Diamond in the Rough: An Illustrated History of Arizona

Diamond in the Rough: An Illustrated History of Arizona by Marshall Trimble (Arizona's official State Historian) tells the story of this great state in colorful language with over four hundred photographs and illustrations. During the 1850s, when the American occupation began, Arizona was a remote western part of the New Mexico territory, still unmapped and unsettled. The new residents clamored for separate status from New Mexico, and in 1863 the new territory of Arizona was created. The fabulous lodes of gold and silver in the 1860s focused national attentionn on the new territory; however, nature kept out all but the hardiest of pioneers. The arrival of railroads in the 1880s was a dramatic achievement. The elements - incessant wind, long droughts, and searing heat, not to mention the intractable Apaches, gunslingers, and an immoral majority of unchurched, unmarried, and unwashed citizens - gave Arizona a notorious reputation that spread far and wide.