cactus

This slim book about native plants found in the Phoenix regional area, circa 1933, was written at a time when the population of the city was just under 50,000 people. It’s a self published book with the author providing both text and simple pen and ink illustrations of the plants throughout the book, including the book’s cover.

“Civilization Follows the Improved Highway.” That was and still is the motto of the enduring and always alluring travel magazine Arizona Highways.  It was first published in 1925 as an engineering newsletter by the Arizona Highway Department. By the 1930s, it had segued into a magazine documenting the road construction of the expanding highway system throughout Arizona. In the 1940s, the magazine excelled as one of the first color illustrated travel magazines at the forefront of color printing technology.

“Civilization Follows the Improved Highway.” That was and still is the motto of the enduring and always alluring travel magazine Arizona Highways.  It was first published in 1925 as an engineering newsletter by the Arizona Highway Department. By the 1930s, it had segued into a magazine documenting the road construction of the expanding highway system throughout Arizona. In the 1940s, the magazine excelled as one of the first color illustrated travel magazines at the forefront of color printing technology.

Cacti are inextricably linked to our vision of the desert. They are native to the Americas with many species found in Arizona, including the state flower, the Saguaro. This book is written by a Cactaceae (cactus family) botanical specialist, Lyman Benson, and illustrated by Lucretia Breazeale Hamilton, a botanical illustrator well known for her drawings of southwest plants. There are many line drawings with color photographs of cacti. This second edition has information on botanical names and taxonomical classification on the species found in Arizona.