ARIZONA LOOKOUTS
BABOQUIVARI PEAK
Pima County
Papago Indian Reservation
Papago Indian Reservation
September 4, 1938: "Romantic-Notioned Tucsonans love to believe that Baboquivari peak is perhaps Pima county's most unclimbable mountain peak.
So it must be quite a shock of late to some who labored up the peak to find right smack on top a neatly constructed telephone booth--equipped with a telephone. And you can make a telephone call, with the necessary nickle, from atop the peak.
It's all the result of Indian relief funds, which put red men to work and made possible those steel service poles, set in concrete, which carry the strands of telephone wire up the sheer mountain side to one of the most unusual phone booths in Pima county." (Arizona Independent Republic)
So it must be quite a shock of late to some who labored up the peak to find right smack on top a neatly constructed telephone booth--equipped with a telephone. And you can make a telephone call, with the necessary nickle, from atop the peak.
It's all the result of Indian relief funds, which put red men to work and made possible those steel service poles, set in concrete, which carry the strands of telephone wire up the sheer mountain side to one of the most unusual phone booths in Pima county." (Arizona Independent Republic)
May 19, 1947: "Dr. R.H. Forbes, dean emeritus of the agriculture college of the University of Arizona and representative from district No. 7 in Pima county to the state legislature, observer his 80th birthday last Thursday by spending the nigh before on top of Baboquivari peak with John Rapp, also a former legislator.
His last trip up the rugged sides and to the top of the 7,730-foot peak was his second--the first was 49 years ago when he made the climb after the challenge of an acquaintance.
Dr. Forbes reported that since his first trip the trail upward has been made more accessible by a trail leading from Topowa Indian Village at the foot of the range, which lies about 50 miles southwest of Tucson. However, the trail, made by the Civilian Conservation Corps, has been neglected and part of it is obscured. One of the four staircases up the steepest part is in very poor repair.
On the summit Dr. Forbes reported that the ranger cabin was in a tumble-down condition.
The trip upward took six hours." (Tucson Daily Citizen)
October 25, 1974: By Douglas Kreutz, "As a result of some well intentioned industriousness 40 years ago and some latter day carelessness, Baboquivari Peak has become a likely place to break your neck.
Here's the situation.
Most of the five-mile trek to the 7,730 foot summit on the Papago Indian Reservation is moderate hiking over a well established trail. But even the easiest route up the final 100-foot pitch to the peak falls somewhere between a very difficult rock scramble and a fairly simple technical rock climb.
Indeed, in its natural state, that final pitch would be awesome enough to rebuff all but those with the confidence and know-how to do roped rock climbing.
But the mountain is not in its natural state.
Back in the 1930s, Civilian Conservation Corps workers were assigned to build a fire lookout atop the peak.
To make the lookout easily accessible, they installed a series of wooden ladders and platforms over the most dangerous sections of the climb. It then was possible to walk safely and effortlessly to the summit.
But after a few years it was decided that the fire lookout was not needed, and the ladder system was abandoned.
Wood rots.
Most of the ladders and platforms and stairways on Baboquivari Peak have rotted over the decades and tumbled part of the way down the mountain.
But the remaining pilings and support cables and wooden platforms offer just enough hand and footholds to entice novice climbers up the steep pitches.
Trouble is, nobady has maintained or repaired the remains of the ladder system for years. And several Tucson climbers warn that relying on the worn and weathered remains could result in a serious fall.
According to Joanna McComb, a skilled climber who has made several roped ascents of the peak over extremely difficult routes, 'One of these days one of those old platforms is going to give way and go rocketing down the mountain. It's definitely dangerous to rely on any of that old equipment.'
Mrs. McComb added that hikers and climbers have magnified the danger on the peak in recent years by leaving climbing ropes dangling invitingly from what may or may not be secure bolts in the rock face.
'Every time I find one of those ropes I cut it down,' she said.
So far, there have been no serious accidents on Baboquivari.
But because the mountain is on Indian land, government agencies and hiking enthusiasts are reluctant to restore or dismantle completely the dangerous remnants of the ladder system." (Tucson Daily Citizen)
Gone