TRAIL OF THE AGES

As one who has traveled over many thousand miles of highway, hearing the call of the road constantly and endeavoring always to travel with the "seeing eye" that takes in all wonders, both great and small, I am overwhelmed by the great beauty and strange scenic effects to be seen from the Arizona highway.

A few years ago, when the road appeal became too strong, I remember leaving New York City and heading northward along the coast of New England, toward Canada. It was well to be leaving the great Bagdad of America, for New York City is a replica of the particular kind of hell the careless and thoughtless motorist should be cast into for perfect punishment.

Once out of the traffic ridden trails of the metropolis, the Boston Post Road, older than our country, stretched before me like a reliable friend who urged me on with kindness and tact, on through the green fields of Connecticut and in to the bean city without mishap.

North of Boston and along the jagged coast of Maine again was the evidence of a skillful hand of a highway department. The narrow but well cared for dirt road following the banks of the St. John's River in New Brunswick, Canada, provided a whole, long day of scenic pleasure, while the road from the historic city of Quebec to inland Montreal, which skirts the banks of the majestic St. Lawrence, was a motorist's Paradise.

Memories of the Hendrick Hudson Boulevard in New Jersey, the Storm King Highway of the Palisades, the wide New York and Albany road, the speedway to Atlantic City, Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, all give mute testimony to the work of man, the highway men who make it all possible and pleasureable for the one behind the wheel.

Arizona's "Scenic Ace"

But just as there is always something new and interesting around the next curve and over the next hill, so this country always has her scenic ace when the tourist thinks he has seen almost all. The Apache Trail is one of Nature's aces and Arizona plays it with a poker face; for at the end of the trail a breathless and awe-stricken tourist says: "I had no idea it was so wonderful!"

I came over the Apache Trail preparedfor a glorious trip, but I also found myself approaching Phoenix with the same feeling. It was as if I had been taken into the confidence of a mighty One and shown His most precious treasures.

Entering the trail before sunrise, surrounded by the silence that is so in keeping with Arizona grandeur, and as the car climbs steadily to the summit, the imagination runs freely and one almost see the forms and hear the moccasined foot-fall of the men who first trod these strange canyons. Then the sun comes up, first gracing only the highest peaks with rose and later painting the road a yellowish gold with the deep canyons still in shadow.

Peace Prevails

An atmosphere of peace prevails on every hand and only the ghost-like presence of high tension wires over my head prevents the complete forgetting that this is the highly developed country of the United States and I am not accompanying the shrouded form of Dante into strange and imaginary worlds. Now the long climb ends abruptly and the tourist, reaching the top of the summit, finds a panorama opened to his vision that is unsurpassable. After leaving the dry hills of the GlobeMiami Mining District his hungry eyes spy a silver ribbon of water in the distance. It is the Salt River!

Dawn prolongs into morning and the cheerful, reassuring sight of a red Highway Department Ford truck looms into view, carrying men to their work, giving the traveler a gay confidence which dispels the eerie feeling of former loneliness. Again and again these red cars appear like argosies of safety, and as the men greet the stranger in passing their presence seems to say, "We are on the job. Go ahead!"

The trail twists and turns. It cavorts around mountainsides and delves into valleys. It carries the tourist up to incredible heights and amazing views and into canyons that were bottomless from above. The appearance of a Gila Monster in the road just ahead may force the tourist to swerve his car, as it did in my case; but pass the Monster by, for he is the fairy tale dragon who guards the wonders within.

The wonders of the trail continue. Up to the left appears the historic Tonto Cliff Dwellings, strange sentinels of a departed race and a silent reminder that we are all travelers on the road of life. Here in all our glory today and relegated to a dusty past tomorrow,our pride and pretensions falling from us like worn garments and only our worth remaining for a critical posterity.

Roosevelt Dam

As a contrast to the cliff dwellings we come upon the tiny town of Roosevelt on the banks of Roosevelt Lake, with its gas stations, stores and postoffice, and the tourist is quickly carried out of the past and into the present, which climaxes in the magnificent modern structure, the Roosevelt Dam! Here man looked upon the water of the Salt River and "saw that it was good" and. determining to harness, use and re-use every precious drop, has performed one of the most remarkable feats of engineering in the history of the United States. Behind colossal walls of stone the water is stored, turned into power and almost reluctantly released to its mission of prosperity in the fertile valley far below.Down a steep grade from the dam and