Selected Articles from Desert Magazine

Desert Magazine was started in November, 1937 by Randall Henderson and it had a continuous run of monthly issues until December, 1979. Then issues came out sporadically until the June/July, 1985 issue which was the last one. A follow-on magazine called The American Desert was published from 1992 to 1993 and had five issues. Altogether there were 539 issues which contain a wealth of information about the American southwestern desert. An Index book was produced in 1997 by the Arthur H. Clark Co. This was authored by Tom Budlong and Joan Brooks. A limited run of this book was printed and it is now out of print. It might be found now in used bookstores or on eBay for about $100.00. It is an excellent resource for finding articles of interest in back issues.

There is a terrific archive of Desert Magazine at this site. A pdf file of every issue is available.

Desert Magazine Archive

I have scanned and put up selected articles which contain stories of climbs of desert peaks and some relevant desert exploring. Here is a list of articles and the issue they came from:

Note - These are pdf files which vary in size from 2 to 15 Megabytes. Acrobat Reader required.

1. February 1938, "Unclimbed Pinnacle of the Desert" by Glen Dawson.

2. September 1939, "Rock That Makes You See Double" by John W. Hilton. (about the Calcite Mine)

3. September 1939, "Dinosaur Tracks at Split Mountain" by Hulbert Burroughs.

4. April 1940, "Watering Place on the Devil's Highway" by Randall Henderson.

5. February 1942, "Up the West Face of Kofa Mountain" by Ruth Dyer Mendenhall.

6. April 1948, "We Scaled El Picacho" by Randall Henderson. (DPS "Little Picacho")

7. October 1949, "Rock Climbers Reach Bottom of the Cave of the Winding Stairs"

8. January 1951, "We Found a Way into Elegante" by Randall Henderson.

9. March 1951, "On the Trail to Picacho del Diablo" by Louise Werner.

10. August 1951, "We Climbed Avawatz" by Louise Werner.

11. September 1952, "We Climbed Rabbit Peak" by Louise T. Werner.

12. January 1953, "We Climbed El Diablo from the Desert Side" by Randall Henderson.

13. May 1953, "We Climbed Coxcomb Peak" by Louise Werner.

14. November 1953, "We Climbed Telescope Peak" by Louise Werner.

15. December 1954, "Atop Nevada's Highest Peak" by Louise Werner.

16. April 1954, "Trail to Keynot Peak" by Louise Top Werner.

17. May 1954, "We Climbed an Old Volcano" by Randall Henderson. (climb of Mopah Peak, CA)

18. July 1954, "Clark Mountain Wonderland" by Edmund Jaeger.

19. September 1954, "Scaling the Ship of the Desert" by Douglas E. Kelly. (climbing Shiprock, NM)

20. February 1955, "Three Tries to the Top of the Whipple Range" by Louise Werner.

21. April 1955, "We Climbed Glass Mountain" by Louise Werner.

22. August 1955, "Three Days in Devil's Canyon" by Randall Henderson.

23. July 1959, "Alpine Island in the Desert" by Louise Werner. (climbing Wheeler Peak, NV)

24. September 1959, "Lady Fire Spotter" by Beverly Walter. (about Verdi Peak, CA)

25. May 1964, "Exploring La Cabeza Prieta" by Norman Simmons.

26. April 1968, "Ghosts; Do Not Disturb" by Madeleine Rodack.  (about the Camino del Diablo,  AZ)

27. November 1968, "The Riddle of the Racetrack" by Roger Mitchell. (in Death Valley)

28. January 1969, "Mysterious Cargo Muchachos" by Jack Pepper.

29. December 1976, "Anza-Borrego's Calcite Canyon" by David Tillerson.

30. February 1977, "Pinacate - Mexico's Newest Natural Park" by Carl Allen.