Many of the grand old houses were not salvageable. I am glad one was!

We always love hearing about our readers' personal connections to the stories we bring them. You can learn more about Morgan-Walton on her two blogs, http://www.deirdre-fourds.blogspot.com and http://gwynnmorganalaska.blogspot.com.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

(Photos courtesy of Gaye Morgan Walton.)