Goat Herd in Monument Valley

Trip to Monument Valley

The road to Monument Valley isn't the best road in the world; nor is it the worst. You leave the asphalt a few miles north of Tuba City, and, if you go way, way north, you hit the asphalt again at Blanding, Utah. From Tuba to Blanding, you travel a gravel road, sandy in spots, but dripping with scenery. Your journey takes you into the heart of Navajoland. The Indian Service keeps a grader constantly at work between Tuba and Kayenta. The Utah Sta State Highway Department maintains the road from Blanding to the state line. Barring heavy rain, the trip is an easy one. Above all, Monument Valley is scenery, a wilderness of spires, buttes, monuments, all of which show the grandiose handiwork of Divine Providence which created them, the tools being earth upheavals, sand, sun, wind, water, the vagaries of weather and time without end.

Monument Valley is color, extravagant color, which changes with the changing sun, the changing seasons, reflecting the nuances of shadow and sunlight, recording the slightest movement of a truant cloud. Golden sanddunes are a sea of color rolling high and proudly against the red cliffs. Here is distance and space, truly deserving the title of the book written about it by Richard E. Klinck: "Land of Room Enough and Time Enough." The folks who live here, a few hundred Navajos and a few white people, are lost in its immensity. You might be a very important person but you are not important in a wilderness of God's good works.

The Valley is people. The Navajos whose land it is; the traders, and lately the folks from the Seventh Day Adventist Mission, whose good deeds make the Valley more habitable for the Navajos who live there. And then there is John Ford, the motion picture director, who has brought so much to the Valley and who has brought the Valley to millions of people all over the world with his classics of the Silver Screen. A story of the Valley wouldn't be complete unless there were a few words about Mr. John and what he has done there. So many of us, through many years, have come to love the Valley because of the folks who take us in, give us a room, and see that we get enough to eat. To our hosts these many years, Mr. and Mrs. Harry Goulding (Harry and Mike to anyone who stops there in the Valley for even an hour or two), are these pages dedicated with all our love and affection.... R.C.

FRONT COVER

"GOAT HERD IN MONUMENT VALLEY" BY ALLEN C. REED.

Little groups of goats, sheep and Navajo horsemen silhouetted against the sky are all familiar adornments to make scenic Monument Valley complete. Rolleiflex Camera, high speed 120 Ektachrome, hand-held, 1/25th second at f.18, late afternoon in September.

OPPOSITE PAGE

"CLOSEUP OF MITTEN-MONUMENT VALLEY" BY RAY MANLEY. Two of the most prominent landmarks in Monument Valley are the Mirtens, because they are so easily distinguishable. One is in Utah, the other in Arizona. The Navajo names for these formations are even more appropriate. They call them "Big Hands." This photograph shows the south Mitten in detail as it arises 1600 feet above the Valley floor.

ARIZONA HIGHWAYS

Vol. XXXII No. 4 April 1956

RAYMOND CARLSON, Editor

GEORGE M. AVEY, Art Director

LEGEND

WE PROUDLY PRESENT THIS MONTH:

MONUMENT VALLEY

THAT WONDERLAND OF EROSION, SAND, SUN & TIME

ON THE ARIZONA-UTAH BORDER

AND WE TAKE YOU ON A VISIT WITH SOME OF THE FOLKS WHO LIVE THERE.

ERNEST W. McFARLAND

Governor of Arizona

ARIZONA HIGHWAY COMMISSION

Frank E. Moore, Chairman Douglas Grover J. Duff, Vice Chairman Tucson Wm. P. Copple, Member Yuma James R. Heron, Member Globe Frank L. Chirstensen, Member Flagstaff Wm. E. Willey, State Hwy. Engineer Phoenix Justin Herman, Secretary Phoenix ARIZONA HIGHWAYS is published monthly by the Arizona Highway Department a few miles north of the confluence of the Gila and Salt in Arizona. Address: ARIZONA HIGHWAYS, Phoenix, Arizona. $3.50 per year in U.S. and possessions; $4.50 elsewhere: 35 cents each. Entered as second-class matter Nov. 5, 1941 at Post Office in Phoenix, under Act of March 3, 1879. Copyrighted, 1956, by Arizona Highway Department.

Allow five weeks for change of addresses. Be sure to send in the old as well as new address.

COLOR CLASSICS FROM ARIZONA HIGHWAYS THIS ISSUE 35 mm slides in 2" mounts, 1 to 15 slides, 4oc each; 16 to 49 slides 35c each; 50 or more, 3 for $1.00 MV-9, Goat Herd in Monument Valley, Cover 1; MV-10, Closeup of Mitten-Monument Valley, Cover 2; IN-40, Painting in Wool, Monument Valley, Cover 3; MV-11, Road by Agathlan Peak, Cover 4; MV-12, View of Monument Valley from Goulding's Lodge, P. 7; MV-13, Rock Door Canyon-Monument Valley, p. 8; MV-14, View of Monument Valley from Hoskininni Mesa, p. 15; MV-15, Sunrise-Monument Valley, p. 16; IN-41, Navajo Campfire, p. 16; MV-16, Ear of the Wind Arch-Monument Valley, p. 17; MV-17, View of Monument Valley from Rim, center spread; MV-18, Spider Web Arch-Monument Valley, p. 20; MV-19, Full Moon ArchMonument Valley, p. 21; MV-20, Moccasin Arch-Monument Valley, p. 21; MV-21, Air View of Monument Valley, p. 22; IN-42, Preparing fire pit-Navajo Ceremony, p. 29; IN-43, Honoree Grinding Corn-Navajo Ceremony, p. 29; IN-44, Pouring corn batterNavajo Ceremony, p. 29; IN-45, Receiving blessings-Navajo Ceremony, p. 29; IN-46, The Patient Navajo, p. 30.