EDITOR'S LETTER

editor's LETTER THIS ONE WAS EASY.

As soon as our logo was dropped on the image, we knew we had a cover. It's not always so easy. Sometimes, we'll scroll through dozens of photographs. Sometimes, more. It's a screening I get to attend every month with the "Balcony Muppets." On the masthead, they're Jeff Kida and Keith Whitney, but around the office, they're Statler and Waldorf, the cantankerous old men who heckled every performer on The Muppet Show.

I can't remember how they got the name they're not at all grumpy. I think it's the tandem nature of their relationship. They're always together. They make layouts together. They eat together. And they queue up our covers together. When they do, I get to join in. It's something I look forward to, even though Keith's office looks like the aftermath of Woodstock, and there's nowhere to sit. But in that moment, I get to be with them in the balcony. Just the three of us, hovering over Keith's computer, like schoolboys in a treehouse studying a transistor radio. Or a corncob pipe.

This time around, we didn't hover for long. That cover shot was a quick decision. We liked the light on the rocks and the clouds in the sky. And the chollas. It's reminiscent of our July 1935 cover, which is the first time we featured the Superstitions up front. A few years later, we published our first portfolio of those mountains. It was a small collection of blackand-whites by Barry Goldwater. They accompanied an essay by Raymond Carlson.

"The Superstitions," he wrote, "rugged and mysterious... lonely landmark for travelers of yesterday, their weary ponies and creaking wagon trains crossing the tired stillness of the trackless desert below a monument of grim beauty watching over the Valley of the Sun wearing its halo of legend as regally as the diadem of dark clouds that comes on the winds of storm."

The words outperformed the photographs, but the images were enough to catch the eye of Jack Lawton, the location manager for Universal Pictures in Hollywood. He sent us a letter.

"It may interest you and your many readers to learn that Arizona Highways is playing a strategic part both in the physical creation and the inspiration behind a motion picture production.

tion that we confidently feel will be one of the outstanding feature films of the current year. Specifically, I refer to the particular issue of March 1940, which dealt pictorially and editorially with the Superstition Mountains. It so happened that Producer-Director Gregory La Cava, preparing to make Lady in a Jam at Universal Studios, was seeking an extraordinary background for the picture. He suggested that Arizona might provide that scenic interest.

"Poring through my files I brought forth the Arizona Highways issue referred to. Mr. La Cava became enthusiastic at once, and at his insistence, we made a personal tour of the Superstition Mountains. Suffice it to say that we found it an ideal location. Further, Mr. La Cava, inspired by the pictorial beauty of the area and by its fabulous historical background, immediately began elaborations of his story to make further capital of the Superstition Mountains' extraordinary treasures.

"Thus, instead of the Superstition Mountains figuring incidentally in possibly a few days' production, it has now become the vital and elaborated background of the story of Lady in a Jam. And Mr. La Cava and his company, which includes Irene Dunne, Patric Knowles, Ralph Bellamy and scores of others, are at this writing - spending not one but six weeks there making the Universal picture. I might add that we have found the weather conditions - always a vital matter in making motion pictures - ideal and wholly in keeping with Arizona Highways' promises."

The movie, which is about a scatterbrained heiress from New York City who travels west to find gold in her grandfather's abandoned mine, is preserved in the Library of Congress. Unfortunately, it isn't on Apple TV+ or Netflix, so I can't tell you what I think. The critical reviews, however, weren't so hot. "It's a farce without mirth, a screwball comedy with the pace of a slug," said Bosley Crowther of The New York Times. Damaging words from one of the era's most powerful and respected film critics. Even worse than the heckling of Statler and Waldorf. At least the setting was extraordinary. They were right about that.

TOM DOLLAR: 1933-2022

It is with great sadness and regret that I report the loss of another longtime contributor. Tom Dollar, whose history with this magazine is many chapters deep, died on March 4 at the age of 89. Ironically, he suffered from the same rare disease - idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis - as his good friend, photographer Jack Dykinga. "He'd been fighting it for quite a while," Jack says, "but this disease goes in only one direction." In addition to so many wonderful adventure stories, he also authored two books for us: Indian Country: A Guide to Northeastern Arizona and Tucson to Tombstone: A Guide to Southeastern Arizona."

"The first time I visited Tom in Tucson," says Charlie Dee, a close friend, "he took me for a hike in Sabino Canyon. 'This is where I belong,' he said. 'In these canyons, these deserts. I just know that I'm supposed to be here." That connection came through in his writing. "My grandfather was an interesting man," says his granddaughter, Liz Dollar, "and he truly loved what he did. I always enjoyed getting Arizona Highways and reading his articles." On behalf of everyone at Arizona Highways, I offer our deepest condolences to the friends and family of our talented writer. His contribution cannot be overstated.