Quest for the Golden Circle: The Four Corners and the Metropolitan West, 1945-1970

Description

Until World War II, the Four Corners Region—where New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona meet—was a collection of isolated rural towns. In the postwar baby boom era, however, small communities like Farmington, New Mexico, became bustling municipalities with rapidly expanding economies. In Quest for the Golden Circle, Arthur Gomez traces the development of the Four Corners' two industries, mining and tourism, to discover how each contributed to the economic and urban transformation of this region during the 1950s and 1960s.

Focusing on four cities—Durango, Colorado; Moab, Utah; Flagstaff, Arizona; and Farmington, New Mexico—Gomez chronicles how these towns played key roles in the West's dramatic postwar expansion. Cities such as Denver, Albuquerque, Phoenix, Tucson, El Paso, and Salt Lake City all grew through use of the abundant petroleum, uranium, natural gas, timber, and other natural resources extracted from the Four Corners region.

But the energy boom in these towns was not to last. With the arrival of foreign oil bringing economic growth to a halt in the early 1970s, town leaders turned again to the land to stimulate their economy. This time, the resource was a seemingly inexhaustible one—tourism. Gomez examines how business-minded citizens marketed the area's scenic wonders and established the entire region as a tourist destination. Their efforts were further assisted by the selection of stunning federal lands—Mesa Verde, Grand Canyon, and Arches National Parks—as treasures protected and promoted by the National Park Service.

Both mining and tourism, however, were beset by complex new problems and issues. Extensive highways, for instance, were planned to bisect a Navajo reservation. As Gomez illustrates, the growing cities in the Four Corners region felt tremendous competing pressures between outside business powers and local needs as their extractive economy boomed and busted and as they then struggled to attract tourism dollars. In addition, he highlights the prominent roles played by federal agencies like the Atomic Energy Commission and the National Park Service in shaping regional destiny.

An outstanding analysis of the complexities of postwar development, Quest for the Golden Circle successfully illuminates the history of one region within the larger story of the modern American West.

Get the book

Amazon.com

Search the book

eBay.com

Search the book

Similar books

• 

  边际效用学派的兴起

  By （美）理查德·豪伊著；晏智杰译

  指数, 107 ;威斯蒂德, P . :和杰文斯, 10,120-123 ;早年在伦敦, 118 ;和数学, 119,131 ;和比顿, 119 ;和肖, 125-126 ;和青年经济学会, 130 ;和门格尔, 131 ;论尺度, 131-133 ;和“边际的”一词, 134 ;论个人比较效用, 135-136 ;和边际效用, 135-136 ;论劳动 ...

• 

  The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, in the Light of the Researches of Lewis H. Morgan

  By Friedrich Engels

  Presents the text of the German Socialist's classic work on the structure of primitive society and early civilization

• 

  Trade Wars Against America: A History of United States Trade and Monetary Policy

  By William J. Gill

  A History of United States Trade and Monetary Policy William J. Gill. The press played the successful supply ... Douglas MacArthur had sprung his amphibious end run around the Communist lines with the surprise landing at Inchon .

• 

  Free Trade, Free World: The Advent of GATT

  By Thomas W. Zeiler

  In Encylopedia of U.S. Foreign Relations , Volume 2 , edited by Bruce W. Jentleson and Thomas G. Paterson . New York : Oxford University Press , 1997 . Coombs , Herbert C. “ The Keynesian Crusade . ” Postwar Reconstruction Seminar ...

• 

  Change and Development in the Twentieth Century

  By Thomas C. Patterson

  Mallon , Florencia E. 1994 The Promise and Dilemma of Subaltern Studies : Perspectives from Latin American History . The American Historical Review , vol . 99 , no . 5 , pp . 1491-1515 . Washington . Mandel , Ernest 1989 Beyond ...

• 

  Working Americans, 1880-1999: Social movements

  By Scott Derks

  Edward Sienkiewicz , a Polish clothing manufacturer living in Portland , Maine , felt an obligation to help Poland's Jewish community in any way he could after the devastation brought to that country during World War II .

• 

  1898: The Birth of the American Century

  By David Traxel

  George Moore, 4 Smith, Page, 312 Snow, Edward Rowe, 300 Social Gospel movement, 77, 114 Social Register, 146 Sousa, john Philip, 35, 38 South African Republic, 89 South Omaha Stoclzrnan, 157 Spain Ambassador Dupuy de Lome, 96—9, ...

• 

  International Macroeconomics: Recent Developments

  By Amalia Morales Zumaquero

  ... 214, 235, 273, 332, 382. 383 firms, 208. 209. 213, 215, 217, 219, 228. 235, 237. 289. 333, 354, 355 first generation. 272, 273, 274, 278, 280 fiscal deficit. 86. 288, 337, 355, 356 fiscal policy. 26. 144. 336. 351. 356. 357 fishing.

• 

  现代经济分析史

  By （英）罗杰·巴克豪斯著；晏智杰译

  (英)罗杰·巴克豪斯著;晏智杰译. 到。因此,俄林不像凯恩斯那样把转账问题看得那么严重􀃊􀁍􀁓 ... 对国际汇率论进行了最广泛讨论的智杰译文集是卡塞尔,他是“购买力平价”这个术语的提出者􀃊􀁍􀁗。这个理论最早的表述是现代经济分析史最简单的:“假定 A 和 B两 ...

• 

  大癫狂：非同寻常的大众幻想与群众性癫狂

  By

  这些都是亲人眼中的圣物,每个人都清楚其中蕴涵着无与伦比的情感。 ... 除了这些让家人珍爱的圣物,还有一些纪念品也是让人们无法割舍的:被人们所欣赏以及崇高美德神圣化的东西,比如一本莎士比亚(Shakespeare)亲手签名的蒙田文集;保存在安特卫普的一把椅子, ...