Arizona Books

Richard Maurer's new book chronicles Powell's second expedition through the eyes, words, and illustrations of Fred Dellenbaugh - a 17-year-old boy from Buffalo, NY who, along with some rowing experience on the turbulent Niagara River and a facility for drawing, had the gumption to make his dream come true. This story is very well written and quite compelling and will appeal to those who love adventure stories set in the Old West. The photographs and illustrations are remarkable. My hats off to the author!

I read Dellenbaugh's reprinted "Canyon Voyage" (the much abbreviated title) as a young man in the flatlands of western Kansas in the 1960's. The romance of the period of Dellenbaugh's youth, and the Powell Expeditions in particular (1869-72), stimulated in me an ongoing interest in the history of the region. I have read the edited and published diaries of most of the participants of the two expeditions, and continue to invest in an array of scholarly and coffee table books that even remotely address the subject. My annual crossings of the Colorado and Dirty Devil rivers to pursue research interests in southeastern Utah never fail to regenerate my own wish to have participated in such an epic adventure. Thus, when I saw the notice of publication of Maurer's book about Dellenbaugh on the second Powell expedition, with the expression in the title "the true adventures," I was expecting something on the order of D.D. Fowler's book about Jack Hiller's, another expedition participant. That is, a pretty serious biography of the man and a pretty faithful reproduction of the daily diary kept during his time in the field. Well, it might be the former, but it is certainly not the latter. Unlike the other expeditioners who kept diaries, Dellenbaugh's original diary has never been published. Perhaps this is because his 1908 "Canyon Voyage" was a timeline-based (albeit compressed) narrative and researchers may have believed there was nothing more of value in the original diary. While Maurer read the diaries of all the participants, including Dellenbaugh's, as well as Dellenbaugh's "Canyon Voyage" and the earlier "Romance of the Colorado River," Maurer's timeline is even more compressed than Dellenbaugh's. Consequently the book lacks the rich detail of Dellenbaugh's diary and earlier publications. For example, unlike the present book, the consecutive daily diary entries of "Looked for the Major today but of course he did not come; carried the rations over," "Looked for the Major again," and "Still waiting,"conveys a real sense of frustration at being in the same camp, on the bank of the Colorado, day after day, laying up under a boat to avoid the oppressive August heat, with nothing to do, waiting for the Major and Prof to come in so the party can continue the trip down the river through the Grand Canyon. Maurer acknowledged that in the writing of the book he "sometimes resorted to the methods of historical fiction to flesh out some of the stories" and that "footnotes would be out of place in a book like this." Thus despite having the best possible materials at hand from which to draw, this book was never intended as a scholarly work. In that context, the writing was a success. Maurer did locate some great historical photographs and drawings not published elsewhere, and that alone is an important contribution. More than that, though, the book was a really entertaining read. I can well imagine some person, like me once, never having heard of either Powell or Dellenbaugh, picking up the book and just marveling at what they did. And, interest aroused, they have an avocation.

I am a big fan of Ann Zwinger and of the Four Corners region. This book recreates the experience of walking through the canyons of southeastern Utah showing that despite surface similarities--each is unique and special. The book is enriched with her drawings of flowers and animals.

This is a book that took me almost a year to read because I made myself ration my intake like it was a private hoard of maple syrup or 100 year old brandy. I have visited Southeast Utah for years and this book captures the essence of the unique canyon country wilderness. It is an experience in the small and personal; the opposite of driving up to a view point, jumping out of your SUV, taking a picture and leaving.

For anyone who loves this country, this book is a return trip. For anyone who wonders how anyone could be interested preserving this "hot, dry, and dusty place," this may be the book that tells you.

In the early 1990s the Nature Conservancy purchased the Gray Ranch in the bootheel of New Mexico, the most ecologicially diverse area of the United States. I've always resented that the Conservancy resold the ranch to a private foundation and thus denied public access to a huge (321,000 acres) and spectacular wilderness. This book explains the factors leading to the sale and resale of the Gray Ranch. I now understand the Conservancy's motives -- but I still think the Gray Ranch should have been made accessible, at least on a limited basis, to a public hungry for wide-open spaces.

The owners of the Gray Ranch and a dozen other big ranchers make up the Malpai Borderlands Group in the high, wide, and lonesome country of southwestern New Mexico and adjacent Arizona. The ranchers have put their land in conservation easements to protect it from one of the worst environmental threats to the West: sub-division of big ranches into five acre ranchettes. The Malpai ranchers are also in the forefront of developing new and improved practices of managing rangeland. All in all, they're a damned good bunch of people. I would hope that their dedication to preserving open space would spread, especially to the ranches just across the border in Mexico.

Not mentioned in this book is another huge threat to the environment along the border: the proposed Wall to keep out illegal aliens which will also inhibit the movement of jaguars, ocelots, antelope, deer, and a host of other creatures who need to pass back and forth over the border in search of water and food.

"Working Wilderness" features wonderful photographs -- alas, not all of them labeled -- and an informative text about the Malpai Borderlands and the people who live and work there. There are sections about preserving, endangered species, the use of fire as a management tool, profiles of ranchers and conservationists, and a message that cooperation is possible between cowboys and environmentalists to preserve the greatest asset of the Western United States: open space and room to breathe.

Smallchief

WORKING WILDERNESS: THE MALPAI BORDERLANDS GROUP AND THE FUTURE OF THE WESTERN RANGE may sound so specialized that one would think it limited only to college-level regional holdings - but it's not. The Western range covers the extent of America's western landscape and its history reveals it's one of the most fiercely contested areas in the country when it comes to land management issues. Private lands have lately been changing to residential development, further involving political and social issues conflicts, which are chronicled in WORKING WILDERNESS. Here geography professor Nathan Sayre examines the alliances that have worked to preserve the open range, The Malpai Borderlands Group, and provides an unusual expose of their efforts.

This is a fabulous book for any F>L>W> collecter. It has many black and white photos which add a nostalgic feel to the book. This is the first book of many I own about Wright to show the beautiful Gertrude and Rose Pauson House. It burned to the ground. I only wish he'd put more in the book, since he did a story for a magazine about the home. This is a Must Have!!!

This is a fabulous book for any F>L>W> collecter. It has many black and white photos which add a nostalgic feel to the book. This is the first book of many I own about Wright to show the beautiful Gertrude and Rose Pauson House. It burned to the ground. I only wish he'd put more in the book, since he did a story for a magazine about the home. This is a Must Have!!!

Misconceptions about the Yaqui (Yoeme) people are widespread because the New Age movement has turned them into gurus. Carlos Castañeda has surely put this tribe on the map, but not in a way the Yaquis might have liked to see it. The one book which has been written from a Yaqui point of view (`Yaqui Deer Songs' by Felipe S. Molina) offers us a glimpse into a world which is, in many ways, very different from ours. You can read about the sacred deer and its meaning to the Yaquis, but I guess you have to be a Yaqui to grasp its full meaning. I would recommend this book to anyone who is truly interested in the world view of the Yaqui people.

The lyrics of the Yaqui Deer Songs are magical, moving poetry both in English translations and in the liquid sounds of the Yaqui originals. This book gives a sense of the true flavor of Yaqui culture and spirituality.

XAMonline has done it again! Their customized approach to these manuals ensures that you know just what you need for your state's exam. When you have finished studying, take the sample exam and see how you did. You will find it is a great preparation tool.

Fully revised by educators with more than twenty years of experience. This practical, well-researched study guide provides up-to-date current standards and information specifically assessed on the PLACE Reading 18,43. This study guide is sure to provide you with enough information to be very well prepared for the test and yet still be used as a reference throughout your teaching career. This product ships fast! If you like this book, you might also be interested in PLACE: English: High School (Place Series).

I was first introduced to the flower essences of this book when I attended a meeting where the author was presenting her work. Not only did I walk away with a bag full of essences to start my own personal practice, but more importantly, with a sense of peace and gentle harmony with desert nature that Cynthia Athina Kemp Scherer not only teaches, but lives.

Her book starts off with a brief, but potent, history of her own background and how she began making desert essences in the first place. The bulk of the book focuses on all the individual essences, including composite formulas as well as ones she is currently researching (seems essence producers research them for YEARS, before pulling them out of that category!) At the beginning of each essence, she lists the "Harmonizing Qualities" and "Patterns of Imbalance" she's found to be associated with that particular flower. At the end of each entry, she lists several statements under the heading, "Indicated When:" For example, under "Desert Holly", it is indicated when: "I am afraid I will appear to be unloving. I feel obligated to love a certain person. I want to love more fully and freely. I feel blockages in my heart and am trying to work at removing them." She also lists if it is a component of a composite formula as well.

One section I found particularly helpful was the Cross Reference. Here she lists various "states of harmony and disharmony" then corresponds each to the flower essence(s) that would be most helpful for either enhancing or dissipating that quality.

Needless to say, my copy is already looking quite dog-eared and worn (after only 2 weeks!) But I wouldn't have it any other way. If you feel drawn to flower essences and especially to the incredible survival power and wonderfully adaptive nature of the not-so-dead desert arena, this book is a MUST-HAVE. Highly recommended.

I found myself devouring each word and picture in this book while flying home from Madrid to my home, Tucson, Arizona, recently. It is beautifully written and eye-openingly informative for any reader. The descriptions are also accurate, about which I can attest as an active inhabitant of this fronterra, living in nearby Tucson and often working in Nogales areas. The pictures (a big difference from photographs) draw you into the experience of the subject in tender ways, while also being technically excellent quality. This is perhaps the best writing and photography to date by the increasingly infamous Hickey-Taylor team. bravo!!
Kathleen Williamson, J.D., Ph.D, CD - prose and song writer, musician, anthropologist, lawyer, etc.,

Written one of the best researchers of Western history, this chronicle of one of the little-known robberies in Arizona history gets more engrossing chapter by chapter. Major Wham escorted an army payroll horseback train that was robbed by locals in southeast Arizona. The locals who were charged were Mormons in an area thick with the LDS, and the region in general was resentful toward the federal government. Local politics and the religious overtones make this a great read.