Central Arizona

The Fred Harvey company operated its exceptional chain of restaurants and hotels along the Santa Fe Railway from 1876 through the 1960s. Among its many innovations was the employment of “Harvey Girl” waitresses: single women who chose to leave their families and adhere to strict lifestyle restrictions for the opportunity to work at respectable jobs. […]

Early traders traveled through Arizona Territory, selling goods from their wagons, but they soon built stores that evolved into trading and social centers where wool, sheep, and NaEarly traders traveled through Arizona Territory, selling goods from their wagons, but they soon built stores that evolved into trading and social centers where wool, sheep, and Native […]

Join DeBarbieri for a lively overview of motion picture history in Arizona from 1896 to present day. Discuss the silver screen magic of the West through stories, film clips and stills of the people, places and scenes of Hollywood in Arizona. Journey to significant sites in Arizona’s movie history near and far and go behind the scenes with classic Westerns, musicals, Indie flicks and […]

This presentation is based on the stories of five women from the Casa Grande Valley towns (Eloy, Randolph, Coolidge, Casa Grande, and the Gila Reservation) who, despite their busy and oppressive lives of work, family, poor housing, etc., managed to become politicized, self-educated activists. They rebuilt their lives and created lively communities even after "the […]

During WWII a select group of young Navajo men enlisted in the Marines with a unique weapon.  Using the Navajo language, they devised a secret code that the enemy never deciphered.  For over 40 years a cloak of secrecy hung over the Code Talker’s service until the code was declassified and they were finally honored […]

The great West that George Bird Grinnell first encountered in 1870 as a 21-year-old man was shortly to disappear before his eyes.  Nobody was quicker to sense the desecration or was more eloquent in crusading against the poachers, the hide-hunters, and the disengaged U.S. Congress than George Bird Grinnell, the “Father of American Conservation.”  Grinnell […]

Charles Lindbergh is best known for his famous 1927 flight across the Atlantic Ocean.  But few realize that Lindbergh and his wife, Anne, played a brief but important role in archaeology.  In 1929 they teamed up with noted archaeologist Alfred Kidder to conduct an unprecedented aerial photographic survey of Southwest prehistoric sites and geologic features […]