Karen Schaffner

If pickleball is the game of choice, there’s a new court in town. Or several courts.

Everyone loves tacos, and in a city known for its excellent tacos, is there room for one more?

(Woofies of North and East Tucson/Submitted) Raynie Hosto and her furry family. The golden retriever on the far right is Molly, a beloved family member who inspired Hosto to enter this business.

Most images of an Old West saloon are barroom brawls and gunfire, with scantily clad “soiled doves” hanging around. : Not according to archeologist and historian Homer Thiel, who has extensively researched the saloons of territorial Tucson. : “There was less crime,” he said. “There were some fights, of course, usually over people being caught cheating. There were a few murders that took place in saloons.” : Find out about Tucson’s old-timey saloons at Thiel’s “Saloons of Territorial Tucson” at 1 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 17, at JoJo’s Restaurant. : About 10 years ago, Thiel looked into saloon sites Downtown, the current location of the Martin Luther King apartment, across from Hotel Congress. : His work covers saloons from about 1860 to 1914. For a short time, the city had 20 saloons, mostly on Congress Street and what is now Broadway Boulevard. Many of the saloon keepers were from Italy and what is now Czechoslovakia. : “They would tend to come to town and then bring their relatives over,” Thiel said. “(The relatives) would help out in the saloons or open up new ones. A lot of the staff included both Mexican Americans and African Americans.” : Typically, Thiel learned that saloons’ lifespans are about one to two years. Unlike bars and restaurants today, it didn’t require a lot of investment to open. : “You just needed a bar, shelves behind it, a table and a couple of chairs and alcohol,” he said. : In early Territorial Days, a saloon owner did not need a license. That came later and it was expensive. Some saloons did actually look like what we imagine. They were elaborately decorated with wallpaper, paintings and prints of half-naked ladies. That is until about 1890, when Tucson’s city council decided to clean things up. : “Women could not sing or perform music in saloons, so eventually they just banned any music,” Thiel said. “Period.” : Also, that image of Miss Kitty and her hoard is incorrect. : “(Women singers) were the only women they employed in the saloons,” Thiel added. “They never had barmaids, and there wasn’t any prostitution in the saloons either.” : However, that’s not to say patrons didn’t enjoy the company of women. : “One of the saloon owners had this machine where you crank the handle and you could watch sort of like a movie,” Thiel said. : “Apparently, it was a dirty movie and somebody found out about it. The police came and confiscated it and brought it to city hall and then the mayor and all of the city councilmen had to, one by one, watch the movie to declare it was obscene. They shut that one down.” : By the 1870s, freight wagons began bringing in items like billiard tables, enormous mirrors, glassware and thousands of bottles of various types of alcohol. At least two or three beer brewers were in Tucson, but port, sherry, wines of all types, spirits and cigars were brought in. : “Saloons were the primary source of entertainment for young men and single men in Tucson,” Thiel said. “Eventually, other things opened up. There were opera houses and an amusement park outside of Tucson, but saloons were an important place to go and socialize.” : “Saloons of Territorial Tucson,” a talk by archeologist and historian Homer Thiel : WHEN: 1 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 17 : WHERE: The Monsoon Room at JoJo’s Restaurant, 76 W. Washington Street, Tucson : COST: $10, reservations requested : INFO: 520-622-0594, tucsonpresidio

Everyone loves tacos, and in a city known for its excellent tacos, is there room for one more?

S tep out in style for the third annual Fashion Fusion, hosted by BNI 6 Figure Success.

Tucson doesn’t ordinarily get snow for the holidays, but the Old Pueblo still knows how to sparkle — particularly the Tucson Botanical Gardens.

Tucson doesn’t ordinarily get snow for the holidays, but the Old Pueblo still knows how to sparkle — particularly the Tucson Botanical Gardens. : The gardens at 2150 N. Alvernon Way are preparing to open its third annual LightsUp! Festival of Illumination, which runs Friday, Nov. 29, to Saturday, Jan. 12. The show is closed on Christmas. : The festival is the brainchild of gardens executive director Michelle Conklin, who researched other botanical garden light displays across the country. She was inspired. : “When I started visiting gardens and saw the beauty that could happen in a garden with lights, it was a whole different experience and, I thought, ‘Tucson needs this,’” she said. : Conklin knew they could have bought a predesigned package of lights but she and her team wanted something special. Her request to landscape architect Tres Fromme was simple yet complex: Give them something that is distinctly Tucson. : “We wanted it to feel very cultural,” Conklin said. “We wanted it to feel like Tucson… We wanted something you could only see in Tucson, and we wanted to keep the flavor of the Botanical Gardens, which is intimate and cultural and beautiful.” : More than 1 million LED lights and several local artists later, the LightsUp! Festival of Illumination opened. Its first show was in 2022. : There is a method to viewing the show. Hundreds of luminarias line the walkway that take guests through a mile of decorations and lights. Guests can take in seven zones, and each has its own color palette. : “We looked at every different zone along that path and we thought, ‘What would enhance this garden?’” Conklin said. : At the entry, guests will be greeted by a large “tree” made of birdhouses. Then, step onto the marked walkway and take in a tree wrapped with strings of lights programmed to twinkle with recorded music. : The lights are strung to the tips of the branches. Tucson’s EnviroCare Tree Solutions is responsible for installing and removing the lights. They take great care not to damage the trees or surrounding plants. : Most of the show was created in Tucson, as the gardens used local artists and construction studios. The lights, however, were manufactured in North Carolina. : The staff is not only careful about the plants. One tree was home to someone who didn’t appreciate being disturbed. : “We hung some drip lights in here, and they usually cover the whole side of the tree,” said Adam Farrell-Wortman, horticulture director. : “Right now, we’ve had an owl nesting in this tree for the last couple of months. She didn’t like the climbers getting too close, so we left her in a good undisturbed zone. Because of that we’re going to have a little bare spot.” : Also featured are tin-punch trees that are lit from within, chandeliers hanging from the trees and made of upside-down luminarias, plenty of illuminated stars and an 11-foot crescent moon that’s suitable for proposals, which evidently has happened in years past. : “It’s a pretty magical place,” Conklin said. “I worked last Christmas Eve as the onsite manager, and there were two wedding proposals. One marriage proposal was extra special because the whole family was there, and the mother and the father were married in that garden.” : The gardens’ staff has been working since Labor Day to prepare the show for holiday guests, something they look forward to, according to Laura Leach, development and marketing director. For them, too, it marks the beginning of the holiday season. : “LightsUp! is a greatly anticipated and joyful team effort at the Gardens,” Leach said. “Installation starts soon after Labor Day and quickly gets us all into the festive spirit.” : The café will be open every night for nibbles, serving items such as Mexican hot chocolate, agua frescas, brownies, cookies and hot dogs. From Thursday to Sundays, peddlers will sell hot drinks like lattes along the way. : More than anything, the Tucson Botanical Gardens staff hopes the Lights Up! Festival of Illumination becomes a new family tradition. : “Come with the family,” Leach said. “Start a new tradition if you haven’t been before. If you have been before, come back because there are new things.” : “This is the only show of its kind in Southern Arizona,” Conklin added. “It’s really special and it’s put together with a lot of love.”

When holistic health practitioner Candice Thomas was training to become an acupuncturist, she stumbled across a theory: mental and emotional health are directly tied to physical health.

Raynie Hosto has found the perfect business in her new franchise, Woofies of North and East Tucson. With decades of experience in customer service and a profound love of all