EDITOR"S LETTER

editor's letter Pancakes and 20-Cent Sundaes

The soda fountain isn't around anymore. Not like it was. There's an ice-cream shop, which is called Bright Angel Fountain, but it's not the mid-century chrome-and-Formica sensation that visitors got to experience in 1955. I wish it were still around. I'd be sitting there right now, writing this column and eating a 20-cent sundae. Instead, I'm in the dining room at Bright Angel Lodge, contemplating pancakes and scribbling these words. The soda fountain, which had a 10-item menu that ranged from malts (30 cents) to phosphates (15 cents), would have been about 75 feet from where I'm sitting. The new place isn't bad, but it's not the same. Still, I love Bright Angel Lodge. Even more than El Tovar.

There's something special about Bright Angel. It's not as old as El Tovar, but it evokes the past on a higher level. You can feel it in the lobby - it hits you the instant you walk through the door. You can feel it at the front desk, too. You also feel it wandering the halls, standing in front of the magnificent fireplace, eating breakfast in the dining room every turn is a step back in time. In fact, despite a few modern upgrades, the lodge isn't much different than it was when it opened in 1935. Like all of Mary Jane Colter's architectural masterpieces, Bright Angel stands the test of time. That's not the case with everything in Grand Canyon National Park. A lot has changed over the years.

In this month's cover story, we take a look at what used to be. You'll see the original soda fountain, Lookout Studio under construction and the first automobile to ever enter the park. There's also a great shot of the old pool at Phantom Ranch, and about 20 other black-and-whites that date from 1902 to 1967. One of my favorite images was made in the 1940s. It's a photograph from the North Rim that shows a group of summer employees performing a "sing-away" for a busload of tourists who were leaving the park. Back then, that's the send-off everyone received. Imagine that scene in the 21st century.

Daddy's Little Girl: “Who are those people, Daddy, and why are they singing in front of our Land Rover?” Daddy: “I don't know, honey. They obviously belong to a cult. Just roll up the windows. NOW. And don't look at 'em. We're getting out of here.” Today, with 4.5 million annual visitors, not even “Super Dave” Uberuaga, the omnipresent park superintendent, can personally say goodbye to every visitor to Grand Canyon National Park. But, for decades, that was protocol on the North Rim. It's part of the history, and one more reason Grand Canyon is arguably the most iconic park in the world. It's the first thing people think of when they think of Arizona. The second thing is saguaros.

Although Hollywood would have you believe that saguaros live in every state west of the Mississippi, they don't. The giant cactuses are, for the most part, exclusive to Arizona. There are a few in California and northern Mexico, but otherwise, they're all ours. They're a source of pride, and they're one of the things Craig Childs misses most when he's away from Arizona.

In Something to Call Our Own, he writes about his affection for saguaros, and the central role they played on a recent trip to Ironwood Forest National Monument: “At night, as my family settled into sleeping bags in the tent, I stayed outside on quiet watch. The moonless sky was full of stars. Orion was cradled in the arms of a couple of saguaros standing side by side. It looked as if they were holding up constellations, their arms raised into the night sky as if acting out some ancient legend.” Later, while visiting a friend in Tucson, he saw more saguaros: “I paused to listen to the soft hiss of morning breezes through their needles. Wildly shaped, like something out of a dream, a succulent given rein to become a tree, the saguaros seemed like a blessing.” Whenever we publish one of Craig's essays, it usually ranks as the best piece of writing in that particular magazine. And maybe it does this month, too. Or maybe that distinction goes to Alberto Ríos. He's one of three poets we're featuring inside. We get a lot of requests for poetry, and In So Many Words is our response. It's a collection of three poems by three of Arizona's most acclaimed poets - Mr. Ríos was recently named the state's first-ever poet laureate.

Like all poems, these are best read aloud. Start with Desert Water, the poem by Alberto Ríos, and then think about how it relates to the Grand Canyon. In six words, “Water hums its song into stone,” he explains the creation of the Canyon - geologists typically need at least a thousand pages. That's the beauty of poetry. It's simple, and it's a simple pleasure. Like 20-cent sundaes or a stack of pancakes.