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I’m an Arizona native, and by the time I was twelve years old I had traveled through much of Arizona. My parents had a deep, abiding admiration for this state. When we took a driving trip, it was almost always on what are now the “back roads” of Arizona. But they were the main roads then, when it was not unusual to drive from Seligman through Prescott, Yarnell, and Wickenburg to get to Phoenix, which was then a bustling town.
Sam Hosler
My sister and I knew Peach Springs, Ash Fork, Pine, Payson, Oatman, Gila Bend, Benson, Morenci, Yuma and Gisela. I spent part of each summer at my grandparents’ home in Sedona and watched the movie westerns being filmed.
Once my parents fired up the blue Ford so we could drive through the brand-new tunnel in Queen Creek just a few days after it opened. I loved Arizona totally, from the San Francisco Peaks to the border station in Nogales, and I was privileged to twice see the beautiful Snake Dance of the Hopi people years before it was closed to the public. Each trip was historical and cultural, for my parents knew the events of the past and the richness of all Arizona’s peoples.
Each place was special in its own way. So, what do we have to offer that makes the towns of the Copper Basin special? What do we think is the heart and core of where we live? I know that for many of us the answer is friends and family and a sense of community. But I’m looking for other special things. For example, when friends or relatives come to town, what do you like to show them and what do you like to do? Do you go out into the desert? Do you go someplace to eat? Where do the photographs get taken? More than that, if you only had a minute to tell a stranger about the town, what would you tell him or her that would make them want to visit?
Kearny’s town library is a hopping place. Last year a bunch of volunteers gave it a new, brightly-colored exterior (based on the original mural painted by the late Abbie McDougall). New desert plants grace the front. The library is a “must visit” for hikers on the Arizona Trail, who make use of the free wi-fi connection to the outside world. The library is also a WorkForce connection site, with computers and software to assist people looking for work. More recently the old teen center building behind the library was cleaned up and brightly painted by people from ASARCO and other volunteers, and has served through the summer as the base station for the library’s summer youth and reading program.
Maybe this doesn’t qualify it as a tourist site, but it does show what can happen when good people get a vision and work on it.
What would it take to get more visitors to come see us and eat in our restaurants, shop in our markets, and spend time in the glorious desert? A vision for attracting families, winter residents, and tourists to the Copper Basin should, I think, be rooted in what makes us want to live here in the first place. Let’s take what we have and make it even better, for the benefit of all.
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