Charles F. Lummis chronicled his road west in a book, "A Tramp Across the Continent." Lummis, who later became the editor of the Los Angeles Times, traveled in 1888 from Cincinnati, Ohio, westward to Los Angeles. On his trip he experienced an aesthetic and spiritual conversion which culminated in northern New Mexico. Ever afterward he considered himself a Southwesterner first and foremost.
Considering his aloof background, Harvard educated and the son of a minister, this was a most peculiar turning. His was hardly a heritage that would have been expected to convert easily to the ways of the great American desert.
Yet, in his later life, Lummis wrote "The Land of Poco Tiempo," "Pueblo Indian Folk Stories," and "The Spanish Pioneers in America."
He wrote of himself and his transition, "Though my conscience was Puritan, my whole imagination and sympathy and feeling were Latin. That is, essentially Spanish. Apparently they always had been, for now that I had gotten away from the repressive influence of my birthplace I began to see that the generous and bubbling boyish impulses which had been considerably frosted in New England were, after all, my birthright."
He defended the Hispanic and Indian inhabitants of the Southwest ever afterward, and organized the Sequoya League to aid the Indians. He also founded the Landmarks Club to restore the early California Missions.
His later home, called El Alisal, located near the Pasadena Freeway in Los Angeles (and now the headquarters of the Southern California Historical Society), was the scene of many parties where Lummis entertained Western legends such as Charlie Russell, Frederic Remington, Will Rogers and John Muir.
As his son wrote later in a biography of his famous father, "To say the Southwest is practically to say his name."
Lummis overcame his native New England reserve and embraced the people he met in New Mexico with a passion. He even admired that which would normally be considered unacceptable. He wrote of his beloved Southwesterners, "They swear methodically, gracefully, fluently, comprehensively, eloquently, thoughtfully-I had almost said prayerfully . . . there is nothing brutal about it. It is courteous, tactful, musical, at times majestic. It carries a sense of artistic satisfaction."
While many later visitors to the American Southwest grew to love its panorama and beauty, none embraced it more ardently than Lummis.