Arizona republican., 1921-07-17


 Atherton Du Puy, was written for Henry Ford's Dearborn Independent, | and is reproduced by The Republi- l can with the special permission of MT. Du Puy. The writer is Salt River Valley boy and resided here until he grew to manhood. He has for many years been a resident of Washington, the proprietor of new syndicate and Is now associated with the Haskin service. The article in the Independent is freely illustrated) well remember the day of my first coming into the Wonder Valley. What boy of eight is not wide eyed with expectancy at every turn of the road when first he ventures from the place of his birth and the reel of the world begins for him the unwinding of even its commonplace scenes?
 This, however, was an experience to be remembered though viewed from the middle point of an active life. The time was 1884 and the place an oasis born of water in the heart oe the desert of the great Southwest. Conceive, if you will, barren stretches west from San An tonia .as great as the distance be- tween New York and Birmingham.
 
 sand and gray sagebrush plain. east from Los Angeles as far as it is from Chicago to Kansas City Now pie ture the pioneer and his family drawn by the lure of the unknown. respond ing to the instinct to fill up the empty spaces of the world, vaguely pursuing fortunes rainbow, lost in this in finity-
 So. as a small boy. I saw the Won der Valley in the beginning Geroni- mo. last of the warlike Indian chiefs, was still at large. taking his merci- less toll of settlers blood. Army posts dotted the waste places of the South west. Plain. patient, everyday men and women from Michigan and Miss issippi. from Missouri and Maryland, were feeling the urge of the pioneer, were facing unknown difficulties armed only with their racial re- sourcefullness. were planting the germ of civilization along the border.
 The Southern Pacific Railroad company had but lately completed the titanic and empire building task of welding two strips of steel across this waste of plain and desert. Even earlier the army and the pioneer had linked one water hole with another until the trail wound westward with
 
 camping place where men, bound for California by this southern roule might satiate their thirst. It became a station on the railroad and now Phoenix, in Salt River Valley, SC miles away, was springing into life. We came to Maricopa after much travel in day coaehes-father. moth CT, sister and I-bound for the new land of hope. We rocked that 8 miles in an old Concord stage jus like those in the wild west shows cowboy driven, prospectorl laden = and arrived at the baby town of ths desert. A one-story adobe house built in a hollow square, Mexican fashion, was the hotel that harboret these dauntless optimists upon theii arrival Similar adobe houses lineC | a street a quarter of a mile long Beyond was the sagebrush. But beside the intersecting streets l were little ditches and down each O these sparkled crystal-clear ware | from the little canal above the town | And upon their banks grew verdan I cottonwood trees and below the towl l they spread out upon the fields tha were green with alfalfa. forage crol | of the Spanish padres, then unknown to Americans except in the South west and later destined to becom | the far-flung and favorite hay cro of a nation. In this running wate lay the promise of a miracle that wa to come In it. Darrell Duppa. vag rant scholar working as commo laborer, had seen the possibilities o | the future, had yisualiZed the com | munity that was to be. built here O the ruins of a prehistoric civilization l and had named it Phoenix.
 Beneath this diversion ditch. whic boasted no security beyond that of
 brush dam across the river and hea gate built in sand, my father settle on a tract of sagebrush land. Tn farmhouse was adobe built and con sisted of two rooms, with brus shed between. The roof was of dil as was the floor until we later GOV cred it with gunny sacks. The gree
 of our alfalfa fields was the onl break in the gray of the sagebrus plains.
 The third day after we were ir stalled, we were gathered about th
 family table for the monday me;
 when a weird thing happened. M
 timid little mother raised her eyes {
 the window opposite and, behold,
 was a frame for the faces of a doze naked Indians. Following her fright
 ened gaze We saw these and othel
 at other windows solemnly observir
 us. In the doorway a stately buc l clad only in a breechclout, stood wit