General Arizona Trivia: Can You Pass?

Arizona State Flag


1. What is Arizona’s best-known nickname>

2. Name Arizona’s five C’s.

3. What is the largest Indian tribe in the United States?

How did Sky Harbor International Airport Get its Name?

Sky Harbor

Q: How did Sky Harbor International Airport get its name?

A: We take up this question with some reluctance because the entire staff and faculty of Valley 101 has a deep abhorrence of airports, which extends to even writing about them. At the same time, however, we always thought Sky Harbor was a cool name, in a 1950-ish, let’s-go-out-to-the-airport-and-watch-the-planes-land kind of way.

Actually, the name Sky Harbor goes back to 1929, a fact we found in Desert Wings, a history of the airport written by Michael Jones, a city Aviation Department employee.

Seven Cities of Gold: The Story Behind Arizona’s Earliest Yarnspinners

Gold Rock

Most folks believe the art of pullin’ legs attached to tenderfeet began with the arrival of windjammin’ mountain men, prospectors and cowboys. But it seems that Arizonans have been tellin’ whoppers to newcomers much earlier.

Latter-day liars would be hard pressed to match the native raconteurs who greeted the Spanish explorers. Legends of golden cities provided the inspiration for the great Coronado Expedition into this area in 1540-42. The dashing Spaniard and his hard-riding conquistadores rode roughshod over the local natives in their quest for the mythical golden boulders of the madre del oro. Naturally, the natives quickly learned that the fastest way to rid their villages of the unwanted newcomers was to direct their search elsewhere.

Why is Tucson a Few Degrees Cooler than Phoenix?

Desert Sunset

Q: If Tucson and Phoenix are both in the desert, why is it always just a little bit cooler in Tucson than it is in the Valley?

A: Tucson is usually a little bit cooler than Phoenix because it is a little bit higher up. You may not actually have a sense of ascending when you drive there because you are lulled into a state of semiconsciousness because it is the most boring drive in the world.

The (Mis)Truth About Montezuma’s Castle

Montezuma Castle

Although the history of Montezuma Castle is pretty well documented, considering that nobody wrote down much of anything when it was a hot spot of ancestral civilization, there’s this one thing that sticks out as a case of mistaken identity. Or make that, mistaken transplantation.