Navajo National Monument, Arizona (1951)

Perched on sheer sandstone cliffs in northeastern Arizona, the three great dwellings of Navajo National Monument reveal a thousand‑year story of the Anasazi, the “Ancient Ones” who once thrived in the Four Corners region. From modest bands of hunters around A.D. 300, they shifted to reliable farming, built thriving villages, and developed distinct cultural centers, the most remote of which blossomed in the Kayenta area. By the early thirteenth century, a combination of soil erosion and disease forced the inhabitants to abandon these cliff towns, leaving behind remarkably preserved traces of their daily lives.

The book guides listeners through Betatakin, a well‑preserved “apartment house” with dozens of rooms, ceremonial kivas, and vivid pottery, set against a backdrop of aspen, juniper and towering red cliffs. It also follows the rugged 11‑mile trek to Keet Seel, Arizona’s largest cliff city, and the quieter Inscription House, noted for a mysterious 17th‑century carving. Together, these sites paint a vivid portrait of a civilization that flourished, faltered, and left an enduring imprint on the landscape.