Through Our Parents' Eyes: History & Culture of Southern Arizona

R. Brooks Jeffery, an Associate Dean at the UA College of Architecture & Landscape Architecture, is presenting "Architectural Legacy: Islamic Influences in the American Southwest," on June 20th at 2:00 p.m., as part of Pima Community College's Discovering Southern Arizona series. This free lecture will be held at PCC's Community Campus, 401 Bonita Avenue.

Synopsis: "Evident in ornamentation, architectural forms and urban open spaces of the Spanish Colonial period, the influences of Islamic cultures are still present in the American Southwest."

Brooks is also coordinator of CALA's Preservation Studies and an expert on the architects and architecture of southern Arizona. He contributed the content to our website Josias Joesler: An Architectural Eclectic and to sections of Spanish Colonial Mission Church Revival Architecture: St. Philip's In the Foothills Church.He is an excellent speaker and his presentations always get rave reviews.

Tucson's 11th el Día de San Juan Fiesta is Tuesday, June 24th. Watch Jim Griffith's Arizona Illustrated segment explaining this southern Arizona tradition [MPEG4] of celebrating the beginning of the “season of monsoon rains.”

Tucson's 11th el Día de San Juan (St. John’s) Fiesta. All of our Tucson community is invited to attend this event:

Date: Tuesday, June 24
Time:5 pm until 10 pm
Location: West Congress St. at the Santa Cruz River (south side, west bank).

Here's something different. Casey, a web developer in the next cubicle over sent me a couple links that just really interesting to see. The first link is a Flickr page Magic Carpet Golf, Tucson AZ. The info for the page tell us that "This mini golf course closed after about 50 years in Tucson on Speedway Blvd. Members of the group Vanishing Tucson got permission to visit it one last time to photo document the statues before they are razed."

For those you who have not visited Flickr, it's a Web 2.0 site where you can host your pictures (images, actually). Without putting you not techies to sleep, it gained popularity in part due to letting the users define the keywords (tags) describing their images.

What I find so interesting, and is likely as interesting to anyone involved with Tucson history and culture is Vanishing Tucson. Seems it is a group of people dedicated to capturing Tucson landmarks before the wrecking ball reducing them to a memory. Check out the images on Flickr, read boingboing's "Flickr photoset of last days of Tucson minature golf course," and a backstory blog entry. Maybe you'll even want to post a comment.

Today is Cinco de Mayo. Watch Big Jim Griffith's Arizona Illustrated segment explaining the southern Arizona tradition with Cinco de Mayo [MP4 video]

I am very please to pass along plans for a new website within Through Our Parents' Eyes about Tucson's Barrio Anita. Last Tuesday I Barrio Anita resident, Ramon Olivas at Oury Park, to discuss developing a website about the Barrio Anita. Ramon has been involved in a number Barrio Anita projects, including the enormous mural that overlooks Oury Park. Ramon passed along two booklets from Barrio Anita projects that collected family histories and engaged area youth in learning more about their heritage. Ramon has two more booklets to share and is going to talk to others in the neighborhood about participating. What I'd like to do is collect digital stories like the two currently on Through Our Parents' Eyes. These tend to be about two minutes of audio that is paced with a family's photos.

Here is an update on a website about the Tucson Press Club that would include issues of The Hellbox mentioned in my March 24th entry.

While exploring ways to present The Hellbox issues in the context of Tucson's unique Tucson Press Club (TPC) I discovered that James. F. Cooper, a columnist for the Tucson Citizen decades ago had published, posthumously, a book about the TPC called The Bar Is Open: The history of Tucson Press Club, 1944-1991. Having a digital copy of this book would be a great addition to the planned website and would be a useful addition to TOPE's e-books section.

1960 cover The Hellbox Tucson Press Club

Thanks again to the Internet and the Web, we received ten of the Tucson Press Club's (TPC) annual The Hellbox. Hopefully, we'll be able to determine if there are any rights and permissions to pursue before creating a new website about the TPC and, in particular, these annuals.

The Hellbox issues were sent by Tyler St.Mark in California who wrote that his "parents, Marklan & Beverly Manning, were active members of the TPC during the 50's and early 60's and even appeared in some of the annual Gridiron Shows. My siblings and I grew up knowing many of the club's prominent members including "Uncle Jess" (Riggles)."

TPC ended in 1991, as far as I can tell. The Hellbox and its annual Gridiron show are unique to Tucson's 20th century history. We hope to bring it to the Web for students and community members to appreciate.

The third of Pima Community College's Discovering Southern Arizona community events is Friday, March 28th, 6:00 p.m. at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center. The topic is "Journeys Through Barrio Anita" and will feature the history and stories of Tucson's historic Barrio Anita. The event, of course, is free. For more information call 206-4500.

Tucson Chinese Cultural Center, 1288 West River Road. map.

This is nice to see from the Pima County Public Library. "A Walk to the Library"

Patricia Stephenson shared another interesting artifact with us yesterday. It is Louise Foucar's Tucson Street Railway stock certificate. You will see that she purchased 3 shares for $100. Certainly, a sizable investment for 1903 and one that would fit nicely with her plans to develop housing in the area. She purchased the shares in October 1903, the same month that the Santa Catalina Apartments were finished.

See both the front and back of the stock certificate, which is in excellent condition, on The University Neighborhood website's "A New Gate and a New Trolley, 1906" page.