The Northlands Beckon

National Forest, (Prescott); Coconino, (Flagstaff); Sitgreaves, (Holbrook); Apache, (Springerville); Tonto, (Phoenix); Crook, (Safford); and Coronado, (Tucson).

The Tonto, with 2,900,000 acres, the largest of our National Forests, is one of the largest of the one hundred forty-seven National Forests in the United States, and is almost the size of the state of Connecticut.

Our National Forests are valuable properties in many ways: lumber, grazing, watershed protection, water conservation, etc. ways that add up into countless dollars and cents, tremendously important in our economy, but perhaps, as God's great outdoors, their greatest value, priceless and inestimable, is in the rest, relaxation and recreation they offer the people.

As John Muir, the naturalist-philosopher, once wrote: “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to pray in and play in, where Nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul.” Those words were written a long time ago, but they are truer now, in this hurried and harassing AtomicAge, than ever before, and they will be more true in the decades to come.

This is truly Everyman's Empire, offering something for everyone. This is our greatest wealth, our greatest heritage, carefully preserved and protected for our enjoyment today, for the enjoyment of generations to come.

We have always enjoyed a description of Everyman's Empire in our October, 1946, issue and we think it's worth repeating: “The eight national forests do much to make Arizona 'the land of contrasts.' Only in the Southwest can you find such a wide range of plant and animal life in the span of a few hours' travel. In these forests you can in a short drive go from the lower Sonoran Zone with its giant saguaros, wild javelinas and occasional Mexican jaguar to the Alpine Zone where mountain flowers wag their heads at snow lingering into summer months in shady crevices and gnarled trees at timber line defy the shrieking storm and all the whims and fancies of weather.

"Altitude and moisture determine life in these zones. As a rule, precipitation increases with elevation. The desert floor, close to sea level, gets a few inches of rainfall the whole year and grows cactus and mesquite. Journey upward and you find the mesa lands, at altitudes of several thousand feet or so, where ten or more inches of rainfall give life to grass and the livestock industry."

"Upward again, till piñon and juniper trees appear. Now you're in the woodland area 5,000 to 7,000 feet in elevation, where annual precipitation is 12 to 18 inches. Chaparral and oak brush add to the ground cover. Higher yet, your feet rustle in the carpet of needles from big pines and firs. The cool, piney air of the forest speaks of 19 inches and more of rain and snow, the bounty of elevations between 7,000 and 11,500 feet." Up here, where forest meets sky, is born the greatest gift of forest to man: the water that sustains his very life, deter-mines whether a village may grow into a city, turns turbines of hydro-electric installations, and foams from spillways of dams to irrigate the thirsty soil of ten thousand farms."

Follow a Lonely Road...

In the beginning there were the trails made by the creatures of Nature. Seemingly aimless, they led from bedding grounds to feeding grounds, from water hole to water hole. Early man came along and he, too, left his paths of travel, but those paths have long been obliterated by the patient passing of time.

The best of the early trail builders was the cow, a road builder by instinct. Follow a cow trail today, if you are on foot, and you'll find an easy way to climb a hill or cross a gulley.

Then the early settlers came with their horse-drawn wagons and roads began to mark the coming and going of people. Wagon tracks followed the gentlest slope of the land and the straightest line was not necessarily the shortest way between two points. Sheer common sense ruled for the easiest and cheapest way to get from here to there.

When the U. S. Army established a network of Army posts throughout the Territory of Arizona, to protect the settlers from the depredations of the Apaches, some of the earliest roads were established in what was then a wilderness. Some of those roads exist today and when one follows them it seems as if they go back into the pages of history, into a dashing era we will never see again. Surely a road was built when the always articulate and observant Lieutenant Emory in his Report described such a scene along the Gila as this: "The sun shone with dazzling brightness; the guidons and colors of each squadron, regiment, and battalion, were for the first time unfurled. The drooping horses seemed to take courage from the gay array. The trumpeters sounded 'to horse,' with spirit, and the hills multiplied and re-echoed the call. All wore the aspect of a gala day; as we approached the gorge, where we expected to meet the enemy, we broke into a brisk trot, then into full gallop, preceded by a squadron of horse. The gorge was passed, but no person seen.

"One by one the guidons were furled; the men looked disappointed, and a few minutes found us dragging our slow length along, with the usual indifference in regard to every object, except that of overcoming space."

In the land of little rain early travelers followed as much as possible the river courses. Stock and men needed water and generally a water course avoided rugged terrain. The modern road builder has in many ways changed all of that. Modern road building equipment and dynamite, skillfully handled, can put a road through or over a mountain with ease and dispatch. The coming of the Age of the Automobile brought the Civil Engineer into prominence and gave him his rightful place in the sun. The automobile made America a Nation of travelers. More and more automobiles demanded more and more roads. Bigger and better and faster automobiles demanded bigger and better and faster roads until we have the vast network of super highways of today.

In the beginning, even the loneliest or most primitive road was born of necessity. As the country became less sparsely settled tracks of travel marked the path of civilization. Here are wagon tracks that led to a ranch. Ranch folks had to get back and forth to town and as the wagon tracks became worn a road was born. Here are tracks that led to a farm and these tracks, too, became a road. When the car and truck came, roads, however primitive, existed for someone's use.

The last part of the last century saw in Arizona great mining exploration. Gold! Silver! Copper! Literally hundreds of small mining camps sprang up and of necessity roads had to be built to serve them. These small towns had their moment of glory and then were abandoned. They became ghost towns and the roads that served them became ghost roads, obliterated by time and weather. Patient Nature had reclaimed her own. In recent years, strange as it may seem, there have come along a horde of travelers who make ghost towns their hobby and once again the ghost roads have been put into use. Ghost town collecting, we assure you, can be fun. Today some of our most lonely roads lead to most interesting places, silent places whose very silence speak of livelier yesterdays.

In Arizona roads have always been a problem because of the very size of the state. Two decades ago our population was sparse and scattered and distances were interminable. It took wise planning and foresight to build roads to best serve the people with the limited money that was available. But roads had to be built not only to serve our own people but the hundreds of thousands of visitors who came annually to the Land of the Sun for the diverse pleasures of the vacation-minded. Arizona, one of America's most important vacation areas, had to have roads; so the roads were built. U. S. 66 in the north; U. S. 70 and 80 in the south; U. S. 89, north-south, border to border. Then U. S. 60, the central route, east-west, a story in itself, a highway that is practically being rebuilt to better carry its ever-increasing load of transcontinental travel.

The northeastern portion of Arizona, that part taken up by the vast Navajo Indian Reservation, for decades attracted only the most adventuresome and durable traveler because of poor roads. Many hardy souls around today still remember their first trip from U. S. 89, north of Cameron, to Monument Valley on the Arizona-Utah border. The road, a polite and imaginative use of the word, was a formidable challenge, but what a trip it was! And how wonderfully rewarding! A big, vast, lonely, beautiful land! Trading posts, big, empty miles apart! An occasional hogan, unobtrusive, part of the landscape! Shy Navajo children herding their sheep! Shifting sand dunes! Deep, colorful canyons slashed into the wind-swept plateau! Unbelievable scenery heaped upon unbelievable scenery, climaxed by unbelievable scenery Monument Valley itself. What a trip it was, in those days, over the lonely road. You saw it all because you had to go slowly, because of the road you had time to see and to absorb.

Now the road is hard-surfaced, a fast road, and the land it goes through is unchanged, as strange and fascinating as ever, but somehow it all seemed different in the old days.

"Ranch Road in Winter" BOB BRADSHAW "The Delicate Touch of Winter"

Portions of this land of the Navajos for centuries never heard the chug-chug of the gasoline buggy. But now that, too, has been changed. And the riches of the earth have caused the change. Uranium! Oil! Scratch a pencil rudely over a map of the area and you'll find roads going here and there where no roads ever existed before. They welcome the exploring traveler but he'd better come in a jeep. The conventional car was not tailored for their needs.

Our lonely roads have no road signs, no directional markers, no service stations, no signs announcing commercial establishments. They are slow roads, haphazardly designed for someone's necessity and not your pleasure. They serve their purpose. But you'll find them friendly and you might be surprised what travel pleasure they'll offer you as they loaf along seemingly without aim or destination. You'll find them tantalizing in their invitation and, maybe, rewarding with what they offer just over the other side of the hill, just around the next bend of the road. We in Arizona are proud of our major highways, slick and smooth and fast, but almost anyplace you come to there's a lonely road inviting you to tarry awhile and see what's ahead.