Arizona and California, its neighbor to the west, have an ongoing, mostly friendly rivalry. In 1934, though, a dispute over water rights led to a heated showdown between the states — and the creation of one of the most unusual “navies” in American history.
In 1929, Mary Adeline Norris Gray took to the sky over Phoenix at the invitation of local aviators. It was the 83-year-old’s first plane flight, but she wasn’t intimidated — “It was better than bein’ amongst all these reckless auto drivers,” she told the Arizona Daily Star.
The city, Gray said, had “all changed since I first saw it.” And that was truer for her than for just about anyone, because more than six decades earlier, Gray had become one of the first white women — and possibly the first — to settle in the Salt River Valley.
In 1953, an admirer recalled that watching Bert Goodrich run the 100-yard dash in college was “a horrible sight.” Perhaps because he stood 6 feet tall and weighed about 200 pounds, Goodrich always got off to a slow start. But after spotting his opponents up to 12 feet, he “would get rolling in a tremendous cloud of flying cinders and dirt and come storming up at the finish to win.”
While he’s remembered as the first “Mr. America,” Goodrich may have been the most versatile athlete in Arizona’s history — and without a doubt, he was one of the most interesting.
Historic Route 66 extends from Chicago to Santa Monica, California. And the longest still-drivable stretch of the Mother Road is in Arizona: a 158-mile portion from the Ash Fork area to the Colorado River. East of there is Flagstaff, one of the state’s most popular Route 66 destinations. And in 1929, during the route’s early years, a Flagstaff business now known as the Motel Du Beau Travelers Inn became one of the first “motor courts” in the United States.
In April 1929, the discovery of a vein of gold and lead ore in the Hualapai Mountains, near Kingman, spurred the development of the Gold King Mine. And today, a building known as the Gold King Mansion stands as a reminder of the area’s mining history.
The Gold King Mine’s proprietor was Paul M. “Paddy” Woods — who, according to a local legend, drove a large Cadillac to and from the mine. Another legend claims that the company’s secretary would literally ride shotgun, with a 12-gauge on her lap, as the two ferried the mine’s payroll to the site from Los Angeles.
Decades ago, John Schaefer, who was president of the University of Arizona from 1971 to 1982, asked one bold question of legendary landscape photographer Ansel Adams. It happened on March 17, 1974, during the opening for Adams’ exhibition at the university’s art gallery, and it happened because Schaefer wanted Adams’ archive to live at the school.
When the city of Phoenix acquired Sky Harbor Airport in 1935, it was just a glimmer of what the facility is today. It had one terminal and served a small number of planes. According to Sky Harbor historians, “By December 1940, the airlines at Sky Harbor included American, TWA, Carl Knier’s Sky Harbor Air Service and Southwest Airways, Inc., bringing the total number of planes at Sky Harbor to 35.”
At the turn of the 20th century, Bisbee might have been considered rough around the edges. At its peak, the Copper Queen Mine employed 2,700 men to pull copper ore from the earth and run ancillary operations, and the smelter burned 24 hours a day. Bars and brothels were on a similar schedule.
In the early 1930s, Angelo Caviglia began construction on a 2,000-square-foot adobe building with an adjacent 700-square-foot livery stable. His goal? To create a gathering place for residents of Arivaca and the nearby community of Ruby, which was experiencing a boom thanks to the nearby Montana Mine.
For one of Tucson’s first rodeos, the Arizona Ice & Cold Storage Co. offered a prize much more valuable in February 1925, the year the rodeo began, than it would be today: a giant block of ice. And while the event — traditionally known as La Fiesta de los Vaqueros — has grown and changed over the past 100 years, it continues to showcase the Old Pueblo’s Wild West allure and entertain winter visitors and year-round residents.
