Widescreen wonders: Arizona’s 100 years of statehood

The Grand Canyon State celebrates its centenary this week, but the cinematic drama of its iconic landscapes has a timeless appeal for travelers.

Arizona has more National Parks & Monuments then any other state in the union. In a few days we will be celebrating our 100 centennial. Hopefully, our recent negative international image will be put behind us and like a Phoenix - we will rise again. 

Leonardo

www.AcrossArizonaTours.com

 

Chris Leadbeater

Friday, 10 February 2012

The Arizona Capitol knows its place in the world. Poised 17 blocks west of downtown Phoenix, it might be an extra from a cowboy film. Just outside its main entrance, a huge cactus – 15ft high, torso a muscular green – lifts arms in salute. And the building seems to respond, nodding back via a dome that, unlike those of its colleagues in New England, with their sleek marble masonry, is forged of copper – a metal that has long been cut from the ground of this rugged region. The only way to make the structure look any more in tune with the American West would be to drop a giant stetson on to its gleaming head.

And yet, if the Capitol could have made a sound on 14 February 1912, it would not have been a horseback holler. It would have been the soft click of a piece fitting into a jigsaw. Because it was on that day that Arizona settled into the groove as an official part of the USA – the 48th state, and the last nugget of the contiguous America to arrive at the party...

http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/americas/widescreen-wonders-arizonas-100-years-of-statehood-6699989.html?printService=print