Phoenix-Scottsdale · USA

Overview

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The Valley of the Sun, a term synonymous with metro Phoenix, is named for its 325-plus days of sunshine each year. The Valley marks the northern tip of the Sonoran Desert, a prehistoric seabed that reaches from northwestern Mexico with a landscape offering much more than cacti.

Palo verde and mesquite trees, creosote bushes, palms, and aloe dot the land, which is accustomed to being scorched by temperatures in excess of 100°F for weeks at a time. Late summer brings precious rain when monsoon storms illuminate the sky with lightning shows and the desert exudes the scent of creosote. Spring sets the Valley blooming, from giant saguaros crowned in white flowers to masses of vibrant wildflowers dotting desert crevices and mountain landscapes.

As the Hohokam discovered 2,300 years ago, the miracle of water in the desert can be augmented by human hands. Having migrated from northwestern Mexico, they cultivated cotton, corn, and beans in tilled, rowed, and irrigated fields for about 1,700 years, establishing more than 300 mi of canals -- an engineering miracle, particularly when you consider the limited technology available. The Hohokam, whose name comes from the Piman word for "people who have gone before," constructed a great town upon whose ruins modern Phoenix is built, and then vanished. Drought, long winters, and other causes are suggested for their disappearance.

From the time the Hohokam left until the Civil War, the once fertile Salt River valley lay forgotten, used only by occasional small bands of Pima and Maricopa Indians. Then, in 1865, the U.S. Army established Fort McDowell in the mountains to the east, where the Verde River flows into the Salt River. To feed the men and the horses stationed there, a former Confederate Army officer reopened the Hohokam canals in 1867. Within a year, fields bright with barley and pumpkins earned the area the name Pumpkinville. By 1870, the 300 residents had decided that their new city would arise from the ancient Hohokam ruins, just as the mythical phoenix rose from its own ashes.

Phoenix would rise indeed. Within 20 years, it had become large enough -- its population was about 3,000 -- to wrest the title of territorial capital from Prescott. By 1912, when Arizona was admitted as the 48th state, the area, irrigated by the brand-new Roosevelt Dam and Salt River Project, had a burgeoning cotton industry. Copper and cattle were mined and raised elsewhere but were banked and traded in Phoenix, and the cattle were slaughtered and packed here in the largest stockyards outside of Chicago.

The Valley is very much a work still in progress; for better or worse, Phoenix is changing, and so quickly that even longtime residents have a difficult time keeping up. Historians are quick to point out that never in the world's history has a metropolis grown from "nothing" to attain the status of Phoenix in such a short period of time.

But at the heart of all the bustle is a way of life that keeps its own pace: Phoenix is, after all, the world's largest small town -- where people dress informally and where the rugged, Old West spirit lives on despite the sprawling growth. If the heat can be overwhelming at noon on a summer day, at least it has the restorative effect of slowing things down to an enjoyable pace.