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So I'm sitting there in a bar, talking with a guy I know, and he's complaining to me about his job. This guy works in a furniture warehouse and he says that one of his coworkers is a wrestler. A wrestler, huh? Yes, indeed. He is the Drifter. And the...

"I used to look at him and say to myself, 'Now, that's what I call a white boy!'" wheezes Marcus Hesby, dissolving into a laugh that starts with sheee and ends about 30 seconds later and an octave lower with it. Hesby is an old man now, a retired hod...

Last March, Eve Edwards took advantage of what she sensed was a grand opportunity. She knew her ex-boyfriend, Jerry Ingalls, was immersed in a legal battle with his ex-wife--a top Dial Corporation executive named Joan Potter. Edwards also knew Ingalls had been talking about suing Dial for allegedly conspiring with...

The Luhrs building, at the intersection of First Avenue and Jefferson Street, is somewhat magnificent--by Phoenix architectural standards. But inside the 1920s-era art-deco structure, the flat, patterned carpet has aged and the hallways smell, faintly, like dirty laundry. It is here, on the first floor, that you will find the...

In 1962, Grover Cleveland Thompson decided to spruce up the front lawn of his Sunnyslope home with a salute to the then-current Seattle World's Fair. Using concrete, marbles, broken pop bottles, shattered ceramic figurines and shards of brightly colored Fiesta Ware, the retired plant foreman created a nine-foot-tall replica of...

It's Friday night at Scottsdale Stadium. Michael Jordan walks up the dugout steps at 6:41 p.m. As he reaches the top step, Jordan looks around the stands as if to count the house. When Jordan ruled the National Basketball Association and led the Chicago Bulls to three consecutive titles, he...

Constable Burt Alvord, who served Willcox in the 1890s, made news when it was discovered that he used the law enforcement office as a front for his other profession--robbing trains. As the story goes, Alvord left behind his partner in crime, "Three-finger" Jack Dunlap, after Dunlap had been shot. Dunlap...

Le Big MacFor two years, a federal grand jury has investigated Governor Fife Symington's business dealings. The state's chief executive is suspected of being the Mac Daddy of phony financial statements. Financial statements are the backbone of all loans, credit lines, investments, partnerships, debt restructuring, write-downs and all the other...

The vacant expression in Joe Stedino's eyes shocks me. I expect him to look more menacing, more unfeeling, like a Mafia soldier from a Mario Puzo novel. But instead Stedino seems vulnerableÏperhaps a little lost. For years he has suffered from a panic disorder. In order to raise the courage...

Last month the MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour devoted a segment to Arizona. The idea of the broadcast, loosely speaking, was to discuss the sheer wonder of living in a state where seemingly normal adults have actually elected into office the stunted race-baiter Evan Mecham, tsetse fly survivor Rose Mofford, a Shriners' caravan...

THE GOVERNMENT MAN recalls the first time he laid eyes on a Klump. "One of the brothers was riding horseback over the south side of the Dos Cabezas Mountains," says Larry Humphrey of the federal Bureau of Land Management. "I noticed that his horse wasn't wearing any shoes and I...

ARE YOU REALLY HAPPY with your current politicians? Perhaps Doug Wead can inspire you. Arizona's newest big-time politician, Wead often tries to display a disarming sense of humor. He doesn't jab you in the ribs; he's kinder and gentler. At his May 12 campaign kickoff rally for the state's newest...

The coroner's report said it all; Ric Rankins' death on July 10 was a "homicide." A scrawny 144 pounds, Rankins had his voice box crushed by a choke hold. Unnamed employees of Smitty's grocery chain killed the 43-year-old black man in a west-side parking lot. Three days later, the Arizona...

Steve Emerine swears he's not a cop. A spokesman for the University of Arizona's controversial Mount Graham International Observatory project, 58-year-old Emerine claims he attends campus demonstrations only to observe and answer media questions. "Under no circumstances, that I can think of, would I be involved in telling police who...

Cody Custer groaned and removed an ice pack from his aching back. Clad only in his underwear, he began the laborious process of taping a brace to his right knee. He had a trainer tape his right ankle, then wrap a huge Ace bandage around his thigh, waist and groin...

Claudia Webb can't forget the day her late husband was betrayed by his union. Reed Webb was a new salesman for the U S West Direct Yellow Pages in Phoenix. In 1991, his second year, Webb's sales were near the top of the highly competitive 30-member staff that sold the...

It's said that Sam Coppersmith surprised even himself the night he snatched Arizona's First Congressional District from an incumbent Republican who seemed much better suited to the conservative East Valley district. It was called the upset of 1992, a race so close that Coppersmith, a pro-choice Democrat making his first...

Felix Solis steps down into the hole with a tiny pink box. Clutching it close to him, he closes his eyes and prays aloud. "Lord, I hope you will accept this baby into Heaven, where things are better than they are here," Solis says, his voice cracking. "Please watch over...

An Introduction Since my book, Secret Ceremonies, was published last month by William Morrow, the Mormon church has been up in arms. I have been visited by a local Mormon official who told me that his authority to discipline me "comes from Jesus Christ," and who, on April 25, saw...