John Ford Archives - Traveling Archive https://travelingboy.com/travel/tag/john-ford/ Traveling Adventures Fri, 19 May 2023 17:25:49 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.2 https://travelingboy.com/travel/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cropped-TBoyIcon-32x32.jpg John Ford Archives - Traveling Archive https://travelingboy.com/travel/tag/john-ford/ 32 32 Traveling Boy Selects the 75 Greatest Film Directors of All-Time https://travelingboy.com/travel/75-greatest-film-directors/ https://travelingboy.com/travel/75-greatest-film-directors/#comments Thu, 09 Feb 2023 18:00:35 +0000 https://travelingboy.com/travel/?p=33849 Since the release of Sight & Sound magazine’s 2022 Top 100 Greatest Films of All Time critics poll, some of us agreed, others were appalled; in particular with the absence of masterworks by Luis Buñuel, Ernst Lubitsch and Howard Hawks. But the positive is that it opens pathways for lists by other cineastes which keeps the importance of …

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]]> Since the release of Sight & Sound magazine’s 2022 Top 100 Greatest Films of All Time critics poll, some of us agreed, others were appalled; in particular with the absence of masterworks by Luis Buñuel, Ernst Lubitsch and Howard Hawks. But the positive is that it opens pathways for lists by other cineastes which keeps the importance of cinema on the front burner. There were twice as many new pundits in the Sight & Sound poll from the last decades poll in 2012, where many stressed the importance of literary content over form. I’m a bit old school on that, remembering the medium is the message, a phrase coined by the Canadian communication theorist Marshall McLuhan in his Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. Is it content over form, or is it form over content; or should the two really be the same in the visual frame?  No doubt, you’ll notice I approach film within the context of the auteur theory. It’s hard not to do so, where each of the 75 directors have a personal signature and vision that’s evident from film to film. Yes, some are a product of the Hollywood studio system, simply given a script to shoot. Yet, like a painter who is assigned to do a portraiture, the content of their painting is well-defined, but they still are able to convey their own unique style, a style that belongs to them alone.

Here’s my list, and I encourage you to assault, disagree or perhaps even agree, and send in your own list in our readers’ section at ad***@tr**********.com . What is most important is to keep a dialogue going about cinema as a visual medium for artistic expression where it takes its place among other art forms.

1. Robert Bresson

Robert Bresson, France, (1901-1999). Photograph courtesy of Senses of Cinema.

The point is not to direct someone, but to direct oneself. When a sound can replace an image, cut the image or neutralize it. The ear goes more towards the within, the eye towards the other. – Robert Bresson

Bresson Films for Review:

 2. Yasujirō Ozu

Yasujirō Ozu, Japan, (1903 –1963). Photograph courtesy of the Nippon Communications Foundation.

I have formulated my own directing style in my head, proceeding without any unnecessary imitation of others. I can make fried tofu, boiled tofu, stuffed tofu. Cutlets and other fancy stuff, that’s for other directors. – Yasujirō Ozu

Ozu Films for Review:

3. Alfred Hitchcock

Alfred Hitchcock, England-US, (1899 – 1980).

If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on. – Alfred Hitchcock

Hitchcock Films for Review:

4. Jean-Luc Godard 

Jean-Luc Godard, France-Switzerland, (1930 – 2022). [Photo via MaxPPP]

If you want to make a documentary you should automatically go to the fiction, and if you want to nourish your fiction you have to come back to reality. – Jean-Luc Godard

 Godard Films for Review:

5. Roberto  Rossellini 

Roberto Rossellini, Italy-France, (1906 – 1977).

I want you to know how deeply I wish to translate those ideas into images, just to quiet down the turmoil of my brain. – Roberto Rossellini

Rossellini Films for Review:

6. Orson Welles 

Orson Welles, US-International, (1915 – 1985).

A film is never really good unless the camera is an eye in the head of a poet. – Orson Welles

Welles Films for Review:

7. Ernst Lubitsch  

Ernst Lubitsch, US, (1892 –1947).

There are a thousand ways to point a camera, but really only one. I let the audience use their imaginations. Can I help it if they misconstrue my suggestions? – Ernst Lubitsch

Lubitsch Films for Review:

8. Howard Hawks  

Howard Hawks, US, (1896 – 1977).

I’d say that everybody has seen every plot twenty times. What they haven’t seen is characters and their relation to one another. I don’t worry much about plot anymore. – Howard Hawks 

Hawks Films for Review:

9. Kenji Mizoguchi 

Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan, (1898 – 1956).

You must put the odor of the human body into images [which] describe for me the implacable, the egoistic, the sensual, the cruel… there are nothing but disgusting people in this world.– Kenji Mizoguchi

Mizoguchi Films for Review:

10. Jean Renoir  

Jean Renoir, France, (1894 – 1979).

What interests me is the interpretation of life by an artist. The personality of the film maker interests me more than the copy of an object – Jean Renoir 

Renoir Films for Review:

11. Max Ophüls  

Max Ophüls, France-Germany-US, (1902 – 1957). 

The highest reaches of the actor’s art begin, I believe, at the point where words cease to play a part. – Max Ophüls

Ophüls Films for Review:

12. Luis Buñuel  

Luis Buñuel, Spain-Mexico-France, (1900 – 1983).

God and Country are an unbeatable team; they break all records for oppression and bloodshed. Thank God, I am still an atheist – Luis Buñuel

Buñuel Films for Review:

 13. Fritz Lang 

Fritz Lang, Germany–US, (1890 –1976).

To begin with I should say that I am a visual person. I experience with my eyes and never, or only rarely, with my ear – to my constant regret. Each picture has some sort of rhythm which only the director can give it. He has to be like the captain of a ship. – Fritz Lang

Lang Films for Review:

14.  John Ford  

John Ford, US, (1894 – August 1973).

My name’s John Ford. I make westerns – John Ford

Ford Films for Review:

15. Josef von Sternberg

Joseph von Sternberg, US-Germany, (1894 –1969)

Shadow is mystery and light is clarity. Shadow conceals – light reveals. To know what to reveal and what to conceal and in what degrees to do this is all there is to art. – Josef von Sternberg

Sternberg Films for Review:

 16. Billy Wilder  

Billy Wilder, US, (1906 – 2002)

I have ten commandments. The first nine are, thou shalt not bore. The tenth is, thou shalt have right of final cut. – Billy Wilder

Wilder Films for Review:

17. Robert Altman 

Robert Altman, US, 1925 – 2006).

Making a movie is like chipping away at a stone. You take a piece off here, you take a piece off there and when you’re finished, you have a sculpture. You know that there’s something in there, but you’re not sure exactly what it is until you find it. – Robert Altman 

Altman Films for Review:

18. D.W. Griffith 

D. W. Griffith, US, (1875 – 1948)

Remember how small the world was before I came along? I brought it all to life: I moved the whole world onto a 20-foot screen. I made them see, didn’t I? I changed everything. – D.W. Griffith 

 Griffith Films for Review:

19. Abbas Kiarostami 

Abbas Kiarostami, Iran, (1940 – 2016).

My films have been progressing towards a certain kind of minimalism, even though it was never intended. Elements which can be eliminated have been eliminated. – Abbas Kiarostami

Kiarostami Films for Review:

20. Carl Theodor Dreyer 

Carl Theodor Dreyer , Denmark, 1889 –1968)

Nothing in the world can be compared to the human face. It is a land one can never tire of exploring. There is no greater experience in a studio than to witness the expression of a sensitive face under the mysterious power of inspiration. To see it animated from inside, and turning into poetry. – Carl Theodor Dreyer 

Dreyer Films for Review:

21. Michelangelo Antonioni  

 Michelangelo Antonioni, Italy-UK, (1912 – 2007).

After you’ve learned two or three basic rules of cinema grammar, you can do what you like – including breaking those rules. A film you can explain in words is not a real film. – Michelangelo Antonioni

Antonioni Films for Review:   

22. Buster Keaton 

Buster Keaton, US, (1895 – 1966).

Tragedy is a close-up; comedy, a long shot. Charlie Chaplin and I would have a friendly contest: Who could do the feature film with the least subtitles. – Buster Keaton 

Buster Keaton Films for Review:

23. Chantal Akerman   

Chantal Akerman, Belgium-France, (1950 – 2015).

When people ask me if I am a feminist film maker, I reply I am a woman and I also make films. – Chantal Akerman

Akerman Films for Review: 

24. Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, West Germany, (1945 –1982). 

Every decent director has only one subject, and finally only makes the same film over and over again. My subject is the exploitability of feelings, whoever might be the one exploiting them. It never ends. It’s a permanent theme. Whether the state exploits patriotism, or whether in a couple relationship, one partner destroys the other. – Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Fassbinder Films for Review:

25. Ousmane Sembène  

Ousmane Sembène, Senegal-France, (1923 – 2007).

I think cinema is needed throughout Africa, because we are lagging behind in the knowledge of our own history. I think we need to create a culture that is our own. I think that images are very fascinating and very important to that end. Our forefathers’ image of women must be buried once for all.  – Ousmane Sembène

Sembene Films for Review:

26. Charles Chaplin 

Charles Chaplin, US, 1889 – 1977).

Laughter is the tonic, the relief, the surcease from pain. You’ll never find rainbows if you’re looking down. We think too much and feel too little. – Charles Chaplin

Chaplin Films for Review: 

27. Andrei Tarkovsky  

Andrei Tarkovsky, Soviet Union, (1932 –1986).

The director’s task is to recreate life, its movement, its contradictions, its dynamic and conflicts. It is his duty to reveal every iota of the truth he has seen, even if not everyone finds that truth acceptable. – Andrei Tarkovsky

Tarkovsky Films for Review:

28. Federico Fellini  

Federico Fellini, Italy, (1920 –1993).

Even if I set out to make a film about a fillet of sole, it would be about me. – Federico Fellini

Fellini Films for Review:

29. Ermanno Olmi

Ermanno Olmi, Italy, (1931 – 2018).

I really don’t feel exclusive. My ambition instead, perhaps because of my peasant–worker background, is to look at the world with others, not as an aristocratic. – Ermanno Olmi

Olmi Films for Review:  

30. Akira Kurosawa 

Akira Kurosawa, Japan, (1910 – 1998).

Kurosawa Films for Review:  

For me, filmmaking combines everything. That’s the reason I’ve made cinema my life’s work. In films, painting and literature, theatre and music come together. But a film is still a film. – Akira Kurosawa

31. Sergei Eisenstein  

Sergie Eisenstein, USSR, (1898 –1948).

Now why should the cinema follow the forms of theater and painting rather than the methodology of language, which allows wholly new concepts of ideas to arise from the combination of two concrete denotations of two concrete objects? – Sergei Eisenstein

Eisenstein Films for Review:    

32. Éric Rohmer  

Éric Rohmer, France, (1920 – 2010).

Rohmer Films for Review: 

I don’t think that my films are ‘literary’; they are based on the most ordinary things of life. – Éric Rohmer 

33. Jerzy Skolimowski  

Jerzy Skolimowski, Poland, (Born 1938).

As a poet my mind is trained along the path of poetic associations – I’m not afraid to wander away from direct narrative – I feel safe with a story that tempts you to believe or disbelieve. – Jerzy Skolimowski

Skolimowski Films for Review:  

34. F.W. Murnau 

F.W. Murnau, Germany-US, (1888 – 1931).

Don’t act – think! Films of the future will use more and more of these “camera angles” or, as I prefer to call them, these “dramatic angles.”  – F.W. Murnau 

Murnau Films for Review: 

35. François Truffaut

François Truffaut, France, (1932 – 1984).

The film of tomorrow will not be directed by civil servants of the camera, but by artists for whom shooting a film constitutes a wonderful and thrilling adventure. – François Truffaut

Truffaut Films for Review: 

36. Miklós Jancsó 

Miklós Jancsó, Hungary, 1921 – 2014).

It’s very simple. Cinema has limits that it can’t exceed. It can never go beyond catching the spectator’s interest to make a spectacle. – Miklós Jancsó.

Jancsó Films for Review: 

37. Hou Hsiao-hsien  

Hou Hsiao-hsien, Taiwan, (Born 1947).

The  “wu” in  “wuxia” means both “to cut” and “to stop.” It also refers to the weapon – usually a sword – carried by the assassin.  So wuxia stories are concerned with the premise of ending violence with violence. The hero’s journey is epic and transformative – physically, emotionally, and spiritually. – Hou Hsiao-hsien

Hou Hsiao-hsien Films for Review: 

38. Werner Herzog 

Werner Herzog, West Germany, (Born 1942).

There are deeper strata of truth in cinema, and there is such a thing as poetic, ecstatic truth. It is mysterious and elusive, and can be reached only through fabrication and imagination and stylization. – Werner Herzog

Herzog Films for Review: 

39. Satyajit Ray 

Satyajit Ray, India, 1921 – 1992).

The director is the only person who knows what the film is about. Cinema’s characteristic forte is its ability to capture and communicate the intimacies of the human mind. – Satyajit Ray 

Ray Films for Review: 

40. Stanley Kubrick  

Stanley Kubrick, US-UK, (1928 –1999).

A film is – or should be – more like music than like fiction. – Stanley Kubrick

 Kubrick Films for Review:

41. Alain Resnais  

Alain Resnais, France, (1922 – 2014).

I use formal techniques to make the film more perceptive emotionally. – Alain Resnais

Resnais Films for Review:

42. John Cassavetes  

John Cassavetes, US, (1929 – 1989).

During the actual filming, I’m not really listening to dialogue. I’m watching to see if the actors are communicating something and expressing something. You’re not aware of exactly what people are saying. You are aware of what they are INTENDING and what kind of feeling is going on in that scene. – John Cassavetes  

Cassavetes Films for Review:  

43. Claire Denis  

Claire Denis, France, (Born 1946).

I am not at all interested in theories about cinema. I am only interested in images and people and sound. – Claire Denis

Denis Films for Review:

44. Sam Peckinpah 

Sam Peckinpah, US, (1925 –1984).

The whole underside of our society has always been violence and still is. Churches, laws – everybody seems to think that man is a noble savage. But he’s only an animal. A meat-eating, talking animal. Recognize it. He also has grace and love and beauty. But don’t say to me we’re not violent. – Sam Peckinpah 

Peckinpah Films for Review:

45. Andrzej Wajda  

Andrzej Wajda, Poland, (1926 – 2016).

When a film is created, it is created in a language, which is not only about words, but also the way that very language encodes our perception of the world, our understanding of it. – Andrzej Wajda 

46. Martin Scorsese 

Martin Scorsese, US, (Born 1942).

Cinema is a matter of what’s in the frame and what’s out. – Martin Scorsese

Scorsese Films for Review:

47. Masahiro Shinoda

Masahiro Shinoda, Japan, (Born 1931).

One thing I can say is either to look at films very carefully, watch a lot of films, or don’t see any films at all. Just imagine! – Masahiro Shinoda

Shinoda Films for Review:

48. Ingmar Bergman 

Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, (1918 – 2007).

Film as dream, film as music. No art passes our conscience in the way film does, and goes directly to our feelings, deep down into the dark rooms of our souls. – Ingmar Bergman

Bergman Films for Review:

49. Sergio Leone 

Sergio Leone, Italy, (1929 – 1989).

When I was young, I believed in three things: Marxism, the redemptive power of cinema, and dynamite. Now I just believe in dynamite. – Sergio Leone 

Leone Films for Review:

 50. Agnès Varda  

Agnès Varda, France, (1928 – 2019).

I’m not interested in seeing a film just made by a woman – not unless she is looking for new images. – Agnes Varda

Varda Films for Review:

51. Jacques Rivette  

Jacques Rivette, France, (1928 – 2016).

I guess I like a lot of directors. Or at least I try to. – Jacques Rivette 

Rivette Films for Review:

52. Clint Eastwood 

Clint Eastwood, US, (Born 1930).

I keep working because I learn something new all the time. – Clint Eastwood 

Eastwood Films for Review:

53. Erich von Stroheim

Erich von Stroheim, US, (1885 – 1957).

In Hollywood, you’re only as good as your last picture. – Erich von Stroheim

Stroheim Films for Review:

54. Chris Marker 

Chris Marker, France, (1921 – 2012).

An object dies when the gaze that lights on it has disappeared. – Chris Marker

Marker Films for Review:

55. Robert Flaherty

Robert Flaherty, US, (1884 – 1951).

Sometimes you have to lie. One often has to distort a thing to catch its true spirit. – Robert Flaherty

Flaherty Films for Review::

56. Claude Chabrol

Claude Chabrol, France, (1930 – 2010).

Films with a message just make me laugh. – Claude Chabrol

Chabrol Films for Review:

57. Michael Powel & Emeric Pressburger 

Michael Powell, UK, (1905–1990) & Emeric Pressburger, UK,, (1902–1988),

Of course, all films are surrealist. They are because they are making something that looks like a real world but isn’t. – Michael Powell

Powell & Pressburger Films for Review:

58. Joseph Losey

Joseph Losey, US-UK, (1909 – 1984).

Films can illustrate our existence… they can distress, disturb and provoke people into thinking about themselves and certain problems. But NOT give the answers. America has abandoned the strong woman of spirituality and is shacking up with the harlot of materialism. – Joseph Losey

Losey Films for Review:

59. Preston Sturges

Preston Sturges, US, (1898 – 1959).

I did not think that a good movie was the equivalent of a good stage play, any more than I thought an automobile ride was as exhilarating as a drive behind a spirited horse, nor a trip by steam as soul-satisfying as a voyage by sail. – Preston Sturges

Sturges Films for Review:

60. David Cronenberg

David Cronenberg, Canada, (Born 1943).

Everybody’s a mad scientist, and life is their lab. We’re all trying to experiment to find a way to live, to solve problems, to fend off madness and chaos. – David Cronenberg

Cronenberg Films for Review:

61. Carlos Saura

Carlos Saura, Spain, (1932 – 2023).

I can’t separate cinema from my life. The two things are interrelated and enrich or impoverish each other. – Carlos Saura

Saura Films for Review:

62. Wim Wenders 

Wim Wenders, West Germany, (Born 1945).

Film is a very, very powerful medium. It can either confirm the idea that things are wonderful the way they are, or it can reinforce the conception that things can be changed. – Wim Wenders

Wenders Films for Review:

63. John Huston

John Huston, US, (1906 –1987).

The directing of a picture involves coming out of your individual loneliness and taking a controlling part in putting together a small world. – John Huston

Huston Films for Review:

64. Shōhei Imamura  

Shōhei Imamura, Japan, (1926 – 2006).

I am interested in the relationship of the lower part of the human body and the lower part of the social structure on which the reality of daily Japanese life obstinately supports itself. – Shōhei Imamura 

Imamura Films for Review:

65. Nicholas Ray 

Nicholas Ray, US, (1911 –1979).

An actor can be as talented as another, but if he doesn’t stick to what the director’s intentions are, it all falls down. – Nicholas Ray 

Ray Films for Review:

66. Jean Vigo 

Jean Vigo, France, (1905 –1934).

However paradoxical it may seem, the film studio’s ideal would be to produce only one film which would go on making money forever. – Jean Vigo

Vigo Films for Review:

67. Vittorio De Sica

Vittorio De Sica, Italy, (1901 – 1974).

Art has to be severe. It cannot be commercial. It cannot be for the producer or even for the public. It has to be for oneself. – Vittorio De Sica

De Sica Films for Review:

68. Jacques Tati

Jacques Tati, France, (1907 – 1982).

The images are designed, so that after you see the picture two or three times, its no longer my film, it starts to be your film. You recognize the people, you know them, and you don’t even know who directed the picture. – Jacques Tati

Tait Films for Review:

69. Richard Lester

Richard Lester, UK-US, (Born 1932).

Cinema must reflect the temper of the times. We must choose material not only on the basis of whether we feel deeply, but on whether or not anyone’s bloody well going to see it. – Richard Lester

Lester Films for Review:

70. Kon Ichikawa 

Kon Ichikawa, Japan, (1915 – 2008).

I’ve made various types of films: period dramas, modern dramas, films set in the Meiji period. But I don’t make any distinctions between them – they’re all films. True, with a period drama, there are certain conventions. With a modern drama, there is a different style of shooting. So you have to make changes according to the genre, but I never think, “This is a period drama, so I have to shoot it in such and such a way.” Films are films. If you don’t understand that, then you start filming lies. – Kon Ichikawa

Ichikawa Films for Review:

71. Laurent Cantet 

Laurent Cantet, France, (Born 1961).

I think we’re going through a really precarious period in film production, and I very much fear that it’s going to be a lot more difficult to make my kind of cinema. If you make films that don’t exactly announce themselves as surefire hits, you feel like you’re walking a tightrope.  I don’t want to take larger scale films in order to show my evolution as a director. – Laurent Cantet

Cantet Films for Review:

72. Jean-Pierre Melville

Jean-Pierre Melville, France, (1917 – 1973).

I believe that you must be madly in love with cinema to create films. You also need a huge cinematic baggage. – Jean-Pierre Melville

Melville Films for Review:

73. Krzysztof Zanussi

Krzysztof Zanussi, Poland, (Born 1939).

I think cinema has a unique capacity to show the passage of time. When the camera can cover a distance of forty years, and you see what really happened to the faces of the actors – how they really aged, with no need for make-up – you see what happens to us. In literature, it is only reference, it’s not sensual; in cinema it’s sensual. – Krzysztof Zanussi

Zanussi Films for Review:

74. Luchino Visconti

Luchino Visconti, Italy, (1906 – 1976).

I could make a film in front of a wall if I knew how to find the data of man’s true humanity and how to express it. – Luchino Visconti

Visconti Films for Review:

75. David Lynch

David Lynch, US, Born 1946).

Life is very, very complicated, and so films should be allowed to be, too. – David Lynch

Lynch Films for Review:

Readers, feel free to comment or send your own lists to ad***@tr**********.com .

The post Traveling Boy Selects the 75 Greatest Film Directors of All-Time appeared first on Traveling Archive.

]]> https://travelingboy.com/travel/75-greatest-film-directors/feed/ 34 Into the Saguaros of Tucson https://travelingboy.com/travel/intosaguarostucson/ https://travelingboy.com/travel/intosaguarostucson/#respond Fri, 07 May 2021 06:29:11 +0000 https://travelingboy.com/travel/?p=24216 Once again, I had it all wrong. A friend of a friend had informed me that Tucson, Arizona was still very much part of the Wild West, where people wore no masks, did not participate in social distancing and everything was wide open. I found the opposite to be true, despite my chagrin of all …

The post Into the Saguaros of Tucson appeared first on Traveling Archive.

]]> Once again, I had it all wrong. A friend of a friend had informed me that Tucson, Arizona was still very much part of the Wild West, where people wore no masks, did not participate in social distancing and everything was wide open. I found the opposite to be true, despite my chagrin of all indoor museums closed.


The Tucson highways led to experiences deep into the Sonoran Desert. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

In my week-long stay in Tucson, I found its citizens to be gracious, wearing masks and sensitive to social distancing. A day trip to Tombstone proved to be another experience, in which I’ll address later. Towering saguaro cacti endowed Tucson’s landscape as far as the eye can see; which led to three life reaffirming hikes in the Sabino Canyon Recreation area, located at the northeast corner of the city in the Santa Catalina Mountains. The whole town seemed to be out – over a million visitors annually – meandering through Sabino Canyon’s many well-marked trails, some intense and others quite easy, making them ideal for any age and size. Rejuvenation was my theme, and Sabino Canyon was as mesmerizing as a carne seca taco at El Charro Café. But, more about that later, too.


Sabino Canyon Stream was a refreshing reprieve after hiking the trails. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

A 45-minute narrated tram ride leads you up into the mountain foothills, where you can easily walk four miles downhill to the main visitor center, or take hikes on side trails, many leading to the rewards of unique rock formations and the pristine Sabino Canyon Stream, ideal for cooling your dusty hiking heals or even taking a swim. The trams make nine stops, allowing travelers to hop on and off where they wish.

The Sabino Canyon offered an endless array of hiking opportunities. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

The saguaro cacti were tall and immense, with their arms reaching high up to the heavens. According to the Sabino Visitor Center, the saguaro cactus is one of the defining plants of the Sonoran Desert and has the distinction of being the largest cactus in the United States. Saguaro are slow growing cacti; a 10 year old plant might only be 1.5 inches tall, but can grow between 40-60 feet tall. The tree-like columnar develops branches (or arms) as they age, although some never grow arms. Saguaros are covered with protective spines, white flowers in the late spring, and red fruit in summer. Some have holes made by birds to nest in, often referred to as saguaro boots. Native-Americans perfected the boots as water containers long before the canteen was available. After the saguaro dies its woody ribs can also be used to build roofs, fences, and parts of furniture.

The Ronstadt Transit Center pays homage to the Ronstadt family. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

PRESIDIO DISTRICT: TUCSON’S OLDEST NEIGHBORHOOD

Before you begin your Presidio District walking tour, you’ll notice the Ronstadt Transit Center, named for the Ronstadt family’s prominence in the Old Pueblo. Singer Linda Ronstadt’s Tucson roots stem from her great-grandfather, who had emigrated from Germany in the 1840s, leading to a long line of Ronstadt family members who affected the commerce and fabric of the city today.

The 2,000-year-old prehistoric pit house at the Tucson Presidio. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

It should be noted that just after the Spanish arrival in 1775, approximately 90% of the native population died from infectious European diseases in which they had no immunity. The name, Tucson is derived from the Tohono O’odham People: Cuk-Ṣon; or Navajo: Tó Oostsʼą.

Once you park your car, it is essential, almost a mandate, to take a stroll through Tucson’s history with a tour of Presidio San Agustín del Tucson (Tucson Presidio). Built on land once occupied by ancient Native-Americans, the Presidio marks the birthplace where Tucson was established as a Spanish military fort. A remarkably well-informed docent pointed out the thick adobe brick walls, 10-to-12 feet tall, that the Spanish used as fortifications after a large Apache attack. My personal highlight was easily a 2,000-year-old pit house, quite literally a hole in the ground, where people slept for protection against invaders and wildlife predators. An original 150-year-old Sonoran row house provided a glimpse of what life in the Presidio was like for soldiers and other residents.

Located across the street is Old Town Artisans, established in 1922, which spans an entire city block, housing art galleries and shops in the longest-inhabited set of buildings in all of Tucson (circa 1850s).

El Charro Cafe dining area. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

In the middle of the block rests the iconic El Charro Café, established in 1922, which constitutes the U.S.’ oldest Mexican restaurant in continuous operation by the same family. The owner explained that the café actually serves Arizona-Sonoran Cuisine with a Tuscan interpretation. The tacos are made with carne seca grass-fed beef, akin to jerky, which has been pulverized back to life. El Charro is said to be the originator of the chimichanga (deep-fried burrito). Tucson itself was awarded the nation’s first UNESCO City of Gastronomy Designation.

The O.K. Corral, the site of the famous shootout – or was it? Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

A Daytrip in Tombstone

The irony of openly carrying guns without a license in the Tombstone of today was too great not to mention. History tells us that Tombstone was once the very definition of a lawless Western Town, but then cleaned up by Marshal Virgil Earp and his deputies Wyatt and Morgan, by issuing a mandate on not allowing guns in the town proper. Curiously, the infamous gun fight at the O.K. Corral – where the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday attempted to arrest outlaw cowboys for carrying guns – is the major marketing component of the town.

But that was then, and this is now, where citizens proudly carry guns and have a homicide rate higher than the Arizona state average. I attempted to interview three Tombstone PR representatives with one simple question: “Where is the line in the street where one had to check in their guns at the jail or hotel during the days of Earp?” My lack of western tang or perhaps wearing a mask made it clear I was an outsider and received very guarded replies. One man politely ended with, Oh… Tombstone is just a fun and safe family town. I decided to leave it at that.

But, he was right, Tombstone was fun, beaming with history and folklore.

Nevertheless, in the hope of finding the real story of  the “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral,” I read an article by Casey Tefertiller and Jeff Morey that had appeared in Wild West Magazine. You can read “O.K. Corral: A Gunfight Shrouded in Mystery” by clicking the yellow button at the end of this article.

On the streets of Tombstone. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

There are seemingly countless books and film versions of the Earp Brothers and the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. But the best film as art, though hardly accurate, is John Ford’s My Darling Clementine (1946) with Henry Fonda as Wyatt Earp. And Remember, When the legend becomes fact, print the legend. – Taken from Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962).

 Back to the saguaros of Tucson. Photo courtesy of Deb Roskamp.

It was back to Tucson from there, with my looking forward to another hike among saguaro cacti in Sabino Canyon. Besides, I was informed that El Charro Café had a franchise restaurant five minutes from where I was lodging.

MORE about O.K. Corral


O.K. Corral: A Gunfight Shrouded in Mystery
By Casey Tefertiller and Jeff Morey
Courtesy Wild West Magazine


Cowboy Billy Clanton still lay dying, his face contorted with pain, when the press began the difficult task of piecing together the details of an October 1881 street battle in Tombstone, Arizona Territory. In later years it would become known as the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Richard Rule, veteran city editor of the Tombstone Nugget, helped carry Clanton into the house where the young man would pass into history, then returned to the streets to go to work.


With the canny eye of an experienced newsman, Rule began collecting the details of the gunfight, interviewing witnesses and trying to get a handle on what transpired during that fateful half minute and what led up to the battle. It would be a model of frontier journalism and vital to future understanding of perhaps the most debated event of the American frontier.


The saga of the O.K. Corral has been told repeatedly and from many perspectives, often with fictional intrusions and biased analysis. Now, for the first time in 120 years, we may have an authentic understanding of the events that led to the gunfight and what actually occurred in the streets of Tombstone — with a great deal of help from Richard Rule.


Through the tense summer of 1881, emotions had grown explosive. Bands of rustlers roamed the backcountry, stealing cattle mostly in Mexico or from Mexican ranchers in Arizona and New Mexico territories and then selling them to apparently legitimate ranchers for resale. The Clanton and McLaury families owned ranches reputed to be headquarters for receiving stolen cattle. This great cattle scam drew little ire from an American population more interested in acquiring wealth in the rich new mining areas than investigating international relations. In addition, Mexico had assessed high taxes on alcohol and tobacco, and smugglers came to southern Arizona Territory to purchase the goods cheaply for resale south of the border. The cash- and jewel-laden smugglers provided an easy target for American bandits.


As that fateful year of 1881 progressed, the situation changed. The Mexican government dropped taxes on alcohol and tobacco and then lodged numerous protests with federal and territorial officials to try to stop the outlawry against Mexican citizens. Territorial Governor John C. Frémont, the old pathfinder and the first Republican presidential candidate in 1856, suggested in February that the territorial Legislature fund a state militia to ride against the outlaws and stop the rustling. Legislators hooted down the visionary plan. The Mexican government built a series of forts along the border and began to fight back against the American outlaws. American rustlers George Turner and Alfred McAllister were killed in Mexico during a raid on May 13.


Back on the U.S. side of the border, citizens also began to grow agitated over outlawry, particularly because of what happened on March 15. Three robbers that day attempted to intercept a stagecoach traveling from Tombstone to Benson, Arizona Territory. Driver Eli ‘Budd’ Philpot and passenger Peter Roerig were killed. Jim Crane, William Leonard and Harry Head were identified as the robbers.


With Frémont’s militia plan discarded, there was little to counter the rustling and other crimes that gripped southern Arizona Territory. Cochise County Sheriff John Behan and his deputies were charged with battling the rustlers, who became known as the ‘Cowboys.’ But Behan was at best ineffective and at worst crooked. His deputy Billy Breakenridge would tell how he deputized Cowboy leader ‘Curly Bill’ Brocius (or ‘Curley Bill’ Brocious) and used him to help collect taxes. And Wells, Fargo detective James Hume was quoted as saying, ‘Even the sheriff of the county is in with the cowboys and he has got to be or his life would not be worth a farthing.’ The federal government was represented by U.S. Deputy Marshals Virgil Earp and Leslie Blackburn, with Earp in charge of most of the fieldwork, backed by his brother and deputy Wyatt Earp. Virgil also served as city marshal of Tombstone, which left Wyatt with most of the federal work.


Wyatt Earp coveted Behan’s well-paid job as sheriff, and the election would be coming up in the fall of 1882. According to Wyatt, he tried to make a deal with Frank McLaury and Ike Clanton, the most visible of the Clanton brothers and a known friend of the rustling crowd, to tell him the whereabouts of the three stage robbers. This would bolster Earp’s chances in the election, and Ike would receive the reward. Before the deal could be completed, two bartender brothers killed Leonard and Head in a remote New Mexico Territory mining village. An army of Cowboys rode down and killed the brothers in retribution.
In August, another cattle raid in Mexico caused Commandant Felipe Neri to dispatch troops to the border, where they found a group of Americans bedded down on the U.S. side of the crossing at Guadalupe Canyon. The Mexicans crept the few feet across the border and opened fire, killing five, among them stage robber Jim Crane and Newman Clanton, scion of the Clanton clan, who left behind sons Ike, Fin and Billy.


With no deal left for him, Ike Clanton grew increasingly worried. Wyatt Earp knew Ike had made a deal to turn on his Cowboy buddies, information that could have ruined Ike’s standing in the rustling community. With the borders closed, outlawry against Americans grew more commonplace in the backcountry. The Earps emerged as the leading law officers, taking an aggressive stand against the region’s criminal elements. The Cowboys resented their actions. ‘They met at Charleston and took an oath over blood drawn from the arm of John Ring[o], the leader, that they would kill us,’ Virgil Earp said.


With emotion running stronger than the best saloon whiskey, Ike Clanton came to Tombstone to confront Wyatt Earp and learn whether Earp had been leaking the secret. According to Earp, Ike accused him of telling the secret to his friend John Henry ‘Doc’ Holliday, a heavy-drinking dentist with a quirky sense of humor. Earp denied the accusation and sent for Holliday, who was in Tucson. Holliday met with Clanton on the night of October 25 in the Occidental Saloon. By the Earp account, Holliday was angry that Clanton had made a false accusation against him. As Ike told it, Holliday called him a ‘damned liar [who] had threatened the Earps….He told me to pull out my gun and if there was any grit in me, to go to fighting.’ Clanton, who was unarmed, said that Holliday ordered him to retrieve his gun. Wyatt, Virgil and Morgan Earp appeared to break up the fight, with Wyatt walking Holliday back to his room at Fly’s lodging house.


Then came perhaps the most improbable event of the day. Ike Clanton, after retrieving his six-shooter, sat down to a poker game with Virgil Earp, Tom McLaury, John Behan and one other player. It would be like ‘Ike’ Eisenhower pitching pennies with Adolf Hitler before the Battle of the Bulge. The game broke up around 7 a.m., with Ike Clanton requesting that Virgil deliver a message to Holliday: ‘The damned son of a bitch has got to fight,’ Ike supposedly told Virgil. Virgil said he responded: ‘Ike, I am an officer, and I don’t want to hear you talking that way at all. I am going down home now to go to bed, and I don’t want you to raise any disturbance when I am in bed. ‘You won’t carry a message?’ Ike asked. Virgil said he would not. ‘You may have to fight before you know it,’ Ike said as Virgil walked away. Through the rest of the morning, Ike fueled his anger with whiskey, lurching from saloon to saloon to talk tough and make threats against the Earps. ‘He said that as soon as the Earps and Doc Holliday showed themselves on the street, the ball would open and that they would have to fight,’ said Ned Boyle, bartender at the Oriental Saloon, who went to awaken Wyatt and tell him of the threat. Deputy Marshal Andy Bronk also heard of the threats and woke Virgil. Injudiciously, both Wyatt and Virgil went back to sleep and ignored Ike’s ire.


About noon on the 26th, Virgil and Morgan Earp spotted Ike carrying a six-shooter and a rifle. Virgil crashed his revolver into Ike’s head, then led the bloodied Cowboy to Judge Albert O. Wallace’s courtroom. Wyatt Earp entered the room and said: ‘You damn dirty cow thief. You have been threatening our lives, and I know it. I think I would be justified in shooting you down any place I would meet you. But if you are anxious to make a fight, I will go anywhere on earth to make a fight with you — even over to San Simon among your crowd.’


‘Fight is my racket, and all I want is 4 feet of ground,’ Clanton responded. ‘If you fellows had been a second later, I would have furnished a Coroner’s Inquest for this town.’ Morgan Earp held up Ike’s gun and taunted him, saying he would pay the fine if Ike would make a fight. Ike refused, saying he did not like the odds. Wallace fined Ike $25 for carrying firearms in the city limits. As Wyatt stepped out of the courtroom, he encountered Tom McLaury and engaged in an argument that led to Earp slapping the cowboy with his left hand, then beating him over the head with a six-shooter. Frank McLaury and Billy Clanton rode into town and stopped at the saloon in the Grand Hotel. Cowboy pal Billy Claiborne told them of the beatings delivered to their brothers, and Frank dropped his whiskey glass without taking a sip.


As the afternoon continued, the town grew more and more agitated, buzzing with trepidation that a conflict was brewing. The Earps congregated at the corner of Fourth and Allen, in front of Hafford’s Corner Saloon, and watched as Ike and Billy Clanton, along with Frank McLaury, entered Spangenberg’s gun shop. Frank and Billy purchased ammunition, but the proprietor refused to sell a gun to Ike. The Clantons and McLaurys left the gun shop and split up. The McLaurys went off to make collections for cattle they had sold, while Claiborne and Billy Clanton went to retrieve Billy’s horse. They would meet up again a few minutes later, at the O.K. Corral, where witnesses would overhear them making threats against the Earps.


Back at Hafford’s, townsmen came to the Earps offering assistance and telling of the cowboy threats. City Marshal Virgil Earp said he asked Sheriff Behan to assist him in disarming the Cowboys. Instead, Behan offered to go down and talk to the Clantons and McLaurys to see if he could peaceably disarm them by himself. After Virgil had waited nearly 20 minutes for Behan to make his talk, local businessman John Fonck came to tell the marshal of the Cowboys? actions. Virgil said he would not interfere if they were getting their horses and leaving town, but if they were armed and walking the streets he would have to arrest them. ‘Why,’ Fonck responded, ‘they are all down on Fremont Street now.’


Virgil Earp turned to his two brothers, and to Holliday. He handed a short-barreled shotgun to Holliday to conceal under his long gray coat. Holliday then gave his walking stick to the marshal, and the four began the fateful walk that would become part of history. As they strode down Fremont Street, Behan rushed up to them and, according to the Earp brothers, said, ‘For God’s sake, don’t go down there or you will get yourself murdered.’ Virgil replied that he was going to disarm them. What the sheriff said next is uncertain. Behan would say that he told the Earps, ‘I was there for the purpose of arresting and disarming them.’ The Earps believed the sheriff said he had already disarmed them, and they then — apparently disregarding the warning that they would get murdered — made the mistake of relaxing a little. Wyatt Earp put his six-shooter back in his coat pocket; Virgil shifted his six-shooter off his hip into a more difficult position to draw and held the walking stick in his right hand. When they arrived at the 15-foot-wide vacant lot on Fremont Street where the Cowboys had congregated, the Earps were surprised to see that at least two of the opposition — Frank McLaury and Billy Clanton — still carried revolvers, and rifles were visible on the horses. Virgil raised his walking stick and growled, ‘Throw up your hands, boys, I intend to disarm you.’


The shooting began quickly. Two shots, a pause, then the gunfight burst out on different fronts. Holliday surged forward to stalk Tom McLaury, partially hidden by a horse, then fired a shotgun charge into McLaury’s chest. At about the same moment, Ike lurched forward to grab Wyatt Earp. Clanton said he heroically tried to push him out of the way. Earp said he told Ike, ‘The fight has commenced, get to fighting or get away.’ Ike, whose mouth had aroused the town and inflamed the Earps, then dashed from the scene.


Virgil took a shot through the calf, most likely from Frank McLaury’s six-shooter. Billy Clanton took a bullet in the chest, probably from Morgan, then a shot in the right wrist. He switched gun hands, leaned back against a building and slowly crumpled to the ground as he continued firing. Morgan stumbled and fell, yelling, ‘I am hit,’ as a bullet entered one shoulder blade and passed out through the other. He rose, but soon fell again, probably tripping on a mound on Fremont Street where the town was putting in new water pipes. Badly wounded, Frank McLaury tried to use his horse for cover as he lurched into the street. He fired at Morgan, causing his horse to bolt. Unprotected and exhausted, Frank squatted in the street, but when Holliday pursued him, Frank stood, aimed and said, ‘I’ve got you now.’


‘Blaze away. You’re a daisy if you have,’ Holliday responded, according to the Nugget. McLaury fired, grazing Holliday’s side. ‘I’?m shot right through,’ Holliday yelled. Frank McLaury staggered farther into the street as Morgan Earp and Doc both fired, Morgan’s shot crashing into the right side of McLaury’s head, Holliday’s into the Cowboy’s chest. McLaury continued to breathe as Holliday ran up and shouted, ‘The son of a bitch has shot me, and I mean to kill him!’ But it was too late. The fight had been shot out of Frank McLaury. His brother Tom had made it to the corner of Third and Fremont, where he lay dying at the base of a telegraph pole. Frank died in the street. Tom and Billy were carried into a nearby house, where they would survive for only minutes.


With Morgan and Virgil Earp both wounded and Holliday grazed across the side, Wyatt Earp remained the only participant standing, untouched by lead. Behan strode over to Wyatt and said, ‘I will have to arrest you.’ A witness recalled Earp’s reply: ‘I won’t be arrested. You deceived me, Johnny, you told me they were not armed. I won’t be arrested, but I am here to answer what I have done. I am not going to leave town.’ And Earp was not arrested — not then, at least.


Almost immediately, journalist Richard Rule and his rivals at the Epitaph began scurrying to collect the news. Both stories were dramatic, colorful and tinged with blood. In the style of the day, they did not present many direct quotes, instead making journalists? assessments of the material. By the Epitaph report, the battle began when two Cowboys pulled their guns and fired the first two shots. The Nugget had it different, saying Frank McLaury made a motion for his gun, which prompted Wyatt Earp to quickly draw and shoot McLaury. Both stories led to a belief that the law officers had been in the right.


Within 48 hours, the situation would change dramatically. As the coroner’s inquest began, well-liked Sheriff Behan, along with Ike Clanton, Claiborne and several Cowboy friends, testified to a much different beginning to the gunfight. They would report that the Earp party fired the first several shots of the conflict. Clanton filed murder charges against the Earps, and a month-long preliminary hearing began at which both sides would air their versions of the events. By the Earp version, it was self-defense; by the Cowboy account, it was murder.


Behan would serve as the most significant witness for the prosecution, which tried to have the Earps bound over for a murder trial. Key witnesses at the hearing in advancing the Cowboy version were Wesley Fuller, Billy Allen, Ike Clanton and Billy Claiborne, who was under a murder indictment himself for an unrelated incident. They laid out a dramatic story of how at Virgil’s command the two Clantons and Frank McLaury thrust their arms in the air to comply, while Tom McLaury threw open his vest to show he was unarmed. Immediately someone from the Earp party screamed, ‘You sons of bitches have been looking for a fight, and now you can have one!’ Barely had those words sounded when two shots were fired, the first from Doc Holliday’s nickel-plated revolver and the other from another member of the Earp party, probably Morgan. After a pause, the Earps got off several shots before Frank McLaury and Billy Clanton could pull their six-shooters and return fire. Tom McLaury was never armed and never fired. This image of men shot down in the act of surrendering would shock the community as reports appeared in the local press.


Wyatt and Virgil Earp would present a much different story. Wyatt would say the fight began after Virgil’s call to disarm: ‘Billy Clanton and Frank McLaury laid their hands on their six-shooters. Virgil said, ‘Hold, I don’t mean that. I have come to disarm you.’ They — Billy Clanton and Frank McLaury — commenced to draw their pistols. At that moment Tom McLaury threw his hand to his right hip and jumped behind a horse. I had my pistol in my overcoat pocket where I had put it when Behan told us he had disarmed the other party. When I saw Billy and Frank draw their pistols, I drew my pistol. Billy Clanton leveled his pistol at me but I didn’t aim at him. I knew that Frank McLaury had the reputation of being a good shot and a dangerous man, and I aimed at Frank McLaury. The two first shots which were fired were fired by Billy Clanton and myself; he shot at me, and I shot at Frank McLaury. I do not know which shot was first. We fired almost together.’ Neither Wyatt nor Virgil Earp mentioned the statement about the SOBs looking for a fight and getting one.


By the Earp version, the fight began in self-defense when the Cowboys, armed in violation of law, made an aggressive move in defiance of a legal order. The Earp version closely reflected the Nugget‘s report of the gunfight, while the Cowboy story was in stark contrast to the immediate reporting after the event. When the preliminary hearing ended on December 1, Justice Wells Spicer ruled the case not be bound over for trial. This was decision without exoneration, as most of the key questions were left undetermined. Spicer ruled that there was not enough evidence to assure a likelihood of conviction. The Cochise County Grand Jury would later reopen the issue and concur with Spicer.


The debate has raged on for 120 years as to who fired first. The quest for a true understanding of events has been confused by a series of later writers advancing inaccurate or simply false information from supposed secret sources. Stuart Lake, in his classic Wyatt Earp: Frontier Marshal, stated flatly that the Cowboys drew and fired on the Earps, which is contradictory to the Earps’ own version in the Spicer hearing. Frank Waters, in The Earp Brothers of Tombstone, quoted alleged eyewitnesses who were never called to testify in saying the Earps fired first at surrendering Cowboys. It has since been discovered that Waters tampered with material in the book, diminishing its credibility.


The issue seemed resolved in 1976 when Glenn G. Boyer’s I Married Wyatt Earp appeared, asserting that Josephine Earp, Wyatt’s third wife, had secret information that Doc Holliday had actually fired the first shot and that Earp lied in the Spicer hearing to cover for his friend. However, Boyer has since admitted that this book is not actually Mrs. Earp’s memoir but rather a creative exercise. Boyer further confused the issue with his 1993 Wyatt Earp’s Tombstone Vendetta, in which he now claimed Holliday told a confidant that Earp himself fired the first two shots so quickly they sounded as one. Four years later, Boyer acknowledged that this was also novelistic. The fictional and fantastic later writings must be discarded in order to gain an understanding of what actually occurred on that dusty street on October 26, 1881. By returning to the original sources, we can finally gain a grasp of what started the gunfight that refuses to die.

The Behan/Cowboy version of the initial gunfire is based on the first shot being fired from Holliday’s revolver at the surrendering Clantons and McLaurys. For this to be accurate, Holliday would have needed to stage a sort of juggling act, firing the revolver, then going to the shotgun to shoot Tom McLaury, discarding the shotgun and returning to the revolver as he chased Frank McLaury into Fremont Street. And he would need to have done it without either the witnesses or survivors seeing it. Behan claimed to have his eyes fixed on the Earp party, and the other pro-Cowboy witnesses testified that the Clantons and McLaurys were lifting their hands to surrender.


However, Addie Bourland, a dressmaker watching from her shop across the street, testified that she clearly saw that none of the Cowboys had their hands in the air.Behan’s credibility would emerge as an issue late in the Spicer hearing. Deputy district attorney Winfield Scott Williams testified that the sheriff had inaccurately depicted a conversation with Virgil Earp after the gunfight in which, according to Williams, Behan told Virgil that one of the Cowboys had drawn his gun to start the fight. Equally important, documents were located in 1997 showing that Behan served as guarantor of a loan to Ike Clanton during the Spicer hearing. With Wyatt Earp seeking Behan’s job in the next election, the sheriff had much to gain from seeing his rival face a murder charge.


And then there is Richard Rule. It is one of those flukes of history that the Nugget story ever appeared as it did. Publisher Harry Woods also served as Behan’s undersheriff, but he was off in El Paso fetching a prisoner at the time of the gunfight. This left the talented and experienced Rule to oversee the newsgathering and writing of a story that would be essentially pro-Earp. With the Nugget‘s connections to the sheriff’s office, it would be logical to seek out Behan as a source for the story. What makes this even more probable is that the Nugget story, without attribution, states, ‘The Sheriff stepped out and said: ‘Hold up boys, don’t go down there or there will be trouble; I have been down there to disarm them.’ Behan would repeatedly insist he told the Earps that he had been down to disarm the cowboys, not that he had actually done the disarming. The article relates details of the conversation Behan had had with the Cowboys. The story further states that Behan ‘was standing nearby commanding the contestants to cease firing but was powerless to prevent it’ — a claim that sounds as if it came from Behan’s own mouth. It is hard to imagine the Nugget not interviewing Behan for this story. By Williams’ account, immediately after the gunfight, Behan told Virgil Earp a story similar to the Nugget report before changing his story at the coroner’s inquest.


For the Behan/Cowboy version of the first shots to be true, Doc Holliday would have had to orchestrate an incredible revolver-shotgun-revolver shuffle, an officer of the court would have had to lie under oath and both the Nugget and Epitaph would have had to have missed the biggest story of their existences. This remarkable chain of events is so unlikely as to render it unbelievable.

 

Postscript: Later that evening we did dine alfresco at the El Charro Café. My sister noticed Kevin, an old friend from Seattle, who lives part time in Tucson, drinking a beer while waiting for a takeout order. I stood up and instinctively shook his hand, then resumed eating hand-to-mouth chips and cheese crisps, another  El Charro Café specialty. The next morning it dawned on me that it was the first time I’d shaken hands with someone since the pandemic. I asked my sister, I’m sure your friend Kevin is fully vaccinated.  She replied, Kevin vaccinated?!  He doesn’t believe that Covid even exits. But then she reassured me that I’ll probably be fine, but will know for sure in ten days or so. The days passed slowly, but on the tenth I found myself to be still alive and well, which gave me further reassurance that the vaccination does truly work.

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