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Arizona in Context

Despite the searing summer temperatures, the desolate deserts, and the lack of water, people have been drawn to Arizona for hundreds of years. In the 16th century, the Spanish came looking for gold, but settled on saving souls. In the 19th century, despite frightful tales of spiny cactus forests, ranchers drove their cattle into the region and discovered that a few corners of the state actually had lush grasslands. At the same time, sidetracked forty-niners were scouring the hills for gold (and found more than the Spanish did). However, boomtowns—both cattle and mining—soon went bust. Despite occasional big strikes, mining didn’t prove itself until the early 20th century, and even then, the mother lode was neither gold nor silver, but copper, which Arizona has in such abundance that it is known as the Copper State.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Arizona struck a new source of gold: sunshine. The railroads had made travel to the state easy, and word of the mild winter climate spread to colder corners of the nation. Among the first “vacationers” were people suffering from tuberculosis. These “lungers,” as they were known, rested and recuperated in the dry desert air. It didn’t take long for the perfectly healthy to realize that they, too, could avail themselves of Arizona’s sunshine, and wintering in the desert soon became fashionable with wealthy Northerners.

Arizona Today

Today, the golden sun still lures people to Arizona; Scottsdale, Phoenix, Tucson, and Sedona are home to some of the most luxurious resorts in the country. Then there are those who come to Arizona on vacation and decide to make the move permanent, or at least semi-permanent. In the past half-century, the state has seen a massive influx of retirees, some of whom stay year-round in the pockets of Arizona where the climate is perfect year-round, and many thousands of others—the “snowbirds”—who leave the cold winters back east for 3 or 4 months in the state’s sunshine.