Tag Archives: Arizona

Life in the Days of Corona

Or How My Brother Lost His Head Patricia Grady Cox, April 23, 2020 My brother is not visiting me this week. He should be, but the Corona virus worries have kept him off a 7-hour flight and he remains in Vermont. He would have arrived yesterday evening, so this would have been our first day […]

Happy Birthday

Patricia Grady Cox February 20, 2019   We celebrate the birthdays of Presidents Washington and Lincoln in February. Schools close, some of us get a day off from work, and the stores advertise big sales. Today I want to remember another big February birthday: The State of Arizona! When President Taft signed a Declaration of […]

When Once is not Enough . . .

Patricia Grady Cox – October 7, 2018 Every now and then I think about writing a sequel to HELLGATE, my most recent novel, set in 1880 Arizona Territory. That thought gained momentum recently as I watched a PBS documentary about the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Prescott’s small Chinatown (50 Chinese in Prescott according to […]

Ghost Town Godfather

Patricia Grady Cox January 18, 2018 Arizona owes its existence to mining. First gold, then silver, then copper. Eventually these mines played out or flooded out and closed down. Tombstone started out as a mining town and was too tough to die. But other mining-associated towns, such as Bisbee and Jerome, became ghost towns before […]

Do It Scared

Patricia Grady Cox August 19, 2017 I have a confession to make. The first time I ever climbed up onto the back of a horse was at the ripe old age of 37. I remember well the day I stood waiting with a friend of mine for the current trail ride to return so we […]

What Inspires You?

Patricia Grady Cox January 6, 2015   One of the most common questions asked of authors is, “Where did you get your inspiration?” For me, reading about the history of the southwest, particularly Arizona, inspires me. The scenery of the southwest, the Sonoran desert, inspires me. Visiting places that remain untouched by time inspires me. […]

A HAUNTING OF COYOTES

Patricia Grady Cox October 31, 2015 Ghostly encounters flare up throughout my novel CHASM CREEK. Ruben Santiago, an elderly Navajo, experiences most of these visions, visitations, and vexatious occurrences. In the following short excerpt, Ruben goes to a place called Haunted Hill, hoping to conjure up the image of his long-dead grandmother. Instead he gets […]

WATER IN THE WEST – A MINI-INTRO

by Patricia Grady Cox October 14, 2015 With all the news about discovering running water on Mars and the drought in California, I thought it would be fun to provide a simplified history of the origins of water supplies in Arizona. The Arizona Territory, created in 1863, consisted primarily of prospectors and gold miners, various […]

Deja Vu in Sedona?

Text and photos by Patricia Grady Cox September 30, 2015 I took a ride to Sedona yesterday. I have been to Sedona about a million times. Every time someone from back east visits me; many times for hikes (nothing like the West Fork Trail in autumn);, just for the fun of it, and once—in 1988—to […]

CRAZY THINGS I LEARNED ABOUT THE 19th CENTURY

Patricia Grady Cox September 23, 2015 Some of us spent our childhoods watching westerns on TV: Gunsmoke, Wanted—Dead or Alive, Palladin, Wagon Train, Rawhide, The Big Valley, Bonanza . . .  Westerns were the NCIS of the late 50s and early 60s. You could find at least one every night. And then they were no […]