“It is the most rewarding thing I have ever done.” Does local businesswoman Marion van Rooy: House the homeless? Feed the hungry? Save the whales? Or does she sell $90, custom-fitted, computer-measured swimming suits to women in Scottsdale? “People come in a little negative, a little worried,” says van Rooy,…
Curtis Hennig arrived at Saguaro High in Scottsdale midway during his junior year, a transfer student from Minnesota who quickly made it known he wanted to play football, wrestle and raise hell. He is remembered by his athlete friends as a friendly, fun-loving kid who loved to roughhouse. When your…
People have portraits made of their babies, right? Babies take considerable preparation and require lots of loving care and regular checkups. Plus, you always have to keep an eye on their fluids. So it makes sense that some people might want to have formal portraits made of their automobiles. Right?…
Postmodern paradise for yuppies and college kids, or the Valley’s version of Hell’s Kitchen? This is a question the residents and fashionable patrons of Tempe’s spiffy Old Town were asking themselves after the area was hit by a scary blitz of teen hooliganism that left several Mill Avenue fun-seekers bruised…
As the young players of the Phoenix Roadrunners strap on their gear and stretch their sore legs, coach Garry Unger skates graceful laps around the ice with one of his stars, Bruce Boudreau. While the men glide along during practice at Tower Plaza’s ancient rink, they tap a puck back…
Being a shopping-mall Santa is not an easy job. The words “G.I. Joe!” “Nintendo!” and “Barbie!” make Santa’s ears ring. His nose plays host to 1,000 viral invaders. His eyes acquire a permanent glaze from 10,000 flash bulbs. This weekend, members of the corps will hitch up their baggy pants…
The London Bridge, hauled brick by brick to the Colorado River, put Lake Havasu City on the map. The rest, as any student of history’s great real estate schemes will tell you, was pure salesmanship. From nothing, chain-saw czar Robert McCulloch (by erecting a totally incongruous tourist attraction) created something…
Welcome to the Big Daddy Hall of Fame! This guide is designed to help you enjoy your visit to the fullest. As you make your way through our exhibit areas, read along and discover a host of facts and figures, as well as some very interesting “behind the scenes” historical…
Let’s condemn the Cards. And own the team ourselves. Hell, we could run it as well as Bill Bidwill. And the day may come when, if we want pro football here, we’re gonna end up as team owners. We’re talking about getting ready for the day Bill Bidwill decides the…
Jude LaCava? He’s the new sports-talk host on KTAR. He moved here from Ohio. Jonathon Brandmeier? He’s the morning-drive jock on WLUP in Chicago, a former radio star in Phoenix and arguably the hottest radio personality in the country. “Karen”? She’s a mystery woman. She is either LaCava’s bisexual former…
Conventional wisdom says it can’t be done. We say it can’t not be. The downtown baseball stadium, once it’s approved by voters next week, should become a world showcase of solar power technology. The Valley’s power companies–Salt River Project and Arizona Public Service–should pool their resources and make the ballpark…
Among the first things the new city council should do–right away–is decree the blue palo verde as Phoenix’s offical tree. And then, the council should require the big blue in all official city landscaping and should encourage citizens to plant the trees in their yards. The council should do these…
This should not be the golden age of weird pickled impulse food. The Cult of Nutrition approves of neither the produ~ction nor distribution of such semi-edible items as brine-suspended Polish sausages, hard-boiled eggs, pigs’ feet and pigs’ ankles (these are better known as “pork hocks”). Yet business is good down…
The white-haired old man the kids call O.M. stands next to a slide projector, flipping through the day’s lesson. From clothes-dropping preliminaries through beatific postcoital grins, the subject of this day’s class is the heterosexual sex act (acts, actually) as practiced by two young lovers. O.M. describes the action, pausing…
It is an old saw among the creators of advertising that the best ads often don’t run. An agency will bust tail to come up with something truly clever, unforgettable and outrageous–a campaign that is sure to sell billions of sprockets. At the last minute, Mr. Spacely himself cans the…
In the New Age capital of Sedona, the great outdoors is a precious commodity. Red cliffs and lush greenery make the land one of the state’s most beautiful spots for tourists and day-tripping city folk. For others the attraction goes deeper. Sedona is world famous as a metaphysical “hot spot,”…
As long as our bad air holds out, the laser display planned for Patriots Square likely will be a great success. The park has been touted as a symbol of the Valley’s desire to build itself a high-tech industrial future. The flashy laser show will complete architect Ted Alexander’s bizarre…
Sandi Smith had everything a career woman could want, including, at least until very recently, a penis. Born as a male, Sandi hasn’t been in a men’s room in two years. Her physical appearance is that of an early-middle-aged businesswoman. Throughout her transformation, she has continued to financially support her…
File it under trickle-down benefit: Among the many aftereffects of the Encanto Park renovation is a cleaner lagoon. Observers say the fish who live there like it better. The recent renovation of the city’s most parklike park, which occurred over a period of almost two years and at a cost…
n 1962, Jack and Leah Eurich came out from Michigan looking for a saloon of their own. They found a little place they liked, a piano bar in a two-story office complex on North 12th Street near Camelback. Jack tended bar, which had been his line since the end of…
For all the Normal Guys of the world who are forced by the circumstance of their employment to have a paging device clipped to their belt–and who hate every minute of being eternally tethered to responsibility–there now comes a unit that might actually be fun to wear. Called the Sports…
Wearing his trademark pith helmet (with chin strap) and an oversize pair of sunglasses, Ulysses Horatio Penelopi Poindexter C. Mortimer Alewishus Hale Gammill II regularly drives his Model T along Central Avenue to his Rotary meeting in downtown Phoenix. The doors of the classic car he bounces along in are…
