What sparked our interest?

Photo Copyright 2016 David Ryan

Howdy, I am John Parsons, creator & maintainer of this blog.  I happen to be a Highway Heritage Fan. I've always loved old highways beginning way back in my "kiddie daze" of the 1950's.  I am now in my mid-70's and have ample time to dig as deeply into Highway Heritage as I may wish.  I have a lot of important personal history with Route 66.  In 2017, I began intensive study of US Highway 89.  In March 2018 my wife, Susun, and I began to drive all of Old & Current US 89 from Mexico to Canada.  It was easily the most fun Road Trip of our lives (so far).

I also have a lot of personal history with US Highway 60, especially between Show Low and Mesa, Arizona, and most especially in Salt River Canyon about 40 miles north of Globe.

In March 2022 I happened to be studying the 1934 construction of a bridge across The Salt River in the bottom of Salt River Canyon.  Naturally, I was Googling "all things Salt River Canyon."  That's how I stumbled onto The Morley Family.  Here's how it happened.

While digging into every link I could find on Salt River Canyon, I came across David Ryan's fun article on driving US 60 from Socorro to Phoenix.  David Ryan has an endearing way with words and I very much enjoy his writing.  He makes you feel like you are riding along with him.

Well, as I was reading his short travelogue on US 60, I came to a section about a roadside Memorial near Datil, New Mexico.  David said, "Not long after entering the ponderosa pines there will be a large monument to the left. I thought it might be the “Tomb of the Unknown Rancher. When I got out of the car to check it out, a sign on the fence said, “No Trespassing for Any Reason.” I did get close enough to see that monument was for a man named Morley. How many times have you visited a town and seen a huge statue in a public park for a man from the late 19th century saying something along the lines of, “he was a true leader and visionary who will not be forgotten.” And you wonder to yourself, “who the heck was he.” When I saw this monument, I started saying to myself, “My name is Ozymandias,…” I soon hopped back into the car, went over the Continental Divide, and immediately ran into (Pie Town).

Of course, my first urge after reading David Ryan's description of the Memorial was to refresh my memory on Ozymandius.  I printed out the 1818 poem and paired it with an Egyptian ruin that might have sparked the verses. (It is shown below.)

Then, of course, I started my digging into the Memorial.  This blog is a direct result of that digging.  It proved to be very time consuming and rather frustrating to determine the "back story" on the roadside Memorial.  And, in fact, several vexing questions remain to be answered about the Memorial.

The more I continued digging, the more I realized the scope of the compelling stories behind that roadside Memorial.  Of course, it didn't take long to realize I had to buy and read "No Life for a Lady."

And yet other books remain to be read as well.  The Morley Family Story is somewhat of a paradox.  It's unique in that so much of it is so well told.  But it's also unique in that so much of it isn't told...at least in a readily available venue and format.

So, as my digging continued unabated, I decided The Morley Family Story needed something like this blog--something that could help an inquisitive US 60 Highway Heritage Fan learn the basics of The Story while providing a framework for further study, digging and perhaps even scholarly research.

This blog is the proverbial "work-in-progress" and I sincerely hope that readers see fit to contribute materials and information to enhance the worthiness of this effort.  

US Highway 60 once spanned thousands of miles in its coast-to-coast saunter across America. Without doubt there have been thousands of Families living alongside US 60 whose stories are unique.

What sets The Morley Family Story aside, especially in context of the US 60 continuum, is that they lived and helped describe a rich slice of an illustrious bygone era---The Cattle Culture of The Great Southwest.  Although perhaps countless books and articles have been written about that era, details of The Morley Family Story have been brought to life by the artful, eloquent words of Agnes Morley Cleaveland.

In reading those words, US 60 travelers alongside the towering Datil Mountains may now relive and savor the imagery of those words.  The rich history of that area can once again be seen through the lens of The Morley Family Story.

Below is how we formatted the 1818 poem by Shelley.   Somehow there is a faint similarity between the Morley Memorial near Datil and the inspiration for Shelley's poem.  Likewise, the words of the poem ring ever-so-true to The Life & Times of The Morley family of Datil.