CHIRICAHUA NATIONAL MONUMENT

CHIRICAHUA NATIONAL MONUMENT
The Faraway Ranch is located almost at the edge of the Chiricahua National Monument, being about one mile from the boundary and about five miles from the rhyolite park.  Prehistoric man has apparently left his mark on the walls of the Chiricahua caves.  Hieroglyphics as yet undeciphered, point to the fact that the volcanic convulsions which turned Chiricahua into one of nature's museums, must have occurred many ages ago.  What these hieroglyphics signify--what tribal artist was inspired to leave his mark for future eyes to wonder over, it is impossible to say.  They remain a challenge to the observers.

The original inhabitants of the Sulphur Springs valley and Chiricahua mountains were the Native Americans.  /they were nomadic type people, moving often as needed.  Their shelters (Wikiups) were made of native materials—limbs and grasses.  In the 1870’s the Sulphur Springs Valley between the Chiricahua Mountains, the Dos Cabasas Mountains, the Dragoon Mountains, the Winchester Mountains and the Graham Mountains was the Chiricahua Apache Indian Reservation.  Cochise, their leader, died and the reservation was closed in 1876.  The tribe was then moved to the San Carlos Reservation and the land was opened for settlement.

Ed Riggs, a member if a large pioneer family that had settled in the neighborhood, married Lillian Erickson.  They lived at Faraway Guest Ranch and together worked on clearing and improving trails into areas of interest among the rock formations.  Armed with photographs and colorful stories, they lobbied for the protection of the land and its beautiful rock formations.  They were part of a group of interested citizens that were instrumental in the establishment of the Chiricahua national Monument.

          Ed and Lillian set up four frames of photographs; they sent one to the County fair in Douglas, as well as one to each of the Chambers of commerce in Bisbee, Douglas and Phoenix.

          During the summer of 1923, Edward Riggs, with the assistance of J.J.P Armstrong and the American Legion park Committee in Douglas, sought to transform the area surrounding the ranch into a national park, in order to preserve its “beauty and grandeur”.  Ed worked with a local grassroots group  that peaked with a visit from Governor George W. P. Hunt in July.  He supported the effort to recognize the U.S. Forest Service site, and on April 18, 1924, President Calvin Coolidge proclaimed the area a National Monument to preserve and protect the pinnacles and other rock formations..

          During the depression of the early 1930’s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt created employment through the funding of Public Works such as the Civilian Conservation Corps.  Their mandate was to construct roads and campsites, to help prevent soil erosion, to aid in reforestation, to assist in flood control, to provide range improvement, and to work on any other conservation-related projects that would either directly or indirectly relate to the broad goals of the CCC which included resource protection and development, rural infrastructure construction and recreation development all over the nation.

          In 1934 the Civilian Conservation Corps, CCC, began improving the road and building and improving trails and structures.  The park comprises 12,025 acres; 84 percent is designated as wilderness.  It has trails for everyone, even the handicapped.  An eight-mile scenic drive climbs from the grassland to the summit at Massai Point, where you get a true sense of being atop a sky island.  The CCC worked for a number of years to improve trails Ed and Lillian had made, develop new trails, develop picnic areas and camping sites.  They built the Visitors Center facilities and developed good roads into the park.

          In April 1934, Frank A. Kittredge, Chief Engineer of the NPS (National Park Service), and Walter Atwell, Associate Engineer of the NPS, toured Chiricahua National Monument with Rex Rice, John B. Crowell of the Bank of Douglas, and Edward Riggs of Faraway; Ranch.  Writing to the editor of The Douglas Daily Dispatch shortly upon his return, Kittredge noted:  “In all the National Park and Monument areas, I know of nothing comparable.  It stands quite unique, so far as I know, both in type of scenery and in the grand formation.  Mr. Atwell and I were led gradually from one spectacular view point to the next until the grand climax at Massai Point.  The view from this point can’t help becoming nationally famous and will rank along with some of the great spectacles of the country.”