Rogue Columnist

When Scottsdale was real

After I finished grade school at Kenilworth north of downtown Phoenix, we moved to Scottsdale (population 68,000) so I could attend Coronado High School. My mother was alarmed by news that a gang of teenagers had kicked a West High student nearly to death. I lucked out, going four years and graduating from one of the nation's best public secondary schools, with a superb fine arts program and academics. And I got to see Scottsdale before it became so rich and big and fake, Silicone Valley with its plastic surgery and a city limits reaching all the way to the Tonto National Forest.

Here's how "the West's Most Western Town" was in those decades. Most of the gallery is thanks to Brad Hall's collection. Click on a photo for a larger image:

Brown Avenue in the 1950s. Scottsdale's population was a little more than 2,000 in 1950.

The Lulu Belle at Scottsdale Road and Main Streets.

Main Street in the 1950s. It was much the same in the 1970s.

Year of living dangerously

Illustration by Carl Muecke

Everything that's good is at risk. Everything bad spreads and gets worse. 

It's difficult to avoid that conclusion, from my personal experience to the nation and the world. In Phoenix, Central Methodist Church — the "Mother of Arizona Methodism" for all the other congregations it established — is now just "Central Church." First it took away such comforting staples as the Apostles Creed, then ran out  the choir and excellent music program, shut the inspiring sanctuary and eliminated the traditional service with the glorious hymns — and has only a contemporary "Jesus, Java, and Jazz" service. I know all you smart agnostic and atheist readers don't care. I do.

The city keeps throwing down gravel and pavement, gutting shade trees, landscaping, and grass. It's ahistorical in the natural oasis of central Phoenix and adds to the deadly heat island. Newcomers lecture me that "we live in a desert" and "there's a drought." They don't care that investments in natural cooling such as shade trees keeps that water away from being wasted on more sprawl. I do.

And little indicates it will change in 2022. It will get worse. This is how we live now.

The art of American Eden

In the first half of the 20th century, the produce of the Salt River Valley traveled to customers in the east via refrigerated boxcars (reefers), iced before they left the Warehouse District packing houses and others in Glendale and Peoria, and along the route. But the wooden crates and later cardboard boxes were decorated with vivid illustrations that advertised the produce — and created a distinct art form. Almost all were done by anonymous artists.

Here is a sample. Click for a larger image:

A Christmas letter

Illustrations by Carl Muecke

Here we are, hurtling toward a Democratic shellacking in 2022. And based on the voter suppression laws being passed by Republican-controlled legislatures around the country, they may never be in power again. For example, the Arizona Legislature has stripped the Secretary of State of the ability to certify elections. Now the Legislature itself will decide electors — here comes Trump in 2024.

Electoral success depends on quick results by the Democrats, not only on infrastructure (which Trump never delivered) but also rebuilding the social-safety net and addressing climate change. Instead, the monstrous Sen. Joe Manchin has torpedoed much of President Biden's agenda. West Virginia is among the poorest states in the nation. It one of the biggest beneficiaries of Biden's Build Back Better programs, but no. Manchin revels in being essentially shadow president. The razor-thin Senate Democratic majority that leaves so much power in the hands of Manchin and Arizona's Sen. Kyrsten Sinema. Both should be Republicans for the damage they did. They are anything but centrists. But let's not forget the Democrat's self-inflicted wounds.

These are nicely encapsulated on Andrew Sullivan's Substack column. (It's well worth a subscription). Here's some of the salient points Sullivan makes:

More early Phoenix

Phoenix grew from 270 people in 1870 to 11,314 in 1910. Here's a gallery of our town before statehood. Most are from the Library of Congress or Brad Hall. Click on a photo for a larger image:

Phoenix in the 1870s. Lots of shade trees and not a palo verde in sight.

Twelve mule-team freight haulers at Montezuma Street (First Street) and Jefferson in 1880, before the railroads arrived. Look at all the shade trees.

Another view of how goods were delivered. This is at Maricopa Street (Second Street) and Jefferson.

The territorial capitol under construction in 1898.

Adams Street east of Center, looking southeast circa 1890. It's near the future site of Switzers and Hanny's.

Looking northeast up Melinda's Alley near Mojave Street (First Street) and Monroe in the 1890s.

The Interstate 11 boondoggle

I don't know why they call the agency the Arizona Department of Transportation. It's the highway department, it's historic name. All it does is plan, build, expand, and maintain highways. No trains – Phoenix is the largest city in North America without intercity passenger rail. No commuter rail or light rail or transit. ADOT is all about highways. Behold its new creation.

Interstate 11 is planned to eventually run from Nogales to Reno, cutting the above swath through hundreds of miles of virgin desert as it winds to the west of Phoenix. I-11 could cost as much as $10 billion to build from Phoenix to Las Vegas alone. But this doesn’t include externalities: Air pollution, emissions that worsen climate change, loss of desert habitat, bladed desert plants, including increasingly vulnerable saguaros.

Kristen Mosbrucker in New Times reported on how the route will benefit Mike Ingram's holdings in Maricopa, as well as Douglas Ranch, acquired for $600 million by the Howard Hughes Corp. with Ingram and Jerry Colangelo as partners. Without freeways, this is worthless empty desert north and west of the White Tanks. With I-11, a goldmine — even though gold mines of the West play out quickly.

USS Arizona

Arizona had barely been in the union for two years when the keel was laid on battleship 39 (BB-39) at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, named after the 48th state. In attendance was Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Battleships were the premier capital ships of any navy and had been revolutionized by the 1906 launch of the Royal Navy's HMS Dreadnought, the first all-big-gun ship. It lost the smaller-caliber weapons of its predecessors in favor of batteries of deadly 12-inch guns that could hurl shells for miles. The ship took its name from Queen Elizabeth I's saying, "I will trust in God and dread nought." This gave the name to all classes of future battleships.

Arizona, according to the New York Times, would be "the world's biggest and most powerful, both offensively and defensively, superdreadnought ever constructed." It was armed with three batteries of three 14-inch big guns each, with a range of 12 miles. The armor belt at its widest (made by Krupp) measured 13.5 inches; the deck was also armored. She was 608 feet long and displaced nearly 30,000 tons, becoming at the time the largest ship in the fleet (today’s new Gerald R. Ford carrier is 100,000 tons and more than 1,000 feet long).

Arizona was launched in 15 months with 75,000 people in attendance, including the state's governor, George W.P. Hunt. Esther Ross of Prescott christened her with two bottles, one of sparking wine and another of water from Theodore Roosevelt Lake (the state had recently passed prohibition).

Phoenix's architectural icons

In an earlier column, I wrote about Phoenix's influential architects from Frank Lloyd Wright to Will Bruder (who decamped for Portland). Here is a gallery of the most iconic and beautiful structures from the past and present, from the McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives, Library of Congress, and Brad Hall. Click on a photo for a larger image.

The Fleming Building at First Avenue and Washington in 1938. It was completed in 1883, the most impressive building in the young town. Among its amenities: A basement bowling alley and two rooms as the first public library. It was demolished in the 1980s for the boxy Wells Fargo Building.

The State Capitol at 17th Street and Washington, completed in 1901 as the territorial capitol. The Legislature never funded a replacement statehouse, although architecturally compatible additions were made. Modernistic structures for the House and Senate were added in the 1960s, and the scene was marred by the 1974 Executive Tower behind it. The Capitol is now a museum with its copper dome.

The Center Street Bridge, first span across the Salt River connecting farmers with the city and its railroads. Completed in 1911, it was claimed to be the longest reinforced concrete bridge in the world.

The Hotel Adams, built to replace an 1896 wooden structure that burned in 1910. It was demolished in the mid-1970s for today's Renaissance Hotel (first named the new Hotel Adams).