In my travels, and professional and personal interactions with people throughout my life, when the topic of my early years in Winslow comes up, there's almost always a reference to the Eagles song. It's just our humanity trying to connect and find commonality. I don't particularly tire of it. I do resist the temptation myself when meeting somebody from a place immortalized in song or named after a classic rock song- "Hi, my name is Rhiannon" "Oh, like the Fleetwood Mac song..." or "Hi, my name is Lorelei." "Oh like the Styx song..." I try to ask something that they haven't probably heard before to engage them and ignore the obvious. I always entertain the Winslow/Eagles conversations that follow, with their insights and connections, but I haven't heard anybody say anything new on the subject for almost 3 decades now. It's not clear if songwriter Jackson Browne or Glenn Frey of the Eagles ever really stood there at any time, (probably not) but after this long, they owe me personally all other Winslow citizens past and present a proper Eagles concert.
Let me declare at the outset that this will be the longest post in the history of the world. It's heavy on the pictures too. I often think that some people must live their whole lives through the viewfinder on their camera. I try to keep that in check in the age of camera phones and social media and I even lean towards less pictures. My memory of people and places is so much more three-dimensional and emotional and "other-sensory" than pictures can capture in any case. Pictures of my dad don't smell like "Old Spice" cologne... This topic required a lot of pictures for me. I travelled up a day early and you should know that in taking all of these pictures, I actually stopped down and had two moments at each place- one through the viewfinder, and then the other with my eyes, ears, nose, skin, taste buds, mind and heart.
Further, for my Christian friends and family and other conservative types, this posting will be rather candid. Not profane at all, but just raw and uncensored. You'll learn some things about me you didn't know before and it may be shocking. I've left out names but even if you think you see yourself, just know that I love you for the lessons I learned from you.
In English, we would say,"I'm from Winslow." In Spanish, that would be expressed more like, "The place where I spent my primary years is Winslow" I think that's actually rather profound since my primary years in Winslow made really did make me who I am- for better or for worse. As I am maturing as a man, I'm mellowing and finding myself hugging people hello more often and allowing people their humanity in a more loving way, I look back and see that so much of the good and bad that is in me started being good or bad IN Winslow Arizona. Of late, I'm just trying to enhance the good and throw as much of the bad over the edge that I can.
Arizona is such a beautiful state! My experience in the Boy Scouts of America and being the son of fellow outdoor lover, Vance Whipple, gave me a great love for this place and I have spent still more time and miles hiking, mountain biking and driving around exploring it. Most people who drive through Arizona may do so on Interstate 10, The Christopher Columbus Transcontinental Highway, through the low desert, or on Interstate 40, largely through the high desert country and they miss the center of the state which is high-elevation, mountainous forest country. It's a nice and green drive to Winslow from the Phoenix area through national forest lands.
Winslow was originally settled by Mormon colonists sent specifically by Brigham Young to farm in the Little Colorado River Valley. They had fled the United States because of religious persecution and settled in Salt Lake- in Mexico. They were sent to the Little Colorado Valley from Salt Lake by a rather solemn (among Mormons) assignment but they returned to Utah after one season and called it a God-forsaken wilderness and the journals recorded that Brigham Young 'thundered' at them to get back down there and settle and farm in that valley. The community was called "Brigham City" but when the Santa Fe railroad came through 3 or 4 miles south a few years later, Brigham City died as Winslow was born and named after a railroad executive at the time. Currently, a Winslow resident/citizen is driving to refurbish and preserve the remains of that original Mormon settlement.
I snapped this pic out the window of the van of the high desert terrain up there.
I snapped this pic out the window of the van of the high desert terrain up there.
I imagine a cowboy on horseback or some settlers with wagon loads of supplies would be completely flummoxed by a canyon such as Jack's Canyon (below) outside of Winslow that runs for several miles in either direction and that is undetectable on the horizon until you get right on top of it. There are stories of Mormon Pioneers who had to spend several days disassembling wagons and moving them across such things and reassembling them on the other side or using complicated winch systems to lower larger pieces down and then hoisting them back up the other side. The other option was to send a scout several miles in either direction to find a more suitable crossing. Ether way, a simple geological feature of the landscape such as this would take several days to conquer. I drove over a bridge and it took probably 1 1/2 seconds at 65 MPH and my cold air conditioning and cold drink were sure nice.
The rest of these pictures are in no particular order but they will be the thread to guide you through my thoughts.
Here we go!
This is the La Posada Hotel and train depot. It was the La Posada when it was built. It closed and the Santa Fe Railroad used it for offices in the 70s and 80s and then they abandoned it. It was to be torn down but some preservationists and other historians arranged to have it restored and it operates as the La Posada Hotel again and caters to Route 66 enthusiasts and other travellers to Winslow. There are over 100 freight trains daily travelling through Winslow and two Amtrak stops daily- an eastbound and a westbound.
My grandfather loved Navajo and Hopi culture and sold sewing machines on the Navajo Reservation in the 1940s and by the 1950s, his endeavors had become a dress shop in Winslow, which is a border town, of sorts, to the Navajo Nation. In the 1960s the shop was becoming a department store. He was also the Mayor of Winslow from 1950 to 1953. He resigned 2 months shy of his term of office, surprising the city council with his announcement that cited health concerns and pressures of running the growing Whipple's store. I'm unaware of what, if any, health issues he had. He lived another 25 years.
I was born in Burlingame California- in the bay area. My dad brought us to Winslow to join his father's business "Whipple's of Winslow", when I was about 3. My mother was already very sick and she died of cancer in Winslow that year and her grave is there. We kinda regrouped as a family in Winslow and that's the story of how I came to call Winslow "home".
My maternal grandmother took care of me most immediately after the funeral but everybody had to get back to their lives and so I had a nanny during the day- an African-American woman named Ruby Williams (Jackson) from Roxie Mississippi that taught me how to count, got me potty trained, taught me the alphabet and she took me fishing for catfish in Clear Creek south of town about 5 miles with her boyfriend RJ when he got off work at the sawmill in the afternoons- and she loved me. I saw Ruby last year, but she wasn't around this time. I would have liked to give her another hug. This was the house we lived in at first.
My dad remarried when I was about 7. We had a "Brady Bunch" family with 9 kids and we moved to this house on Gilmore St. Boys downstairs and girls upstairs.
This is where I went to Sunday School as a little boy. They had a basement with a cozy fireplace for the kids program. Somebody has since purchased it and is using it as a home. Probably the biggest home in town. In my life's travels, a rather random personal contact, upon hearing that I was from Winslow, handed me a program from the dedication service of this building in the early 50s, which I still have in my possession. They also handed me a yearbook from Winslow High School dated 1928, which I think was the first graduating class from the new building which you'll see here later. They were not from Winslow or even Arizona and didn't remember how those two things came into their possession but they were happy to pass it on to me.
This is where I went to church from about age 9 and up. I broke my left arm on that grass out front, goofing off after a Boy Scout activity at age 13. I got tackled and my arm got tucked under the weight of my body and the weight of a couple of other boys and it cracked both the radius and the ulna about halfway through and then split them upwards toward my elbow as if they were green tree branches. It ended my violin career (thankfully) (violin players in Winslow High School were not cool and I lacked in any other coolness factors anyway- the violin wasn't helping) Even after 35 years the injury impedes any proficiency on the guitar.
This is Highway 87 that runs north from Winslow to the Navajo Nation and south from Winslow to Payson, Mesa and Tucson. I don't know why, but when we were kids, Dad would always honk the horn going through this tunnel under the Santa Fe railroad. All of the kids would scream at the top of our lungs. Who am I to mess with tradition? I honked and shouted in 2012 at age 46.
When I was in high school, this was Leemon's Appliances which happened to also have a small selection of vinyl records and 8-track tapes. I'm happy to report that I was the first kid in Winslow Arizona to own Styx's Cornerstone album. My step mother worked at Leemon's for a couple of years while I was in high school. I would go down once a week or so after school and study the Billboard magazine and make recommendations based on what I saw on the music charts as to what she should purchase for the store that could be sold. I remember exclaiming once- "Ahhh! Van Halen has a new album coming out next week." She replied "Oh, is he good?" ummmmmm "Yeah mom, he's really good. I'd say 4 or 5 copies of that one." I'm not even going to explain why that's so funny. Van Morrison is pretty good too. I still play some of his good stuff as a DJ. It appears to be a Tuxedo rental place now. Winslow is just not a tuxedo kind of a town. I wish them success in this tough economy, but I fear it will be an uphill battle.
This used to be "Whipple Park" named after my Grampa Whipple, probably in honor of his service as Mayor. It used to have some playgound equipment and picnic tables and barbecue pits. It appears to be something that the firefighters use to practice their skills now. There's big pile of wooden pallets behind the building that further make my case for my suspicion as to its purpose.
There was an artist in the 70s that supposedly went to each state and carved something like this to honor each states' place in the republic on the occasion of the bicentennial. I don't know why Winslow was chosen for the Arizona installation but I have always liked what the guy did. He spent about a week on this with a chainsaw. I rode my bike out to watch him a few times. It was located out by I-40 originally on a big mound of dirt but it always looked out of place and not as grand as its intent. The city has moved it to the south end of town near some of the Route 66 tourist stuff and it looks more at home now.
I had a great Sunday School teacher when I was 12 and 13 who lived right here. She gave me a great love for the Bible and gave me a working knowledge of the Gospel of Jesus Christ which built the foundation for my relationship with Him now. She was a lover of people and of learning and of teaching and a true model of what Christianity should be. It wasn't just dry talking- trying to get through the lesson, she was trying to get the lesson through us. In addition to bringing the scriptures to life, she introduced me to books by Zig Zigler and others who seemed to know how to apply Christian principles to life and find success and happiness. I've thanked her personally on multiple occasions.
This was and is the post office in Winslow AZ- 86047. I don't have anything to say about this other than the fact that the ZIP code has stuck in my memory for all of these years. I also remember my phone number back then. It was 289-4884 but you only had to dial the 9 and the 4 digits. I've lived at four addresses in the LA area, two addresses in north central Washington state, two addresses in Minneapolis and one in St Paul and I can't remember any of those ZIP codes. I've had several phone numbers over the years and I can't remember any of those either.
This store front used to be the office and printing shop for "The Reminder" a throwaway advertising rag that came out on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday nights. When I was 9 years old, I started delivering to 125 homes on Apache Avenue. We'd pick them up around 7 or 8PM (some nights as late as 10PM if they were extra busy or had extra pages from lots of ads or had a printer break down) We would get paid a fractional percentage per page- it came to $5 or $6/wk and also on Tuesday nights it would be "Nickel Night". We would knock on doors for tips instead of just leaving the papers on the doorstep. When the homeowner opened the door, we would say "Nickel Night" and get a nickel. If everybody on your route was home, and answered the door and gave a gratuity, it would add up to another $6. Most of us delivery boys got smart and realized that the term "Nickel Night" limited the tip to a nickel. The term "Reminder Night" was much more open ended and a conscientious delivery boy who always got the papers right on the porch or tucked under the mat could get a quarter or even two quarters.
When I was 11, I added The Winslow Mail- a more traditional local weekly newspaper on Thursday afternoons. I think my route had about 150 homes on it. I got paid strictly by the paper from subscriptions but it was not uncommon to get $5, $10 or even a $20 in a card for Christmas if you got the paper on the porch consistently. Notice that both buildings are vacant. They still kinda exist loosely in an online format, but the Winslow Mail folded in 2008. Although it is closed, it is still the longest running and oldest newspaper in Arizona. The mighty Arizona Republic still has 4 years to go to catch up and beat them.
When I was 13, I added the Arizona Republic to my deliveries. 7 days a week, 365 days a year, 165 homes, rain or shine or sleet or snow, at 430AM. The papers would be flown in to Winslow airport at about 330 each morning and then dropped at several neighborhood drop spots for local carriers. This was my Uncle Tom's house and my cousins Tommy, Rory and Burke. About 6 boys knelt in this driveway every morning, folding and slipping a rubber band on to each paper. We had canvas bags that fit on the handlebars of our bikes and with some practice, you could really learn how to make those papers fly and land just where you want them. I have a defective sports gene and I'm rather clumsy when it comes to basketballs and baseballs, but I had a knack for flinging a newspaper. More often than not, I could get it not only on the doorstep but leaning up against the door so that when the homeowner opened, the paper would fall inside their house!
I was invited to the wedding rehearsal dinner for the family that I went to Winslow to work for this week and I had the pleasure of sitting with the grandmother of the groom. She's 84 and sharp as a tack. When she oriented herself as to who I was (by identifying my father and grandfather) she was most complimentary about our family's contribution to Winslow and further, she said that I had been her paper boy and that, after me, she has never again had decent delivery service. That's a lot of years to suffer with crappy service and still bother with the paper that could be had in an online format.
I was riding on a swing set adjacent to the ball park (near the offending restroom) at about age 8 or 9 and I took a high-speed and high arching foul ball right in the lower gut on an upswing- my body was positioned just right to get hit squarely and solidly. It knocked me off the swing which landed me flat on my back on the ground and stunned my diaphragm (knocked the wind out of me) so that I couldn't breathe for a minute or so.
That park also represented the first time I saw pornography of any kind as a little boy. There were some discarded playing cards with nude women in various poses. I was innocent and not ready for that and certainly didn't seek it out, but it was as if I had been exposed to a virus. There was a time later in my life when pornography would dominate life and my thinking. I've often thought of the story in the New Testament where some men were trying to get under Jesus' skin by asking, "Who did sin? this man or his parents? that he was born blind even from his birth?" Jesus replied, "Nobody sinned, he was just born blind. That's all. It just IS. He was born blind so that a miracle of God could be manifest in his life." (I'm paraphrasing there- Jesus was always very frank but not that casual.) The chance exposure to porn was not a sin that I committed, but it was just a circumstance in my life. A circumstance such, that a miracle of God could be manifest as I broke free. Frankly, I give gratitude to God for it because without it, I may have never come to know the gift of the Atonement of Jesus Christ in such a profound and personal way.
Here's what used to be the Rialto Theater. One family owned both this movie theater and the local drive-in theater. They would show one movie per week, drive in open during the summer months, indoor theater open during the winter months. I don't know if you are picking up a pattern here, The Reminder- gone, Winslow Mail- gone, the Rialto- gone... I can't remember any specific films that I saw here, I vaguely remember "War of the Worlds" but I do know that I saw Jaws at the drive-in theater when I was 8. I think I was asleep and my head was on my step mom's lap. I woke up just at the scene where the shark is on the back of the boat tipping it upwards and the crusty old fisherman/sailor slides down into its mouth to be chewed to death. Not a good time to wake up as an 8 yr old. That movie so frightened me that I STILL- 38 years later- I STILL am frightened of water. I'm not non functional, but I do freak out once in awhile in the ocean and in even in lakes and rivers. Well-played Spielberg, well-played indeed!
Here's a couple of pictures of Clear Creek out south of town- previously described catfishing expeditions happened here. Great swimming hole for high school kids. I was a bit of a nerd in high school but I had just enough moxie to be able to hang here at times. It was always great for jumping off rocks and barbecuing and for others- drinking and carousing with the opposite sex, speeding and other dangerous driving on the road to and from and perhaps a few other unnamed nefarious activities for teenagers.
I was competing in a 5th grade spelling bee and I know spelling pretty well. Even in 5th grade, I had a very good grasp on the English language. My word was "balcony." Mr McNeil pronounced it as "belcony." I had him repeat it twice, per the rules, and each time, he repeated "belcony." I fought my instinct that he was wrong and resigned myself to the thought that that maybe there was a word that I didn't know. I spelled it B E L C O N Y and was eliminated. I've always remembered that and have always regretted not trusting my instincts and I curse him for possibly altering the course of my life! If I had just won that spelling bee, my whole life would have been different.
This is Washington Elementary. I didn't attend there but this place was built when I was in high school to replace an older version of itself, if I remember correctly. I'm not sure why, but this picture made me remember a bully I had in my life. I had been teased regularly and assaulted more than a dozen times over the course of the years that I had to cross paths with him. I've had a hard time searching my memory, I'm not sure if he moved away by high school or not, but when I put up this picture of the dome, I remembered hearing that he (the bully), was playing around on a construction site during the night- perhaps this one- or perhaps on a construction site in the place he had moved to (I really don't remember) and he fell to his death. (Post script- a reader indicated that there was, in fact, a death on this construction site and named him to me. He was not the bully. Chalk that up to a couple of stories combined in my memory.)
Here's what I did at the Elks Lodge for this wedding I was hired to play for. It was sure good to come back to my home town with the professional guns blazing. There were lots of people who even seemed intimidated by me. They wanted to say hello but felt the need to ask somebody else to ask me... that's so high school!
My first rock band was kinda born inside this house. It was me with an electric piano and a friend with an electric guitar and we played for several weeks just getting some bugs worked out.
We added another guitarist and a bass player and there was a kid in our school who had some drums and lived in this house which is now a bed and breakfast. We kinda auditioned him because he had a cool drum set and his parents seemed supportive and they had money. It wasn't a good fit. Plus, the house creeped me out. I think it was and still is haunted. My cousin Tommy eventually filled the slot on drums for a summer that got us up and running. Of the 6 people that eventually played in that rock band, 4 are still employed professionally in music. 2 performing and 2 in behind-the-scenes technical areas. The one guy that I would have thought would still be in music, the one with the most guitar talent and natural good looks and great hair is a dry waller. He has 10 kids!
If you turn the camera left, you'd see this. The Whipple's store also moved from Route 66 to this new mall. It occupied the Family Dollar and the vacant space next to it. The space in the corner further to the left was the corporate office. The last time I was in Winslow a couple of years ago, the railroad had offices in the vacant space that is now for lease. My career in entertainment was kinda born in this parking lot at a big retail promotion.
This Circle K store was at the end of my Reminder paper route and I pissed away huge amounts of my earned money on candy and comic books from here. That candy wreaked havoc on my teeth and I just spent $2900 on dental work earlier this year to finally deal with the last of the fall-out from that stupidity.
This was part of the National Guard Armory out by the airport when I was a kid. It's a broken down hangar now and it looks like the Forest Service is using it to store junk parts for fire fighting aircraft. Several windows are broken out so I don't think it's anything important going on in there. The airport is now named "Winslow-Lindbergh" after Charles Lindbergh who designed it. When it was built, and for several decades, it was the only all-weather airport between Albuquerque and Los Angeles.
My first kiss was in this house. It was a dance party for about 15-20 teenagers when I was 15 or so. We had 7 of those 45rpm 7" single records that we played over and over in a rotation and it seemed to work. One of them was Commodores "Sail on" which I still play sometimes in my piano set. I was dancing with a girl that I had the warmies for and we turned our heads in for a kiss and I'm not sure I even got her lips but when you are 15, it still counts. I have 35,000 songs on my DJ hard-drive now. The question is, do I have the right 90 songs for THIS event?
This place used to be a Coca Cola bottling plant. In the early 80s, the Federal Bureau of Printing and Engraving was considering a new printing plant to print paper money and Winslow was among a half dozen contenders in the West. The Whipple's stores had just gone out of business and my dad had been hired as the City Administrator. He got a committee together to wine and dine the advance team that was coming to check Winslow out. Part of the festivities included tour of the city, including this closed plant that could house the printing operations, and a reception/barbecue in our back yard (house pictured earlier.) He hired a local bar band with the instruction that they needed to know The Eagles' "Take it Easy" The band dutifully played it as the lunch was winding down and they did a great job as I remember. Then my dad got up to speak and espouse the beauties of Winslow, Arizona and to invite them to bring their operation here. As part of his remarks, he talked about a song as if it was ancient history- the song was about 7 years old at the time- "The kids used to sing a song about 'standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona' and the song was about taking it easy" I never told him that the song is not actually complimentary. Ultimately, the government not only chose not to come to Winslow, but not to add a printing plant at all. This building still sits vacant more than 30 years later.
There were some monument signs placed out at the freeway ramps at the time also that said "Take it Easy in Winslow Arizona!" Those are gone too.
Well, for better or for worse, I stood on a corner in Winslow Arizona. Nobody in a flat bed ford slowed down to take a look at me- girl or otherwise. Whether anybody from the Eagles ever actually stood on any corner anywhere in Winslow is kinda irrelevant, they were making the point that they were down and out. It could be any number of places that could make that point in a song, but you gotta admit, Winslow, Arizona does kinda fit the bill. I was never one to wait around for someone to save me. I left Winslow at 4AM on the morning after high school graduation when I was 17 years old. I left Winslow and all things Winslow behind. I regret not nurturing and protecting friendships and family relationships that I should have nurtured and protected. It sounds shocking now as a grown man saying so, but I didn't know that I was supposed to. Thank heavens for Facebook getting me reconnected with people who blessed my life in the past. I'd like to hope that my contribution will bless their lives going forward. A friend of mine from California actually took this next shot of me on a previous Winslow visit. Note what a great job the artist did depicting a flat bed ford reflected in the window. There's an eagle perched on the window above and two lovers embracing in the window on the right- it's just a painting on a wall!
Well, for better or for worse, I stood on a corner in Winslow Arizona. Nobody in a flat bed ford slowed down to take a look at me- girl or otherwise. Whether anybody from the Eagles ever actually stood on any corner anywhere in Winslow is kinda irrelevant, they were making the point that they were down and out. It could be any number of places that could make that point in a song, but you gotta admit, Winslow, Arizona does kinda fit the bill. I was never one to wait around for someone to save me. I left Winslow at 4AM on the morning after high school graduation when I was 17 years old. I left Winslow and all things Winslow behind. I regret not nurturing and protecting friendships and family relationships that I should have nurtured and protected. It sounds shocking now as a grown man saying so, but I didn't know that I was supposed to. Thank heavens for Facebook getting me reconnected with people who blessed my life in the past. I'd like to hope that my contribution will bless their lives going forward. A friend of mine from California actually took this next shot of me on a previous Winslow visit. Note what a great job the artist did depicting a flat bed ford reflected in the window. There's an eagle perched on the window above and two lovers embracing in the window on the right- it's just a painting on a wall!
Here's one of hundreds of tourists who stand on this corner in Winslow and take pictures like the one you see above. Note that a tourist or other enthusiast has parked a Ford on the curb there... in the left of the shot?
The great philosopher Popeye once said, "I am what I am and it's all that I am." (He also said, "I'm strong to the finish, because I eats my spinach!") Instead of fighting against it, I just AM. I'm from Winslow- and that fact damaged me terribly in some ways, but in other ways, I don't think I could have made it through my hard-times without some of the lessons learned there. It's not always people committing evil acts against us. It's just life happening to us.
You may not believe this, but the thought actually crossed my mind as I took a day to reflect on my time in Winslow and look at the place of my primary years with more mellow and seasoned eyes- I thought that I could actually live here and make a go of it.
