Page 499 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - USA

INTRODUCING THE SOUTHWEST  497
THE SOUTHWEST

Distinguished by its dramatic landscape, the Southwest is a land of twisting
canyons, cactus-studded deserts, and rugged mountains. For more than
15,000 years, Native Americans had the region to themselves, but by the
20th century Anglo-American traditions had mingled with those of the
Hispanic and Native peoples to create a new multicultural heritage.

The states of Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and of casinos. Some of the biggest names in
New Mexico make up America’s Southwest. show business, such as Frank Sinatra and
Perceptions of this region are influenced by Elvis Presley, as well as eccentric millionaire
the landscape – the red sandstone mesas Howard Hughes, have all contributed to
of Monument Valley, the tall saguaro cacti Vegas’s image as the fun city of limos,
of Arizona’s Sonoran Desert, the staggering showgirls, and glitzy lifestyles. This city of
scale of the Grand Canyon, and New megaresorts and casinos is as popular for
Mexico’s adobe architecture. At its heart is its wedding chapels, where more than
its defining geological feature – the 100,000 couples get married each year.
Colorado Plateau – a rock tableland rising
more than 12,000 ft (3,660 m) above sea History
level and covering a vast area of around The first Native American people were
130,000 sq miles (336,700 sq km). The hunter-gatherers who inhabited the region
plateau was created by the same geological around 13,000 years ago. The introduction
upheavals that formed the Rocky of new farming techniques and crops,
Mountains. Subsequent erosion by wind, especially corn from Mexico, saw the start
water, and sand molded both hard and of settled farming communities in around
soft rock to form the mesas, canyons, and 800 BC. By AD 500 an agrarian society
mountains. Many of these natural wonders was well established, and large villages
have been preserved as national parks. or pueblos began to develop. By
The region’s main city, Las Vegas, has 700 the three main cultures in the region
been synonymous with glamor and were the Hohokam, the Mogollon, and the
entertainment ever since Nevada legalized Ancestral Puebloan. Ancestral Puebloan
gambling in 1931. Mobster Bugsy Siegel people constructed elaborate dwellings that
opened the first luxury hotel, the Flamingo, grew into large cities such as Chaco Canyon.
in 1946, and soon there was a proliferation However, in the 12th and 13th centuries,

The desert floor dotted with sagebrush, Monument Valley, Arizona
Visitors taking a trip on a gondola around the Venetian Resort Hotel Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada

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