Places/People/Progress: RIDE THE WEST - HORSE PACK TRIP ADVENTURES IN SOUTHERN ARIZONA

Let's put those three categories in perspective: the places have been here for centuries, people live on the land and progress is made respecting all three for creating a future legacy.
Some more details will be added later, but you might like to see that when you look at the website http://www.ridethewest.com/index.html,
the same person featured in an earlier posting here on a horse called "Howdy" is one of the partners offering packtrips into the big landscapes here.
For those who might get "saddle shy" overnight accommodations are affiliated with two distinct properties, The Esplendor Resort in Rio Rico www.esplendor_resort.com and Hacienda Corona de Guevavi www.haciendacorona.com in Nogales.
Rides are scheduled on Ride The West's event calendar on their website.
Happy Trails



RIDE THE WEST - HORSE PACK TRIP ADVENTURES IN SOUTHERN ARIZONA

Places, People & Progress: Challenge to Uncovering History

"As Time Goes By . . ."
Look closely, dear readers, at this recent digital image April 2009 taken from the Smelter Alley side of this property located at the intersection of McKeown & 3rd Avenues. WHAT do you see?

Really now, WHAT DO YOU SEE?

This is what residents of Patagonia look at either walking or driving by frequently year-in and year-out --and at the same time what visitors see when they come here: Junk? Overgrown backyard?

What's in there?

These are questions asked to me by visitors when I walked them around the streets of Patagonia.

Some remarked after coming here for many years that certain parts of the town were badly-neglected and had fallen into disrepair and what a sad-and-sorry reflection of the community it was to have this "just happen" . . .

Whose watch did it happen on? . . . or was no one watching at all? Or not caring? Or not, What?

Happily, that's not the case:
Last year some individuals - Ted Piper and Phil Ostrum among them -decided to do something.
They formed Patagonia Green Partnership.
Today you can see the work-in-progress at the same place that used to be at various times in Patagonia's history The Corbett Lumber Company and The Little Depot.
Soon to have an opening is a new business for the new lifeways here: Pilates of Patagonia . . . now that's what I call progress

Wayfinding & Landmark Snarfing

Image featured is an equipment van for the Adventure Cycling Association - a group with headquarters in Seattle, Washington - from an overnight stay here a couple of weeks ago in the public park area dedicated to Dr. Delmar Mock for his 37 years of service to the community on a plaque on a stone historic marker at the west entrance to town. They planned their stop here last November asking for a permit for overnight camping from the town clerk Randy Heiss at that time ...new lifeways making use of one Patagonia's many resources. They found their way here . . .
Readers might ask about our Patagonia Heritage Tile Mural Project funded by a grant from the Arizona Office of Tourism Rural Tourism Development Grant Program "So why do we need to work together to develop the opportunities for increasing visitations and tourism here in Patagonia?"
Who benefits directly and indirectly?
Can we afford not to plan for smart and intelligent growth?
Why do visitors want to come here?
Why do we live here? How did you or your family find their way here?
What legacy do we want to create for future generations?
Do we have a sense of pride in the places that are here?
...or is it a matter of "benign neglect"? or wanting to keep Patagonia "a hidden paradise"?

While hosting travelers wanting information who come into the Patagonia-Mountain Empire Visitor Information Center - they WANT TO KNOW locations and directions and find their way to our regional attractions and services available in the communities. Show and tell me what's great about Patagonia ...How do I get to the lake? Where do I find the birds? Where can I go hiking? Where can I stay? What's there to do? Where can I eat? Is there a bank? Where's the library? Where's "a hot zone" for internet access? Is there a notary public in town? How do I get to "The Ghost Towns"? Where can I camp? Where can I bring my horses? Where can I buy stamps/mail a letter?
They still ask about The Museum of The Horse, even though it moved out of town more 20 years ago!
What's surprising to me is that people who have lived as close as Tucson - about one hour away! - for 8, 10 or 20 years have never taken the time before to travel here [lack of regional exposure and marketing], while travelers from as far away as China,Russia, France, Spain, Germany, England, Bulgaria and South Africa do find their reasons to visit here!
The Heritage Tile Mural Project is a primary wayfinding source of information that showcases our community and region, points of interest and attraction, activities and natural resources, visitor services, and encourages landmark restoration and community development in the process.

The link below is to an organization called Historical Marker Database.
Go to it and check if you see anything at all in Patagonia ... -
http://www.hmdb.org/Results.asp?State=Arizona

Likewise --- and this is a somewhat of a surprise - there are major omissions in a map of milestones here in Arizona: go see for yourself
http://www.azpbs.org/arizonastories/milestones.php

People, Progress & Places in One Legacy Marker

 
To give you an idea of a research target for our Patagonia Heritage Tile Mural Project 2009 take a look at this historical marker for The Mowry Mine.
You'll note that the infamous Sylvester Mowry didn't appear on the scene here until 1859 although his name somehow got attached permanently to this mine that had been worked for centuries before by native labor and Mexicans. So-called "Anglos" wrote that history apparently and dominate our interpretation of what has come before. Mr. Mowry was a Confederate sympathizer during the American Civil War; he was imprisoned for being on the wrong side of that conflict.

The weather-beaten marker is mounted on a locally-quarried fragment of granite in the center of town at the intersection of Naugle & Third Avenue.

Certain facts in the progression of history are better represented than others, leaving gaps in a balanced legacy:

"Worked by NATIVE LABOR" ... We had "natives" here in Patagonia? Did we forget?

"under the direction of Jesuits" . . . Yes, it appears the Black-Robes did more than convert the natives to Christianity

"Later by Mexicans" . . . yes, but how about some more details? . . . and for how long before The Gadsden Purchase in 1853-54?

"Nearby Ghost Towns and Cemetery are reminders of frequent Indian raids" . . . You mean the mines went out of business due to attacks by Indians? HUH? and local residents couldn't defend their lives and properties against raids?
Reminders - for the purposes of accurate local history - should also include the Boom-to-Bust cycles of mining companies and external events outside Arizona.


Who's buried in the local cemetery who was killed by the Indians? Can that be verified? Where are the records and archives located?

And Patagonia was called "a sleepy town"???? . . . Somebody got that all wrong!
And, it appears just by the notations on this legacy marker, that it was never "a hidden paradise"...Not then and not now.

Please join the local working group for the Arizona Centennial Heritage Project - we've got a lot to do

PATAGONIA: The Sense of Place

Here'a legacy image that someone chose to record for future generations highlighting the precipitation, population and elevation.
You can see the Patagonia Drug Company building in the background with the train depot to the left.
Finest All The Year Climate in the U.S.

Somethings don't change, but some things do

If you have images that speak to future generations about the progress over the decades in Patagonia history, its people, or places of interest then and now, please send them along.

You can also drop into Mariposa Books & more, where the Visitor Information Center is located, between the hours of 10:00 a.m-5:00 p.m.

Patagonia History: PLACES & PEOPLE

Information Wanted

Having plowed through about fifteen books and research articles now, this business has not been notated anywhere so far

PATAGONIA SMOKE HOUSE

H.H. McCutchan, Prop

Other details somewhat fuzzy.

Can anyone help identify anyone in the group, or the possible occasion for taking the photographs?

Reclaiming Patagonia History: PEOPLE

CAPTAIN JAMES HENRY TEVIS

Arizona Pioneer and Confederate Soldier

??????????????????????????????????

What? you might ask ... sometimes historical truth is stranger than fiction, as your blogger would like to bring your attention.

Just one chapter in this man's life places him at Fort Buchanan, now wiped off the map but a military outpost before the Civil War about six miles northeast of Patagonia on the Scenic Patagonia-Sonoita Highway today.

You won't see it there now, but we'll plan to commemorate that milestone in local history in one of the proposed locations for the Heritage Tile Mural Project that your local working group is planning for the Arizona Centennial Heritage Project 2009 . . . bringing what's "hidden" in history echoing and thundering and silenced down the centuries here to reveal the people, places, and progress that bring us where we are today - where we want to go in the future and what legacy we want to leave for future generations.

If you join us and pitch in to uncover and reveal history, we'll get it "shovel-ready" - a paradise it's not, for sure.

A biography of Capt. James H. Trevis, titled "Arizona in the '50's", Revised Edition, edited by Betty Barr and Dr. William J. Kelly, published 2007 by BrockingJ Books is available at Mariposa Books & more ..., or you can contact the author for additional copies online http://www.brockinjbooks.com/

Reclaiming Patagonia History: Vintage Foto #4

Your blogger had just downloaded this foto from an archive of Judith Whitcomb's and no sooner had a print been made, in walks Margie Buyer to Patagonia-Mountain Empire Visitor Information Center to tell me some details: the cowboy on the horse is her son-in-law Dan Skiver, the horse's name is "Howdy", the image was captured at Poco Toro Ranch near Mowry (now "a deserted ghost town"), the fence - un cerco estacado - is made from the oak trees growing on the land constructed in a zig-zag pattern of "a Mexican" tradition, and the calves are an English breed called British White Parks . . . and there see you some of the research details triggered by memories of seeing just one image.
Notice, if you will, one of the calves of a different color and conformation . . . ???

Patagonia People: Vintage Foto #1

7 Dudes on the front porch of one of the town's seven saloons .
Today there is only one
while the Old Wagon Wheel gets some back-of-the-house refurbishing.
Can anybody say and prove Who's Who?
Holding the pose for history: so what's the story?

Places: THE SAN RAFAEL VALLEY: Headwaters of The Santa Cruz River

Images of acreage, purchased in 1999 from private owners, of some of the vast original land holdings in the San Rafael de Zanja land grant when Spain and Mexico assumed jurisdiction and title to the rich grasslands in the geophysical features creating the headwaters of The Santa Cruz River as we know it today.
The myth and popularity of Hollywood-style "cowboys" was created here, but it was preceded by the earlier traditons of Mexican "Vaqueros" and cattle-ranching centuries before.
Today certain private landowners are re-establishing A Life in Balance and a viable, sustainable working landscape that respects all that came before in the progress of time, keeping a sense of place, and looking back at the people who were players in the history of this great place that echoes, and thunders, down the centuries.

Reclaiming Patagonia History: Foto #2

Building on Sonoita Avenue . . . image taken about a week ago.

In comparing this with a photograph from 2005 by Robert Whitcomb - just a few years ago - a mesquite fence has been replaced with a wire one, and a gateway entrance removed.

This is a wider shot to show you the addition of a white picket fence, the installation of a satellite disk on the nearby house, and a trailer wedged under the overhang on that house.

This building, however, remains.

Mute testimony to Patagonia's past for now, but waiting for its story and history to be told.

Reclaiming Patagonia History: Foto #1

This building stands in silent testimony to days gone by . . . alone and white-washed in an unspoken or unwritten history that goes unnoticed today except for the fact that it remains - a remnant of the tapestry of lives lived and things forgotten across the advance of time, woven through the decades of people, progress and places here in Patagonia.
You've probably passed it by many times or perhaps not even noticed it at all.

What story and what history does this building want to reveal as it stands out in stark contrast in a back alley against an industrial backdrop with bars on a two-story high window?

Who knows?
Why was this structure built?
What was done here?
How did it look before? Way back . . . When?