A Storied Land of Serene Landscapes and Friendly People

Travel on U.S. 70 and U.S. 666 gives tourism a potent place in the county's economic life, with restaurants, motels, garages and service stations directly benefiting from the traffic that flows on these main arteries of travel. And of utmost importance, too, is the fact that winter visitors and retired folks from many states are more and more discovering Graham County's varied and intriguing attractions, such as its proximity to Mexico and a wide selection of ghost towns, snows in the mountains and hot springs in the valleys, happy hunting grounds for rockhounds and a land of cacti and pines.

Semiannual cattle sales conducted at Calva by Apaches are colorful affairs which give an important impetus to the county's economy. The recent development of 600 acres of irrigated farm land near Bylas is another Apache plus, and the future development of lakes, lodges and trading posts in the Point of Pines area of the reservation holds high promise for the forward-looking Apaches in promoting their land as a great tourist attraction.

Until recent years little notice has been given Graham County's most precious asset-a splendid all-year climate devoid of extreme heat and cold. Now word of its pleasant days is spreading afar, and more and more folks are enjoying Graham County's dry bracing air and a sun that won't quit smiling.

A Storied Land

Friendly towns and villages grace the Graham County landscape. Regardless of size, they present a most pleasant appearance. In these homey communities one finds the good life, the unhurried life where a neighbor's sick child is cause for concern, where a church social is still in style, and parking a car on Main Street is no great chore.

Some of these towns and villages owe their origin to the Gila Valley's rich productive soil, others to mining activity, and several to the Apache wars. Each has an individuality of its own, and its own assets as shown by this brief look:

SAFFORD

Much of Safford early history dating from 1873 revolves around Joshua (Josh) Bailey and Edward D. Tuttle, who first entered Arizona in 1862 with the Confederate-hunting California Column. Josh gave Safford its name (after Governor Anson Pacely Killen Safford), established its first store and was its first postmaster and justice of the peace. Tuttle, a member of Arizona's First Territorial Legislature, made many invaluable contributions to early-day Safford and taught in its first school, an adobe building which stood on the site of today's post office. Situated in the middle Gila Valley, Safford early became an important trading center for a wide area, with five gristmills, an ice plant, a creamery, nine newspapers and three banks making contributions to its steady expansion and increasing prosperity. Gaining the county seat in 1915 helped Safford become Graham County's largest town.

Today's Safford is a composite of attractive homes, shady streets, fine motels, hotels, modern stores, excellent utilities, including mountain water, churches, schools and everything found in a modern city.

THATCHER

Lights in the dormitories, lights in the library and lights illuminating the L.D.S. Church steeple are an integral part of the Thatcher scene. Except on tangy nights when stadium shouts fill the air, the town-folks of Thatcher and the Eastern Arizona College students walk and talk softly on the streets and on the campus. Removed to Thatcher from Central in 1891, the college combines with agriculture to create a delightful ivy-atmosphered town.

Thatcher was named to commemorate a Christmas visit by the Mormon Apostle Moses Thatcher, with Apostle Erasmus Snow in 1882.

SANCHEZ

Located at the head of the Gila Valley and named for its founder, Union soldier Lorenzo Sanchez, this tiny Mexican community, which once boasted a store and post office, continues to dwindle in size, until now it consists of only a few scattered farm families.

Today in Sanchez an abandoned schoolhouse, a picturesque cemetery, with rocks piled high on each grave, and adobe ruins are part of a scene which conjures visions of another Pompeii but Mexican style.

CENTRAL

Main landmarks in today's Central would be its reverence-commanding L.D.S. church, a general store, the Omer Smiths' lovely hillside home and the Bigler pecan orchard.

Although a scattered far-flung community, Central is nevertheless a closely knit one, prideful of its many achievements and rich historical background, ready for the agricultural prospects now under development throughout the Gila Valley.

SOLOMON

Few Arizona towns provide a more sharp contrast between the past and the present than does Solomon, another upper Gila Valley town named for its patron, Isadore Elkan Solomon. Adobe buildings old before the turn of the century stand in the shadow of new, costly residences; the shell of Solomon's first brick building is but a stone's throw from the present sparkling school plant and Mormon Church.

During its heydey as county seat for Graham County (1883-1915), Solomon residents danced on the Solomon Hotel's veranda, rushed to greet the arriving stage at Noah Green's corral, proudly read its own newspaper and steered clear of bartender Jerry Barton, who killed easily. In the course of its long life, Solomon ran a gamut of names Munson, Pueblo Viejo, Solomonville, Solomonsville before the present one was applied to the post office, a change complicated by the official notification, which read, in part: "... An order has been issued changing the name of the Solomonsville, Arizona, post office to Solomon, California, effective June 1, 1950." That's right: California!

BRYCE

Two widely separated places honor the name Ebenezer Bryce Bryce Canyon National Park and the community of Bryce, situated in the lower Gila Valley. Born in Scotland in 1830, Ebenezer joined the L. D. S. Church and migrated to the United States at the age of seventeen. He married in Utah in 1854 and lived near Cannonville, where he intimately knew the rainbow-colored canyon which now bears his name, one he later described as "a heck of a place to chase a cow."

After putting his millwright talents to use in Southern Utah, builder and colonizer Ebenezer moved his family to central and northern Arizona in 1880, and to the Upper Gila Valley in 1882, where he founded the community of Bryce and commenced farming and ranching activities. Other of his many enterprises included a sawmill and gristmill.

Far from being a one-family village, Bryce counted other widely known pioneer personalities as its own. John Felshaw was Bryce's first schoolteacher and Nephi Packer its first postmaster and storekeeper. The Bryce that Ebenezer knew has now disappeared from the scene.

SAN JOSE

The United States census of 1880 recorded San Jose's population as 186, larger than any other Graham County community. Through the years this upper Gila Valley village has not only lost its population leadership but also Casamera Garcia's busy store and Fat Molina's Whoopie Hall.

Now a mixture of old and new homes, San Jose still retains a touch of Old Mexico, with strings of bright red chile hanging from adobe walls. Guitars still make music and gastronomical miracles are created in kitchens from chile, cheese, corn and onions.

KLONDYKE

A number of men returning from Alaska settled at this place and named it to commemorate their experiences in the Klondyke hence the name. It was located at the fork of wagon roads leading to the Grand Reef, Aravaipa and Table Mountain mines. "Two saloons, one store, one restaurant, two tents, occupied by fallen women, and a corral make up the famous town of Klondyke," reads Solomonville's Arizona Bulletin (July 17, 1898). Now the old John Greenwood store building and a school represents the tiny community which once had high hopes.