Wandering Lizard
Arizona

Graham County

Gila Box Riparian National Conservation Area - Early Spring

The Gila Box Riparian National Conservation Area is located on the border between Graham and Greenlee Counties in Eastern Arizona. It protects the riparian area surrounding the junction of Bonita Creek and the Gila River. The earliest traces of human habitation in this desert oasis date from the time of Christ when Hohokam and Mogollan people had farms in the area. Francisco Vasquez Coronado may have passed this way in 1540 on his way to Kansas. Apache Indians hunted here in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. A few Americans trapped beaver here in the nineteenth century and General Stephen Watts Kearney passed through with his Army of the West during the Mexican War. A stone cabin dating from the early twentieth century is all that is left of twentieth century American and Mexican efforts to homestead the area.

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