Photograph by Albert Allard
William the Conqueror
It’s early March, and I’m on the phone with William Albert Allard. He’s reading me what he once wrote about Arizona rancher Henry Gray, whom Allard had met while traveling across Arizona: “We sat in…
Photograph by Gurinder Singh
Sky Islands
Arizona is 99.7 percent dry land and lacks an ocean coastline, so around here, islands are hard to come by. There are buttes that jut from Lake Powell, Lake Mead and some of the state’s other man-…
Photograph by Jeff Maltzman
Down South
Gurinder Singh Delicate wildflowers surround an alligator juniper in Gardner Canyon, which is on the east side of the Santa Rita Mountains. The canyon, named for a…
Photograph by Jill Richards
It's Looking Up Downtown
The first time I visited Tucson, in 1973, I stayed in a comfortable downtown hotel, interviewed for a reporting job in a downtown newsroom and went for a downtown walk with the city editor. He showed…
Illustration by Sam Ward
Who Shot First?
Klondyke’s cemetery sits high on a ridge overlooking the broad sweep of Aravaipa Canyon, about 35 miles west of Safford. Prickly pear cactuses and a handful of grave markers rise from its tall, tawny…
Photograph by Joel Grimes
Practice Makes Perfect
Look closely at Michael Chiago’s watercolors, and you might spot a small boy — he’s hatless and wears a blue shirt. The boy pops up in multiple paintings and typically appears on the edge of the…
Photograph by Laurence Parent
Wet Your Appetite
Jeff Maltzman A tiered cascade flows over golden-hued rocks in Bear Canyon, part of the Tucson area’s Santa Catalina Mountains. Numerous seasonal waterfalls come to…
Photograph by Rich Rudow
When It Rains, It Pours
Editor’s Note: The disaster in Phantom Canyon is included in our book The Desert Cries by Craig Childs. It appears in two parts: an essay about the canyon, and a detailed account of the deadly flood…