ON THE ROAD

From the December 1940 issue OLD BILL Portrait of an Arizonan

OLD BILL IS JUST A plain old burro, ugly as a battered fence, but tougher than shoe leather. He's a philosophical sort of cuss and he takes life just as it comes. He can be the meanest, the most stubborn animal ever to set four feet on the ground and refuse to budge. And then again he can be an angel, as sweet and loving as a kitten, and the workingest old fool in 40 counties.There is something noble about Old Bill, something fine and superior. He holds himself proud like a gentleman should, and he accepts the blows of ill fortune without flinching and with dignity, the same as he accepts the blessings of good fortune. He looks out on the world through sad, patient eyes, without a chip on his shoulder, not like he's always looking for trouble; nor does he cringe like he's afraid of trouble when it comes.

His slow, steady tread is heard all through the pages of our history books. Old Bill's great, great, great grandfathers came to America from Spain in the days of the Conquest. Long before that, one of Old Bill's ancestors trudged down the dusty road from Bethphage and Bethany to carry the Carpenter of Galilee into Jerusalem, the most memorable journey ever taken.Years and years ago, when Arizona was just a big empty place on the map, Old Bill's forefathers proved their mettle by helping carve a state out of a big, straggling wilderness.

Men came along looking for mines and places to hoe the ground into farms, and burros like Old Bill made it possible for them to do so.

No sun ever beat upon the desert that was too hot for Old Bill and no trail or hillside too rocky or too steep for his sure step. He may not be pretty-like, but he'll live and grow fat on catclaw and mesquite that would be slow death for the haughtiest thoroughbred. He may not be winged lightning but he'll carry a heavy pack all day in the hottest sun, and he'll get there without bellyaching for water all the time. He's no beauty and he's about as awkward as a weather-beaten barn but he's as reliable as the sun itself and you can rely on him like on your best friend.

Old Bill is brave, too, and he'll fight for his own. The old prospectors say that even coyotes give Old Bill and his kin a wide berth because when he starts kicking he just doesn't know when to stop.

Nope! Old Bill will never win any beauty contest and those flop ears of his will seldom set an artist crazy. But sometime, maybe, they'll build a big statue out of solid granite that will stand always in honor and memory of one of the most important figures in the winning of our West and they'll dedicate it to the burro one like Old Bill.

Raymond Carlson was editor of the magazine for nearly two generations beginning in the late 1930s. His vision, his uncanny knack for spotting talent in writers, photographers and artists, and his love of Arizona came together to make Arizona Highways known and respected throughout the world.

Excerpted from the September 1947 issue FINDING A PARDNER

I have always classed myself as a writer. Over 30 years ago I got my first professional job as a dramatic critic on a New York daily. But I have always disliked city life and eventually acquired a farm in the New Jersey suburbs. I worked it for almost 10 years between writing chores, but the long winters grew longer and bleaker and I began to hanker for a less isolated routine.

You see, I am a bachelor.

So one winter after the holidays, I scooped up a stack of railroad and guest ranch folders and hopped a train on a blind date with the Southwest.

My first port in Arizona was the Y-Lightning Ranch at Hereford, a small settlement in the heart of the cattle country with ranch activities in full swing at the time.

The strongest urge in my strange setting was to find a partner. And my mission was completed almost before it began. On my first morning in the corral, a dun colt came shuffling toward me out of the remuda with a look that unmistakably said: “This is one helluva world to be understood in, pardner, and I've got you sized up as a kindly young outlaw like myself. I sure would admire to team up with you and to take the breaks and the knocks along the road of life with you as we hit the trail together.” When Frank Moson, owner of the outfit, came along, I asked him if he would sell me the colt, as he had a large herd of trained horses for his cowboys and a more than adequate number of gentle horses for his guests.

“He's just a wild mustang I ran outta the brush,” Moson told me. “But I never refuse to sell or trade anything but my missus.” So I gave Moson a check and tossed down a shot of bourbon with him to make it legal and, Buckaroo, the dun colt, and I have been pardners along the trail ever since.

CORNY CURE

The old prospector wrote to the corn syrup company: “Dear Sirs, I've been usin' your corn syrup for five years and it ain't helped my feet at all. They hurt worse than ever.”

ON THE ROAD Gary Bennett Designer Set the Pace For Today's Arizona Highways

When people talk about Arizona Highways, they usually comment on the great scenic photographs we run, and we do.

But other magazines have access to the same photographers. We do not own the photos. We just purchase the right to use them one time. So why do the pictures look better in our magazine than in others? The answer is we design the pages better, giving the photos a chance to show their best.

And artist Gary Bennett is the person responsible for establishing those modern design standards. Bennett was art director and creative director of the magazine for 17 years before leaving in 1995 to pursue a career as a fine-art painter and illustrator of books and magazines.

In the 1940s, the magazine hired George Avey as its first art director. Through Avey's efforts, the magazine became a showcase for not only photographs but also illustrations. Design became a focal point of the magazine.

But readers usually don't recognize good design. They notice stories, photos and illustrations, but rarely do they realize good design merged those elements into a comprehensive, readable package.

Gary Bennett, a graduate of Northern Arizona University who has a master's degree in fine art from the University of Arizona, established the design standards for today's Arizona Highways. Under his leadership, the magazine won numerous design awards and was lauded in design shows around the country and as far away as Paris and Tokyo. So effective was Bennett's work, he was recognized in 1991 as the outstanding state employee. Mary Velgos followed Bennett as art director in 1995 and has furthered the magazine's design legacy. Under the direction of Bennett and Velgos, Arizona Highways has been named the best regional or state magazine in nine of the past 10 years by the Western Publications Association.

THE VALUE OF A NEWSPAPER VARIES BY USER

When the late Budge Ruffner, a great satirist and frequent contributor to Arizona Highways, wielded his pen, no one was too big or too powerful to escape his rhetoric. Here from his book All Hell Needs Is Water, is Budge's observation about a newspaper editor: Every year we observe National Newspaper Week as a reminder of the value of a free press. But newspapers have hundreds of ancillary values that sometimes escape the casual eye. A truly talented individual can find a hundred thrifty uses for a daily paper after its prime function of informing has been exhausted.

During the Great Depression of the '30s, a northern Arizona editor received a pitiful plea in his mail one morning. The letter outlined the plight of the writer, a dry farmer a few miles out of town. The man explained to the editor he had been a victim of the Depression as well as the weather. The lack of rain had reduced his crop yield to a few dehydrated stalks and stunted vines. What few pigs he had were lean and bony. His 11 head of cattle looked like fragile wooden frames, barely able to support a red-and-white hide.

He was concerned that in the midst of this ordeal, his subscription to the local paper was about to expire. He did not have the money to renew it. He assured the editor, however, that if his subscription were renewed by the paper, he would honor the obligation as soon as his fortunes improved.

The editor was a compassionate man (some are); he answered the letter in the kindest tones and garments of diplomacy. He stated that while credit was not available, barter was an honorable vehicle of practiced economy, and the newspaper had a great need for corn cobs as an excellent tool for cleaning their presses. An exchange could be arranged - a pickup load of corn cobs for a year's subscription to the paper.

In a few days the editor received his answer. It was honest but disappointing. It devastated his professional pride. The farmer stated briefly that he had no corn cobs, and furthermore, if he had any corn cobs, he certainly wouldn't need a subscription to a newspaper.

Herb and Dorothy McLaughlin Their Love of Arizona Showed in Their Photographs

The credits always read "Photograph by Herb and Dorothy Mclaughlin Collection," because, as Herb had said, "A lot of the times, we didn't know who took which photograph." Unlike many couples who find they need space in their togetherness, the Mclaughlins literally lived with their work and each other - 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and treasured this relationship.

They came to Phoenix by very different paths - he an already successful advertising photographer from Indiana, she a turkey farmer from Utah. Herb and Arizona Highways quickly discovered each other when he arrived in 1946, and his first photo appeared that same year. The picture earned only a fraction of what it might have in another market, but Herb said he did it for the love of the magazine.

"Arizona Highways was our showpiece," Dorothy declares. "It made us recognized nationally."

(Above) A sense of the drama inherent in both the state of Arizona and the medium of photography propelled Herb and Dorothy McLaughlin's long careers as image-makers.

(Right) The McLaughlins strike a pose for a self-portrait in front of Rainbow Bridge.

Herb and Editor Raymond Carlson became good friends. "Ray even hired mariachis to sing under our window on our wedding night," Dorothy laughs.

Dorothy met Herb in 1950, and decided he must be okay because she'd seen his name in Arizona Highways. "I was impressed that I had seen his name [there]," she says, "so I knew he was good at what he did." Shortly after they married, Dorothy also developed an eye for the perfect shot, concentrating on children, Native American portraits and crafts and landscapes. Her work won numerous awards.

Early in their careers, the photographers began acquiring the rights to historic photo collections and in 1971 self-published a book, Phoenix 1870-1970 in Photographs, for which they won an Outstanding Citizen Award. Doubleday and Arizona Highways also published portfolios of their photos.

Eventually their library contained more than 400,000 black and white negatives, which the couple had agreed to donate to Arizona State University. "They know how to preserve them, and that's most important," Dorothy says.

Herb died in 1991, at 88.

Dorothy remains active in leasing both reprints of their work and copies of the historic photos. Her latest project involves choosing historic photo themes with a decorator for new Whataburger fast food restaurants.

Editor Bob Early highly values their years of contributions to Arizona Highways and the state, saying, "The Mclaughlins have given Arizona a lot to be proud of. Without their passion to preserve our history, we may have lost a legacy." Betty Marvin

Excerpted from the April 1949 issue

CLIMAX JIM My Favorite Outlaw

BY GEORGE H. SMALLEY Grizzled cowmen from the mountains, grim, stern settlers from the Gila Valley filed into the jury box. The county attorney plunged into a vociferous recital of the misdeeds of the accused.

"Gentlemen of the jury, the Territory of Arizona will prove to you that this defendant is the most dangerous criminal known from Hardscrabble Creek to the Mexico border. There is not a jail in this part of the Territory that has not housed him - but not for long, for he has broken out of every one of them.

"Listen to this from our local newspaper, the Solomonville Bulletin: 'Climax Jim, the notorious jail breaker, is exerting his arts and wiles to the utmost to absent himself from our jail. Confined in the steel cell with Climax were seven other desperate criminals, and the sheriff had them shackled in pairs. A horse thief and Climax were bound together with handcuffs and leg irons. The next morning when jailer Merrill entered the cell the two men were parading up and down, their legs tied with cotton string. The shackles were hanging on the cell door, and the handcuffs were on the floor. Climax Jim is the most slippery bird in the Southwest. When confined in jail at other times it was impossible to keep him shackled."

The judge ruled that the best evidence of guilt was the check which the Territory alleged

MINING FRAUD

From the January 1957 issue Tucked away in a remote section of southeastern Arizona, in a setting of indescribable beauty, sleep the remains of the Spenazuma, one of the greatest mining frauds ever perpetrated on the American people. Here, almost in the shadow of the Blackrock, a huge, isolated mass of rock abruptly rising over a thousand feet into the sky, was enacted the main phase of a swindle of which the master crook Ponzi, or Reavis, the Red Baron of Arizona, could well be proud.

It was the very grandeur of the location that convinced Dr. Richard C. Flower the title selfbestowed that here was the ideal site for his coup d'etat on the American pursestrings. And there is every reason to believe that Flower's golden dream would have come true had it not been for George H. Smalley, a Tucson newspaper reporter. Let Smalley tell his own story: "Arizona had been the scene of many doubtful mining promotions, some barefaced frauds, but none had equaled the Spenazuma in magnitude and boldness. Dr. Flower would have made his millions as he planned, except for the vision

LIFE ON THE FRONTIER

of an Arizona pioneer. In 1897, two years before the Spenazuma Mining Company was organized, Prescott Mayor Bucky O'Neill saw the menace to mining through fraudulent operations.

"He suggested that a survey be made of the territory and publicity be given to the mining industry, extolling honest effort to develop mining resources and exposing fraud. Legitimate mining operations were threatened by the stigma which was fast gaining foothold and destroying confidence in Arizona as a mining center. He proposed a mining department in The Arizona Republican, then a small daily paper published in Phoenix. The plan was approved and I was assigned the task of riding over the sparsely settled territory to write up the mining industry as I found it.

"In the spring of 1899 while enroute to the San Carlos Strip to write articles describing the development there, I stopped at Geronimo and met Bill Duncan, who told me about the Spenazuma. We rode out to the camp together and looked things over. All of the bluster of a week before, when Dr.

Flower entertained the Easterners at the camp, was gone. There were a few men at work, but the superintendent was lounging in a hammock beneath a sycamore tree. We were informed that the property was not open to the inspection of strangers.

"So Bill Duncan stood guard while I entered the workings of the Spenazuma Mining Company. We visited four tunnels and three shafts, all of them representing but a few hundred feet of work, and none revealing ore of value.

"But on the dumps there was rich ore which had not come out of the workings of the Spenazuma. Where did it come from? Duncan shook his head thoughtfully.

"The framework of a building its foundation the bare ground and the heaviest timbers but four by six inches - presented a ridiculous contrast to the massive structures legitimate mining companies use for housing ore crushers and concentrators. Work had been abandoned on the building, for it had served its purpose during the visit of the Easterners.

"It was plain the Spenazuma had been salted. To find out where the ore on the dumps came from was necessary before the story would be complete. Duncan said it resembled ore from the Henrietta in the San Carlos Strip or from the Marblehead in Aravaipa Canyon."

Smalley's search throughout the Strip revealed that claim owners in the Stanley Butte, Deer Creek and Aravaipa districts had sold ore to Dr. Flower which had been packed to the Spenazuma. Ore from Marblehead claims had been shipped Climax Jim altered and cashed. A witness employed in the bank where the check was cashed was placed on the stand, and the county attorney attempted to introduce the check as evidence after it was identified by the witness. "Object," whispered Climax Jim to the young lawyer who was defending him. The young lawyer jumped to his feet swinging his arms and shouting his objections. The county attorney cut in and a fiery argument ensued. He placed the check on the table to allow full use of his hands in clinching his argument. The eyes of judge and jury were upon the speaker - but not the steel blue eyes of Climax Jim. From the folds of his shirt he drew a long moist plug of chewing tobacco. He bit into it and laid the plug on the table as he nonchalantly stroked his shaggy moustache. A moment later he drew the plug of tobacco toward him and slipped it into his shirt where he crumpled a paper that had adhered to it. Stroking his mustache he placed the crumpled wad in his mouth. As the argument progressed Climax sat complacently chewing, and when the judge ruled the check was admissible, Climax quickly swallowed, and the prima facie evidence supporting the Territory's indictment disappeared down his throat.

JUST THE BEAR FACTS

On assignment for Arizona Highways, Bisbee photographer Marty Cordano has been trying to take pictures of wild bears in the Arizona outback, but the mission has been more of a nightmare than a moneymaking venture.

Time after time, he has been thwarted in his pursuit of the "perfect" bear shot by circumstances beyond his control. "Get a photograph of a bear standing on two legs, snarling in front of a beautiful waterfall. It should be simple," said the editor.

Once Marty arrived at Hawley Lake. He spotted two Apaches and asked them, "Have you heard about a big bear that's been hanging around the lake?"

"Sure have," one of the Apaches answered. "Want some? They're barbecuing him right over there."

LIFE ON THE FRONTIER

direct to the Spenazuma Mining Company offices in New York and put on display "for the delection of the more astute investors who wanted to see what they were buying."

In 1916, the law nabbed Flower in Toronto, ending a hunt that covered the whole of North America and part of South America. While he was out on bail awaiting trial, death came suddenly in a Hoboken theater. The fake doctor's Arizona sojourn is now but a memory to the old-timers in Gila Valley. Even the town of Geronimo has all but disappeared.

Flower's legacy to Arizona was a rubble of tin cans, some brick, a few holes in the ground and the story of a man who might have been. -William R. Ridgway

CORONER'S FEE

The kid was riding alone in Lonesome Valley, practically in the shadow of Mingus Mountain, searching for a sorrel horse whose return would put a $5 gold piece in his pocket. Five dollars would go toward the purchase of books when school opened in Prescott.

Thunderheads rose massively above the granite hills to the southwest and blew across the rolling stretches of the valley. The wind blew stronger and, despite attempts of the afternoon sun, the light in the valley became more feeble. The knee-deep grass leaned sharply before the wind. Sand swirled out of the small arroyos.

From the October 1939 issue The kid nudged his horse's flanks and moved a little more rapidly toward home at Spaulding's Station on the Camp Verde-Prescott road. He was still several miles away, and in the early 1880s, Arizona riders did not carry ponchos. Rain was certain.

Before long the rain fell hard and light-ning cracked over the valley, light-ing up the trail and frightening an already nervous horse.

Topping a little hill just as a long bolt flashed out of the black cloud mass, the kid saw a rider ahead, also running his horse. The kid slackened a bit, too young to feel safe riding a dismal rain-swept valley with a stranger. Still he youthfully longed for company.

The stage from Prescott to Phoenix had been robbed a few weeks before, and who could tell, this might be the bandit. And what business did the man have in Lonesome Valley? Of course, he could have been riding from Jerome to Prescott but it was late in the day to still be so far from Prescott. Too, he was several miles beyond the trail. The kid walked his horse.

It was still raining hard an hour later when the kid's horse snorted and shied from the stranger and his horse sprawled on the road, struck dead by lightning.

The kid rode on to the ranch and told his father. As the storm abated in the evening, word was sent to the sheriff in Prescott.

The next morning a buckboard drew up to the ranch with three passengers, a deputy sheriff and two witnesses. The kid climbed in and they drove out into Lonesome Valley to find the dead traveler. Buzzards marked the location of the body as the funeral party hurried into the valley. One pistol shot frightened the vultures from the two bodies, already torn by the beasts.

The dead man was a Mexican, neither old nor young. He was ordinarily clad. None of the party, widely acquainted in the district, could identify him. There was not a single coin in his pockets, absolutely no papers or other signs of identification.

They buried the unknown traveler on a little hill out in Lonesome Valley and buzzards consumed his horse.

One of the witnesses slipped into his blue denims the battered common pocketknife that was the man's only personal possession.

The saddle and bridle were the coroner's fee.