Brown (another Arizona Highways contributor), she was married to horse trainer Luis Mario Baeza for six years before the marriage ended amicably.īaeza's writing won her fans among generations of readers of Arizona Highways and the White Mountain Independent, for which she began writing in 1981. After an eight-year marriage to Western author J.P.S. The couple divorced in 1965, and she moved to Pinetop-Lakeside, where she resided until her death.
"I retain the title of 'Oldest Living Contributor,'" she concluded, "until an older contributor comes along, which seems unlikely at this time."Īlso in 1956, she married cattleman Cooney Jeffers, and her time living with him on a ranch south of Holbrook inspired her 1964 book, Ranch Wife. Later works included 2011's Eagles at Noon, a collection of poetry, and 2012's Arizona: The Making of a State, timed to coincide with the state's centennial. It was a product of the times, and the Hash Knife brand is a symbol of that stormy period in northern Arizona.Īt a 2013 gathering of Arizona Highways "old-timers," Baeza recalled, her 1956 story was the subject of a good-natured debate with former editor Don Dedera over which of them had been first to contribute to the magazine. What distinguished it from all other cattle companies in history was just where and when it flourished. It wasn't just the size of the property, nor its value, nor its gun-toting cowboys that earned the outfit its reputation. But big or small, none will be remembered longer than the old Hash Knife outfit of the 1880s and 1890s, whose infamy has been spread in campfire legends throughout the West. There was the XIT ranch in the Texas panhandle, and the gigantic Terrazas spread in Chihuahua, Mexico. There were bigger cattle companies in North America. Sketches by Ross Santee accompanied the story, and the opening paragraph typified Baeza's plain-spoken, yet vivid writing style:
Her first story for the magazine was The Hash Knife Outfit, published in June 1956 under her maiden name.
She then settled in the Holbrook area after graduating from Stanford University in 1954 before long, she was writing for Arizona Highways. She was 87.Ī cause of death was not specified, but Baeza's obituary in the White Mountain Independent, where she wrote a regular column, noted that she battled scleroderma, a progressive autoimmune disease, in recent years.īorn Joan Johnson, she was a Minnesota native and member of a family that helped settle that territory in the 1800s. Jo Baeza, a gifted and prolific writer whose descriptions of Arizona life endeared her to readers of Arizona Highways and other publications, died November 16 at her home in Pinetop-Lakeside.
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