History Adventuring

In a longish life, I've often wondered why people do the stuff they do, and most of it seems to be an endless task of collecting stuff. Some people collect money, some people collect stamps, and it seems as if they're never satisfied. It's always made me wonder if these people were greedy, always wanting more, but now I realize that it's just the nature of the joy of discovery. Speaking for myself, I just a huge kick out of discovering new things about historic Phoenix. I've been doing it for a long time, and no matter how much I find, I want to find more. I have a collection of Phoenix photos (all digital, of course) of about 10,000 images and often my biggest challenge is to find the stuff that I've already found. I try to use a logical file system that I learned from a fellow graphic designer who also collects old Phoenix photos, and it's wonderful. I can use the "find" command on my computer and usually "put my finger" on an imag...

If you're a fan of Phoenix history of the 1960s, you know about the sculpture that artist Paul Coze did of the Phoenix Bird for the Town and Country Shopping Center, at 20th Street and Camelback Road. You may even remember seeing it. And it may surprise you to find that you can still see it, it just takes a little bit of work. Come along with me. As of this writing, March 2018, it's there, on public display, in what I call "hidden in plain sight". If you're a better driver than I am (and that wouldn't take much!) and keep your eyes on the road, you may have gone past it many times and never seen it. It's now on 21st Street and Camelback Road. Yes, it's there, and if you've never seen it there, really I can't blame you. I "rediscovered it" about three years ago when I asked the Woman in My Life to help me look for it. At the time she was working right across the street, and had never seen it. I was convinced that it was there, s...

As I write this, I'm on my way to surviving the flu season of 2018. I'm trying to do everything right, sitting here at my computer with the humidifier going, sipping Dasani bottled water. I've got my Nyquil handy again for tonight, and if necessary Luden's Cough Drops, and WalMart 'Tussin. Come to think of it, I've surrounded myself with everything I could think of to minimize the pain of living through the flu, and since I had a fever for about two days I had plenty of time to think about how it must have been for the people of old-time Phoenix. In 1918 there were a lot of people who weren't as lucky as I've been. In fact, 500 million people died from the flu that year worldwide. Yes, 50 million. And as I was freezing and burning with fever a couple of days ago I know that my little brain strayed over into thinking that those who lived were not the lucky ones. Sorry, fever scrambles your brain, I'm OK now. Of course, I had Tylenol to reduce m...

One of the things that I've appreciated about Phoenix ever since I moved there from Minneapolis as a teenager is the dry heat. And it's a phrase that puzzles a lot of people who've never lived in the Midwest. Now calm down here, I love both Phoenix and Minneapolis - they're beautiful cities. But if you've ever spent a summer in Minneapolis where the humidity is so high that you can barely breathe, you know that it's unpleasant, to say the least. And it doesn't really have to be all that hot by Phoenix standards to be horrible - in the 80s with high humidity can have you scratching your hair in tortured agony and wishing that you can worn nothing that day but deodorant. I grew up in Minneapolis, and if you've spent a summer there, you know. If you haven't, I don't recommend it. I'm not saying Phoenix isn't hot. It gets insanely hot. And I mean "you can fry an egg on the dashboard of your car" hot, but it doesn't get hu...

From the vantage point of the 21st century, it's hard to imagine how much a nickel could buy in 1892 Phoenix, Arizona, when the first electric trolley cars were built. And the Common Council of Phoenix stipulated, among many other things, that the price of the fare of a street car would never exceed five cents, for fifty years. In 1892, you could get a "shave and a haircut" for two bits, which was twenty-five cents. You could buy lunch at a restaurant for a nickel, and have an extra penny for a tip. By the 1940s, a nickel could buy you a bottle of Pepsi, but not much more. In other words, fifty years of inflation between 1892 and 1942 spelled bad news for the street cars. Just like the Red Cars of Los Angeles, the street cars fell into disrepair. Everyone was happy with the five cent fare limit, except the people who had to run and maintain the system. They scrambled for money, and in Phoenix, when the fifty year mark was hit, the street cars remained in operation ...

As someone who has lived in Los Angeles, and now lives in Phoenix, I've seen people do a lot of commuting. And the question arises: "Why would people do that?" It's certainly not something that I ever considered, in fact, it's the main reason I left California and moved back to Phoenix, I wanted to buy a house, and I couldn't afford anything in the greater Los Angeles area. I would have had to have lived in somewhere like Lancaster, which is about 60 miles away from where I worked in Woodland Hills. And I knew a lot of people who did. They commuted every day for over two hours each way in some of the most congested bumper-to-bumper traffic in the country. It seems kinda crazy to me, but if you're genuinely wondering why people do that, I think I can explain. And it starts with wanting to have "the American dream" - a house, a place that you can call your own, maybe have a little garden, a garage, bedrooms enough for a family. And as I approa...

Even though many years have gone by for me, I've never outgrown my enjoyment of exploring a neighborhood the way I did when I was a kid on a bicycle. And that leaves most grownups puzzled when I say that I know a particular neighborhood well. Grownups see the restaurants, the parking spots, the lowest price for gas. They know the quickest way to the freeway, the fastest way to drive to downtown, and about a million other things that are meaningless to kids, and to me. I first started doing this in my neighborhood in Minneapolis, where I grew up. I left there at age 19 and the people that I talk to can hardly believe that I lived there. I don't know any of things they know - you know, the restaurants, the parking spots, the lowest price for gas, the quickest way to the freeway. But I knew that neighborhood in the intimate way that only a kid would know it. When I moved away, to Phoenix, I did the same thing. I knew the neighborhood by Lopers just that way, I knew the neig...

Yesterday I went to the Biosphere 2, which is near Tucson, Arizona, south of Phoenix. And yes, I loved seeing it, and was amazed at it, and I could go on and on, but I won't. I recommend that you go see it. It's open to the public, it costs about twenty bucks admission, and there are regular tours through it all of the time, so you can just stop in. And while I'm glad to have seen it, when I look back at yesterday, it was only a part of it. Yesterday was a wandering day. I learned the phrase "A wandering day" from my friend who drove. Like most of the people I've known all of my life, he's very busy with the new job, and repairs to the house, and a thousand other things. And while we've talked about going to the Biosphere 2 for years (we're both "plant guys"), it just seemed as if it was always being put off "until tomorrow". But we finally made it happen. On Friday we went to Apache Junction and stayed with a friend who ...

Phoenix has a lot of empty lots. Personally, I've always liked them, as it means less congestion, less traffic, and better views of the mountains. Of course, I'm not an investor, and I'm sure they look at them differently. If you've driven past 21st Avenue and Bell Road since 1988, you've seen an impressive-looking sign that says "Phoenix Northgate", and really nothing else except a chain link fence that goes all around the property. I'll tell you what I know about it, but really it's not much, because all it means is that it was supposed to be a center of a flurry of business, and it never worked out. There, that's about it. It happens all of the time. From what I've read, in addition to car dealerships, there was supposed to be a hotel, restaurants, banks, that sort of thing. It seems like a good location! Back in 1988 it may have been "way out there", but it isn't anymore. Go figure. The funny thing about this is tha...

There's a saying that I like that says that to begin understanding something, start by learning what it's called. And while I'm not usually fussy about names, because a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, the best way to begin to understand what most people call "the Biosphere" in Arizona, down near Tucson, is to call it by it's proper name which is Biosphere Two. And if you're looking around and wondering where the Biosphere One is, you're standing on it, it's earth, also known as the Big Blue Marble. And that's the point of Biosphere Two, to see if something could be man-made that could support life, both plant and animal, out in space. Like earth does, only smaller. The Biosphere Two was built in the late 1980s, and like most people who live in Arizona, I've never gotten around to visiting it. I plan on seeing it this weekend, and like all of the places I visit "In Real Life" I start with some exploring in cyber...

I've lived in Arizona, and briefly in California, all of my adult life. I grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and have been amazed at how far my "midwestern work ethic" has taken me professionally in the southwest and how much it has harmed my nervous system. Yeah, I could probably relax a bit. My friends who grew up in Phoenix, or Los Angeles, see me as a bit maniacal. I grew up in a neighborhood where it was expected of every decent person to have their sidewalks shoveled no later than 10 am, that sort of thing. If you've lived in Minneapolis, you know what I mean. In fact, one of the things that I fell in love with in Arizona and California was the more "laid back" approach to life. I know that my friends back east picture me either with a sombrero, or maybe carrying a surfboard, but I still have a lot of "midwest" in me. And being that way has been a blessing, and a curse, for me living in Arizona and California. Something that I've...

I like reading old books, and one of the things I've noticed is that people used to know the exact time when trains would leave. That is, a train would leave Paddington Station at 12:04, and people would say, "I have to rush and catch the 12:04!" Or they would be at a country house and know that the train that would get them back to London in time would be 6:17. And they would ask the chauffeur to drive them to station to get there in time for the 6:17, which would get them to London by 8:02. This way of thinking has nothing to do with how I've lived my life, because I've always just jumped in my car and complained of traffic. So today I'll be doing an experiment with the bus - I'll be taking the 1:33 to my dentist. I could, of course, take the 1:03 but that would get me to my destination way too early. If I miss the 1:33, I'll have to wait another half-hour, in which case I would call my dentist to say that I would be running late. People in old bo...

As some who has lived in some really awful neighborhoods in my younger days, I know that food at neighborhood markets is the most expensive way you can buy it. If you've never lived in a neighborhood that's, uh, "less than fashionable", it may come as a shock to you that those little neighborhood market's prices are much higher than, for example a large chain retailer, whose name I won't mention here, but rhymes with "almart" I've been lucky. My career and my income grew, and I was able to move into a nice suburban neighborhood, where everything is designed for the convenience of people with cars. And even in my "less than fashionable" years, I had a car, and was able mostly to drive away from the neighborhood to a grocery store, or a discount store, or well, anywhere. People in the neighborhoods who weren't as mobile as me didn't have that many choices. When I lived in Canoga Park, a "less than fashionable" nei...

I've always like this story: Three men on a construction site are asked what they're doing. The first says, "I'm earning a living", the second says, "I'm laying bricks", and the third says, "I'm building a cathedral!". That taught me everything I needed to know about point of view. I like asking people what they're doing, and mostly I hear "going to work" and "doing errands". And I often wonder how these people could live in such a drab world. Luckily, I've known people who are adventuring, and I've learned a lot from them. My favorite role models for this have been James Bond, and my brother who lives in California. They're always adventuring! Yes, they're doing their jobs, and from a certain point of view doing errands, but they're doing with style, and really living. If you can't see it, I'll see if I can explain. I'll start with going to an airport. Like most people, m...

I like Phoenix history, and I especially like old photos. Yes, I can read, but I still mostly wanna look at pictures. I'm a "pictures and captions" kinda guy. I like a short explanation and a really nice picture. And since I'm a Photoshop guy, I like to store photos digitally, where I can look at them at my leisure, as up close as I want to, with no limit whatsoever on the amount I have. My career as a graphic designer started with the change from analog (drawing boards) to digital (Macintosh computers) in the 1980s, and I loved digital stuff right away. But a lot of people of my generation disagree with me. They don't value digital stuff, and it's not real unless it's on paper. And that attitude puts a lot of precious history at risk. I'll see if I can explain. I was at the Burton Barr (the main library of Phoenix) a week before the flood damage, in the Arizona Room. I had never been in that room before, but I'd been in lots of places with ...

If you lived in Phoenix in the 1970s, '80s, and '90s, you saw a lot of Jerry Foster and his helicopter. Nowadays news helicopter pilots are nothing special, but Jerry was the first, and he did it in Phoenix, Arizona. I had lunch with him today, and while he was self-effacing and gracious, I knew that he was still a hotshot. To my surprise, Jerry hadn't realized how much of a local celebrity he was. People on TV news are, of course, in the public eye, but they seem to be pretty much interchangeable. Jerry was one-of-a-kind. I remember Jerry. Of course, when you meet a celebrity in real life, they tend to be not as tall as you had thought, and they're older. Maybe that's because we expect larger-than-life people to actually be ten feet tall, and to look the same way they looked thirty years ago. But in real life Jerry is every bit as dynamic as I'd imagined, and as for his age, he said it best in response to the statement "there are old pilots, and the...

I'm a believer in giving gifts. I haven't done a lot of it in my life, but it's always been important to me that when I give a gift, it's given "without let or hindrance", freely, to be used however the receiver desires. Absolutely no strings. The gift I've been giving away in cyberspace for several years is digital images, like the one at the top of this post. I'm delighted when people like them, and I do it because I can. Collecting old photos is my hobby, and I can give them away without losing anything myself - they're not paper, they're digital. I don't do it for money, because frankly there isn't enough money in the world for the amount of work I put into it. I do it because I enjoy the collection, and the gift is just the icing on the cake for me. Of course, not everyone agrees with what I'm doing. There are a lot of people who resent how someone might use a gift, whether it's displayed correctly, whether they gi...

My fascination with old photographs goes way back. I've always enjoyed old movies, old books, old photos. And what I wanted to do was to step into them in my imagination. A few years ago I started calling it "history adventuring" and mostly I did it on my computer. Then I started sharing these old photos on the web, and asking people to join me in my journey of imagination. And then, to my surprise, some people wanted to share this journey IRL (in real life). As a person with mobility issues because of a medical emergency I survived many years ago (please don't ask), going out into the "real world" is difficult for me. But I've been trying it lately, and I like it, and I would like to do more of it. I don't drive, but I can sight-see with the best of them. When I look out at the mountains surrounding Phoenix I see a time when they were protected by Apaches. I can see the Phoenix of Dwight and Maie Heard, when suburbia was only two miles from dow...

If you've ever driven in Tempe, Arizona, you know that the main road through town is Mill Avenue, and after you've gone past the campus of ASU, while Mill Avenue continues south, the main route curves to the east to become Apache Boulevard. The reason for this is that most people who are traveling south on Mill Avenue are crossing the river with the intention of continuing on to Mesa, Apache Junction, and all points east. Personally, I'm fascinated by any road in the Phoenix area that curves at all. The greater Phoenix area is mostly just a big flat expanse of desert, and whenever I see a road curve I wonder why? Back in Minneapolis, where I grew up, roads curved all of the time around lakes (there are a LOT of lakes in Minnesota, and several are right there in town), but in Phoenix unless a road is curving to go around a mountain, it makes me wonder. Of course, looking at the curve from the opposite direction shows the route people wanted to take if they were comi...

If you're a ghost hunter, you may want to look for the ghosts of Minnie Powers and William Belcher, alias "the Cockney" (because he was from London, England) in downtown Phoenix. The article at the top of this post, which is from 1899, is the first mention of ghosts in the house where Rose R. Gregory, known as Minnie Powers, was murdered by William Belcher, who then committed suicide. This house was a house of ill-repute, that is a place of prostitution, which at the time was just outside of the city limits of Phoenix, which was 7th Street. The sad ending of two lives in 1898, William Belcher and Minnie Powers (Rose Gregory). From the Library of Congress  https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn94051692/1898-09-24/ed-1/seq-1.pdf The exact address was 720 Railroad Avenue, which would be 720 E. Jackson Street, just east of where Chase Field is now, east of 7th Street and north of the railroad tracks, which are still there. Of course the old buildings are long ...