Editor's Letter

editor's letter The Story of Our Life

Five hundred words. That's all I get to cue up an issue that recounts nine decades of magazine history. It demands more, our "90th Anniversary Issue," but even 4,000 words wouldn't be enough, because the piece you're about to read is unlike anything we've ever done. The idea was pretty simple: Look back through the archive, bookmark some of the most interesting pages and tell our story. It was simple ... until we realized that it wasn't so simple. In the course of 90 years, we've produced a lot of pages worth remembering. I don't know how many hours we spent digging, but I do know that we went through every issue in our archive - there are more than a thousand in there - and ended up with a great collection of old ads, maps, illustrations, fonts, logos, headlines, stories and photographs. In all, we tagged more than 800 pages, and the best of what we found is presented chronologically inside. As you'll see, we've come a long way since 1925, when we ran ads for road graders and published stories about bridge construction. You'll also see that things got a lot more interesting in 1938, when Editor Raymond Carlson and Art Director George Avey came along. Of all the names in our storied history, theirs shine the brightest. They're the founding fathers of a magazine that would go on to make publishing history in 1946, get banned in the Soviet Union in 1965 and share the beauty of Arizona with readers in all 50 states and more than 120 countries around the world.

One of those readers is Shannon Boomer. About a year ago, Shannon called me and asked if I'd like to have her grandfather's typewriter. "YES," I said, in all caps. "Are you sure?" She was sure, and today that old Underwood sits on a small table in my office, the same office where George Avey - Shannon's grandfather - typed letters to Ansel Adams, Esther Henderson, Ted DeGrazia and a long list of other notable contributors who have graced our pages. Although we've had our share of impressive bylines over the years, including Ed Mell this month, it's the names you never see that have made Arizona Highways one of the most respected magazines in the world. I only get 500 words for this column, so I can't individually recognize the hundreds and hundreds of men and women who have worked behind the scenes over the past nine decades. However, I do have enough words left to acknowledge my team, which powered through this project the way Hannibal marched over the Alps.

Barb, Diana, Jeff, Keith, Kelly, Nikki, Noah ... that's the crew that makes this magazine come to life every month. They're a tireless and talented team of professionals, and they're passionate about the history of Arizona Highways. They're passionate about the future, too. Although we're all happy to have made it to 90, we'd like to live to be 100. We hope you'll join us.