Fifity years ago, friends and car junkies Tom Barrett and Russ Jackson held an auction of their personal auto collections. What was supposed to be a one-off event turned into one of Scottsdale's premier occasions each year. This year, collectors, buyers, and curious onlookers alike were surrounded by more than 1,800 cars at Westworld in Scottsdale. Regarded as one of the world's greatest collector car auctions, auto enthusiasts from all over arrive in the desert in hopes of being the highest bid...
Jan 31, 2022•17 min
Few laws have influenced high school sports more than Title IX, which turns 50 this summer. The law prohibits the discrimination based on sex in any programs or activities in all federally funded educational institutions. This includes both middle and high schools in addition to universities. Before Title IX, there were pioneering women who fought for inclusion and equality in sports. One of those is Ina Gittings. Gittings was the first director of physical education for women at the University ...
Jan 24, 2022•27 min
Nearly 60 years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr delivered the famous "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to more than 250,000 people in Washington, D.C. Today, the nation recognizes his birthday to honor his life and commitment to the civil rights movement in America. For the city of Mesa, this celebration is close to home. They've been hosting a parade and festival in his memory for 24 years after a long battle to get the holiday recognized at a city level. In this week'...
Jan 17, 2022•19 min
In its heyday, Fiesta Mall was "the center of the universe" for the East Valley. That's how Mesa Mayor John Giles puts it. Situated on the western edge of the city, by the US-60 and Alma School, Fiesta Mall was the premiere shopping spot for decades. In 2017 it closed its doors, with the last holdouts shuttering in 2020. Since then, the 1.2 million square foot shopping center has been boarded up and unusable. There were talks of converting it into multi-use property with campuses for both educat...
Jan 10, 2022•19 min
Winter is finally upon us. This past Christmas Eve was the wettest since 1944. It is a welcome relief after hotter than average fall. December 1 shattered all previous records with a high of 85 degrees. Thoughts of frosty nights seem like winter fantasy for Phoenix. However, January is typical the Valley’s coldest month. This has horticultural novices and experts thinking about protecting their gardens.. In this episode of Valley 101 we get to the root of how to over-winter your plants Arizona s...
Jan 03, 2022•9 min
Happy holidays, listeners! The Valley 101 team is off for the rest of the year. Today we have a few past stories to highlight to continue the holiday spirit. We look forward to answering more questions and telling more stories in 2022. Feel free to follow the podcast on twitter @ a-z-c-podcasts and subscribe wherever you get your shows. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dec 27, 2021•7 min
On the southern edge of Gila County, snuggled into a valley surrounded by in the mountains, there is a town called Christmas. Now, the town of Christmas is a ghost town, but in the 1930s it had about 1,000 residents and a very popular post office. While people from all over the world would visit the post office to get the highly desired postmark at the holidays, the residents of Christmas lived there because of the copper mining. In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona R...
Dec 20, 2021•15 min
Festive feasting is one of the highlights of the holiday season. Many people in the U.S. traditionally enjoy a juicy ham or golden turkey and popular culture has reaffirmed those dishes. But there are those who enjoy foods that speak of their heritage and family traditions. Festive foods are a big part of holiday gatherings. It just wouldn’t be the holidays without that one special dish you have only this time of the year. In this week's episode of Valley 101, producer Kaely Monahan asks some of...
Dec 13, 2021•23 min
Have you ever been on a hike, a walk or a stroll in the Arizona mountains and came across an interesting looking rock? Did you take out your phone and browse the internet to find out what kind of rock you found? If so, you just might be a rockhound. Rockhounding is the recreational study and collection of rocks, minerals and gems. Some rockhounds, or amateur geologists, find that Arizona's vast mountain ranges and developed mines are great places to explore for interesting and unique rocks. In t...
Dec 06, 2021•11 min
Still picking at Thanksgiving leftovers, we here at AZ Central’s Podcast team turn to the end of year holidays. Hanukkah has begun, and Christmas is just around the corner. Unlike much of the country, we celebrate our holidays in light jackets and flip flops. No snow for us in the Valley of the Sun. But we’re still able to get into the holiday spirit just as easily as our wintery neighbors with our local traditions – snow or not! In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona R...
Nov 29, 2021•13 min
Most of us are familiar with the story of Thanksgiving. In 1620, a ship called The Mayflower traveled from Plymouth, England to the New World in search of religious separation and a fresh start. In 1621, they enjoyed a bountiful meal after the harvest with the Wampanoag tribe, expressing their gratitude for helping them learn to survive in their new home. Many of us might believe that this was the first interaction between European settlers and Indigenous peoples who lived in what is now America...
Nov 22, 2021•19 min
When you think of Arizona, what comes to mind? Sprawling deserts or urban sprawl? The Grand Canyon or the mighty White Mountains? Hollywood has painted our state as a wild, uncivilized frontier filled with dangers and adventure. Rugged landscapes split by sharp mountains and dotted with scraggly brush, and the sentinel of the desert. The saguaro cactus. Found only in the Sonoran Desert, the saguaro cactus has a shallow but wide root network – snaking outwards in the hunt for water rather than bu...
Nov 15, 2021•26 min
Arizona is known for being a transplant state. For some, it was the attraction of the warm winters and beautiful mountain views that brought them to the Valley. For others, well, maybe it was their job or simply they just needed a change. Regardless, a lot of people who now call Arizona home didn't grow up in the Valley of the Sun. And maybe after a while you begin to realize, you're not in Kansas anymore. Like a listener who submitted a question to the Valley 101 team. He said that he’s lived i...
Nov 08, 2021•14 min
In Arizona, there are over 300 golf courses and more than 200 of them can be found in metro Phoenix. According to a study commissioned by the Arizona Alliance for Golf, in 2019 more than 10 million rounds of golf were played in the state. The state is largely seen as a golf destination, but how did that happen? In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, producer Maritza Dominguez breaks down how golf's popularity grew in the Valley. Learn more ab...
Nov 01, 2021•15 min
The number of West Nile virus cases in Arizona continues to grow, making 2021 a record year for cases. As the number of probable and confirmed cases rise, Maricopa County is working on prevention methods. Cases of West Nile can range from mild to severe. This year, the number of severe cases is also on the rise. So what is West Nile virus, and how is it being prevented and researched? In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, producer Alexandra ...
Oct 25, 2021•26 min
In August, the City of Glendale announced it will be cutting ties with the Arizona Coyotes after this season. The relationship between the hockey team and Glendale has been a long and rocky road from nearly the very beginning. But the team hasn’t announced where they’re going next. There isn’t another NHL-sized arena in the Valley so it begs the question, where in the world will the Arizona Coyotes play next? In September, the team proposed a $1.7 billion hockey arena and entertainment district ...
Oct 18, 2021•21 min
When you think of water canals, you might think of Venice, Italy, Amsterdam in the Netherlands or even Venice, California. You probably don’t think about Phoenix. But metro Phoenix actually has more miles of canals than all three of those places combined. The city's canal systems are operated by the Salt River Project and the Central Arizona Project for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. But Phoenix has had canals long before the Reclamation Act was signed in 1902. In this week's episode of Valley ...
Oct 11, 2021•16 min
Drivers on a dark and lonely stretch of desert highway knew they had made it to the outer edges of the Phoenix area when they saw the bright, flashing lights of a motel sign. It was the 1960s, and the neon sign that served as a beacon to travelers was dubbed the Diving Lady. The motel sign on Main Street in Mesa continues to hold a special place in the hearts of many. What is the history behind this 70 foot motel sign and how did it become a rallying point for Mesa? In this week's episode of Val...
Oct 04, 2021•21 min
If you ever been driving past Camelback Mountain or Piestewa Peak, you may have looked out the car window and seen a house perched along a ridge. From the road it looks as if it's almost built into the mountain. But in reality it's built beside the mountain. The process is costly and arduous, but wanting an unrestricted view of the Valley is a trend that's nearly 100 years old. And even before it was a trend, it was a necessity to build up into the mountains. In this week's episode of Valley 101...
Sep 27, 2021•11 min
Before the southwest Valley was filled with grocery stores, an airport and real estate, it was home to Latino farmworkers employed by Goodyear Farms. Hundreds lived in five different camps made up of tents and wood-framed houses.The tight-knit communities were the first permanent residents of what is now Litchfield Park. In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, producer Maritza Dominguez walks us through the history of the Mexican laborers who ...
Sep 20, 2021•21 min
In November 2020, voters passed Proposition 207, the Smart and Safe Arizona Act legalizing recreational marijuana in the state. Since January of this year, Arizonans over the age of 21 with a valid ID have been able to purchase marijuana in dispensaries across the state within limit. Now that there are regulations and rules, long time users, medical patients or beginners all have questions about what legal recreational marijuana means in Arizona. In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast f...
Sep 13, 2021•32 min
On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Andrew Bird,13, woke up to the sounds of his mother running down the hallway and into his older sister's room. As he made his way into the room, Bird saw on the television footage of American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 crashing into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. Bird, now 33, remembers thinking to himself, “I think dad is around there somewhere. I think something is very wrong there and we are in a lot of trouble right now.” H...
Sep 06, 2021•25 min
Before COVID-19, the human civilization was plagued by tuberculosis, a disease that dates back thousands of years. In the late 1800s physicians encouraged people with tuberculosis to travel to Phoenix where it was believed was the warm, dry climate would help. With an influx of TB patients to Phoenix, it wasn't long before the city pushed them outside Phoenix and would become known as Sunnyslope. Although help was given, tuberculosis continues to be a worldwide killer of millions each year. Lear...
Aug 30, 2021•16 min
Summers in Arizona mean heat, triple-digit temperatures, and desperately trying to stay cool. But summers in Arizona also mean monsoons - big, bright thunderstorms returning rain to the desert. During the summer monsoon season, Phoenix receives one-third of its annual rainfall, a necessary relief to help combat the drought that 83% of the state is experiencing, according to the National Weather Service. While monsoons bring reprieve from the extreme heat and aid in the drought, they are sometime...
Aug 23, 2021•20 min
Health experts have been tracking a new variant of COVID-19 they say is nearly twice as contagious as previous strains and causing more breakthrough infections. That strain is called the delta variant. First identified in India, the delta variant is now the dominate strain in Arizona. What is the delta variant? What does it mean for us? Are vaccines mitigating community spread of the variant? In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we answer t...
Aug 16, 2021•17 min
Why do home builders continue building out instead of up, and what's the deal with basements in the Valley? In this week's episode, producer Keith Reed speaks with experts about caliche, a hard surface deposit consisting of multiple compounds such as sodium nitrate and chloride, which hinders efforts to dig deep in the ground. The Valley 101 also met with a City of Phoenix official and a local architect about how efforts are being made toward building more high-rise residential buildings in down...
Aug 09, 2021•14 min
Within the city of Mesa is a five and a half square mile section that gets its energy from the city's Energy Resource Department. It covers most of the downtown Mesa area from Brown Road to Broadway Road and Extension Road to Stapley Drive. It's not a perfect square, but the area covers about 17,000 people. While the Salt River Project and Arizona Public Services electric serve the rest of the state, Mesa has owned and operated its own electrical utility since 1917. At that time, the city purcha...
Aug 02, 2021•13 min
Jagger Eaton, 20, grew up in Mesa with the hopes of making it to the Olympics competing in skateboarding. He reached his live long goal on July 24, when he won the first ever bronze Olympic medal in street skateboarding. Eaton is now back in California and joined producer Maritza Dominguez for a one-on-one conversation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Jul 28, 2021•11 min
USA Skateboarding, the official governing board of the sport, announced in June the first Olympic skateboarding team for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The team includes 12 skateboarders, three of which have Arizona ties. Jagger Eaton, Alana Smith and Brighton Zeuner all started their career in Arizona. How are there so many Arizonans on the team? What impact has the Valley had in the growth of the sport? In this week's episode of Valley 101, a podcast from The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, we d...
Jul 26, 2021•21 min
When you think of Bigfoot, the Pacific Northwest comes to mind, not Arizona. So, it came as no shock when Valley 101 listener Chris Shaver, who lived in Oregon prior to moving to Arizona, asked if there are Sasquatch or other mythical creatures in the Valley. Surprisingly enough, sightings of a Sasquatch-like creature have been reported in Arizona, including one in 1903 near the Grand Canyon according to an article in The Arizona Republican. Several years later, when more sightings of a similar ...
Jul 19, 2021•18 min
