AJ, AZ - A Three-fer: 3 Museums in one day

Today we completed a trifecta, a hat trick, a triple, a three-fer or what ever else you might want to call it: we visited an archeological site, a museum and an arboretum. We even got our daily walk in. And, we were home for dinner. We began with the alarm at 6:30, a quicker than normal breakfast and an 7:45 start for the drive to Glove, AZ. Globe is east of Phoenix about 50 or so miles but there is an archeological site that is very good. We seem to have been specializing in archeology this trip so this fit right in with the program.

While Gary was shaving I made our lunch for the day, a peanut butter and jam sandwich on 12-grain bread. This is our usual since often we carry our lunch with us when we hike and pb&j is pretty durable. We also carry 2 protein/vitamin bars with us and today we had a honey crisp apple for each of us. For a change, today I also added lettuce to the sandwich. I thought I’d try that out and was pleasantly surprised. What a delightful addition. Not only healthy but it gave the sandwich a bit of texture. The next time I’ll add lettuce and some spinach sprigs. I probably should take some carrot sticks but they’ll be too heavy for hiking but great for a museum day.

So, for all of you who think we eat only ice cream and donuts, sometimes we intersperse these two with some healthy food, too. Actually, we had neither donuts nor ice cream today. But, it’s not for lack of trying. We tried to find the ice cream store in Globe but the door was locked, bolted and dark when we got there at 1:00, after lunch. The sign said 10 - 5 on Mondays but it was not to be.

Meanwhile back to our Globe adventure. We arrived Besh-Ba-Gowah, a 700-year old pueblo community where a Salado Indian community lived between 1225 - 1400 AD at 9:05. This community resembled many of the other pueblo style communities that we have visited this fall. There was an extremely thick, 4-5 stone wide, wall around the outside and the only way to get into the community itself was through a long covered corridor about 2 people wide with no windows along its length. Was all of this for fortification and protection? No one knows but we could see these construction techniques. In this picture it is not covered since much of the pueblo is in ruins but you can see what it looked like.

In places the buildings were 2 stories tall with most of the ground stories used for storage, the middle story for living and the roof for other activities. Back in the 30’s, much of the site was excavated as part of a government program to increase employment. When WWII came, the site was abandoned and much of the work was destroyed in the intervening years. There are some refurbished buildings around which we could walk. We could even ascend to the second story via a ladder and the Solado did.

As in most pueblo structures, there were very few doors since entry was generally through the roofs onto ladders which went to the lower stories. We did see two doors, however.

We walked around the grounds and imagined living here oh so many years ago. We were particularly impressed with this cactus. This is all one cactus - and one stud muffin.

Our next stop was the Gila County Historical Museum housed in the Globe-Miami (Mi-am-uh) Mine Rescue Station. The museum was divided into several rooms: Governor Hunt’s (1st Governor of Arizona and from Globe) Victorian bedroom, a print shop, a Native American room with some marvelous baskets,

an archive room and several other rooms with a myriad of displays showing early Globe.

Globe was built on mining and there are still several mines in the area. Here is a map showing the copper mines in Arizona. Note the cluster around Globe.

We have looked at the Globe-Miami area on Google and the most stunning site is the copper mine to the east of the road linking the two communities. It is mammoth. There was a picture of this mine from the air in the museum and I took a picture of this picture. Note the homes and streets in the lower left of the picture.

And, here’s an old washing machine. It consisted of a deep round tub with a metal bar at the bottom attached to a handle. To switsh the clothes through the soapy water, the ‘operator’ moved the handle back and forth. Note the rollers on the back of the machine. Pretty basic and time consuming but it got the job done.

Lunch outside the the museum at a picnic table, followed by a futile search for ice cream, then on to the Boyce Thompson Arboretum State Park. I’ve heard that this is a marvelous State Park but I’m not always excited about looking at plants. However, this park was exceptionally good. I wish we had gotten there earlier. We originally thought we’d visit Besh-Ba-Gowah in the morning and the Gila Museum in the afternoon but both took less time than we had thought so we had some extra time and were driving right past the Arboretum. So, here we are.

12,000 plants spread out over 392 acres. There was an Austrailian desert section, A South American section and a Sonoran and Chihauhuan desert region. Boyce Thompson was a copper magnate who had a few misgivings about what the copper industry was doing to the environment. A trip to impoverished Russia in 1917 with the Red Cross at the end of WWI convinced him that growing and using plants wisely could help feed the world. His interest in plants led him to establish this Arboretum.

We took the map but actually just wandered around the gardens. We were surprised that desert plants in Australia did not develop the spines for protection that the American desert cactus did. We did see this sign for one plant though.

Our question is how in the world did the Aborigines devise the system to make this plant edible? Who was the one who crushed and leached but forgot to roast? And, how long is ‘at length?’ What if you are one minute short?

Look at this planting of barrel cactus. Cute little things aren’t they? Look, but don’t touch.

Very interesting trees here. Here’s Mr. Big, a red gum eucalyptus,planted in 1926 which is now 8’ in diameter and 100’ tall. They typically put on 6’ - 10’ of growth when young and have large root systems.. These are not ideal for foundation plantings. The second tree is a Boojum tree from Baja California.

There were several trails that we could take through the arboretum and we meandered around. Beautiful plantings and informative explanations. Some of the trees were showing their fall splendor. And, I thought only northern climes had trees with leaves that changed color in the fall.

We thoroughly enjoyed the arboretum and are glad that we came. It certainly broadened our knowledge and appreciation about deserts throughout the world and the infinite variety of flora growing in each.