My Impression of Arizona

ARIZONA HIGHWAYS VACATION LAND, 1929 MY IMPRESSION OF ARIZONA

By JAMES J. DAVIS, Secretary of Labor, Washington, D. C.

WHEN Horace Greeley wrote his book, "What I Know about Farming," some critic said what the book revealed was not what he knew, but what he didn't know about the subject. To know anything one needs to get very close to its heart. A foreign observer comes to America, spends a few weeks among us, then returns home and writes a book on the impressions that the country has made upon him. If he happens to be a genius, he may write a book that is worth reading, but the average work written under such conditions is not worth the paper that is consumed. I have lived in Arizona, consequently what I know about the country is strictly limited. But I have seen it and I have been impressed by what I saw. I understand that there is some dispute in regard to the meaning of the name of the state. Some say that the name is derived from "arida zona" which means arid soil; while others claim that it is derived from "arizuma" which means silver-bearing. Whatever its derivation may be, Arizona is rich in mineral wealth. It yields a considerable supply of silver, and it is one of our great copper-producing states. It has lead and zinc and other minerals, and even if its name meant originally "arid zone," we have learned that by means of irrigation it can be made to blossom like the rose.

A soil is often like a weed. We call a thing a weed when it seems to be destitute of any human value. Cotton was originally a weed, tobacco was originally a weed. But when the economic value of cotton and tobacco was discovered, nobody called them weeds any more. The people in the southland began to say "Cotton is King," and tobacco was at one time the measure of value, the money of the people of Virginia. They even paid the salaries of their clergymen with it. And nobody objected, for as soon as Sir Walter Raleigh went back to England smoking a pipe, tobacco became a highly important commodity. King James the First of England insisted that the plant was only a weed, and a bad stinking weed; he even wrote a book against its use; but the people of England paid no attention to the King's book, and went on smoking. The Sultan of Turkey enacted a law against the smoking of it, and providPaid the penalty of hanging. According to history, after thousands of Turks had been hanged for smoking the Sultan repealed the law, fearing that in a short time he would rule over the kingdom of the dead.

I have said the soil is often like a weed. At one time the geographers used to designate an immense tract of soil as "The Great American Desert." Arizona, or the greater part of it, was of this desert. But science proved that desert soil is extremely fertile if it is irrigated. A vast amount of Arizona soil has since come under irrigation, and produces important crops. In years to come more and more land will be brought under irrigation and then the importance of Arizona farm products will be great.

When Arizona was annexed to the United States after the war with Mexico, the greater number of our people thought it was a worthless possession. They said it would always be worthless, just as Mr. Seward, when Secretary, bought Alaska from Russia (and he bought it for a song) Americans used to refer to the new territory as "Seward's Folly."

But Alaska turned out to be one of our richest possessions. "Seward's Folly" became Seward's wisdom as soon as the rich gold deposits of Alaska were revealed. And so when it was learned that Arizona was unsurpassed by any other part of the Union in mineral wealth, one heard no more of the "Worthless Possession" obtained from Mexico. Arizona proved to be one of the important parts of the Union. Exclusive of Alaska it is thefifth division of our country in area, and, as I have remarked, it is among the states, unsurpassed in mineral wealth. It is splendid for stock raising, and it is doubtless destined later to be famous for farming as well.

Again, Arizona has a superb climate. It is dry and healthful, and many a victim of tuberculosis is strong and healthy today because he had the good sense to make his home in Arizona. Mark Twain complained of New England, when he went to live there, that it had no climate. But nobody has ever made that accusation against Arizona, and nobody ever will. There are comparatively few places in the world which have a climate as enviable as the one for which Arizona is famous. People who go to Arizona are loath to leave the state because the climatic conditions there are ideal.

Old Dean Swift of England once approached a stranger and asked him if he had ever known any good weather. The Dean declared that he never had. The weather he had always known, he said, was either too wet or too dry, too hot or too cold. If Swift had lived in Arizona instead of England he never would have made this complaint.

I wonder sometimes if climate is not one of the most important things of existence. There used to be a superstition in France that most Englishmen eventually committed suicide because of England's rains and fogs. Of course we know that they didn't, but anybody who has ever lived in England knows that weather there is one of the great topics of conversation, and that an Englishman's grumblings are largely based on the kind of weather that he has to endure.

In fact, I recall an English clergyman, though I forget his name, who said, six or seven years after the death of Queen Victoria, that since the Queen's death Englishmen had seldom been able to catch a glimpse of the sun.

Well, in Arizona you see the sun; you get a deluge of sunshine. The beauty of the country is due not a little to this flood of sunshine. I believe that the original inhabitants of the