Battle over 'West's Most Western Town'
Wickenburg says it deserves slogan more than Scottsdale

SCOTTSDALE - A down-home feud is brewing over the West's Most Western Town.

Scottsdale trademarked the slogan in 1951 but the city has tried to cultivate a more-sophisticated image since then. As a result, one of the last vestiges of its Western heritage - the Rusty Spur Saloon - finds itself sandwiched in among chi-chi spots like the W Hotel, AZ88 The Bar and RA Sushi Bar.

Enter Joe Beattie, Chief Cowboy of Wickenburg's Kay El Bar Guest Ranch, who says he can no longer abide the idea that Scottsdale still uses the slogan to lure tourists to its outrageously contemporary self.

"You have 13-story urban condominium towers. We have dude ranches," Beattie wrote to Scottsdale City Council member Tony Nelssen. "Whatever 'Western' that still may exist in Scottsdale doesn't hold a candle to Wickenburg."

Beattie proposes that Scottsdale call it a long day and cut the phrase out of tourist brochures. The deception, he adds, hurts all of Valley tourism.

Wickenburg Town Manager Gary Edwards said officials were not aware of Beattie's letter, but boy, they sure agree with it. A couple of decades ago town officials tried to get Scottsdale to part with its slogan, but to no avail.

"I've just noticed the last three or four years that Scottsdale doesn't use the slogan as much as they were using it," observed Julie Brooks, executive director of Wickenburg's Chamber of Commerce.

As evidence of their rightness, folks in Wickenburg, in the far northwestern corner of Maricopa County, point to True Westmagazine, which just put Wickenburg in the Top 10 List of True Western Towns of 2008.

Need they say more?

Meanwhile, Scottsdale's latest marketing coup was a mention in the New York Times Magazine, which called the city a "desert version of Miami's South Beach."

But Scottsdale isn't willing to concede.

"I don't think in the West you're supposed to take another cowboy's brand," said Scottsdale spokesman Pat Dodds.

Scottsdale Mayor Mary Manross argues that the slogan is a piece of Scottsdale history, although she too fell back on the more lawyerly grounds that the city holds the trademark. It's an argument that might not hold much sway with real cowboys.

Nelssen - who has grown his own cowboy-hat, mule-riding tradition in North Scottsdale - wrote Beattie that it won't take long before Wickenburg's cowboy heritage is overrun by big-city developers, just like Scottsdale.

"Hold on tight, the developers and lots of greenhorns are coming to boost your town's coffers," Nelssen advised. "Some will run for office, get elected and try to make Wickenburg more like Pittsburgh. I have seen it happen."

Nelssen insists, however, that Scottsdale remains truly Western. Along with the city's massive desert preservation effort, Nelssen points to his own Desert Foothills neighborhood, which is home to "The Spirit of The Cowboy and The Center for Cowboy Ethics."

And just this week he asked city planners to better define "Western heritage" in the city's new downtown plan so it can be preserved.

The original slogan was a marketing effort, Nelssen added, but it's a spiritual thing as well.

"It's more than boots and hats," he said. "It's about the spirit of the West - a new beginning, self-determination, responsibility for oneself. We've got to merge that in with Scottsdale's history."

He might have his work cut out for him. A recent Scottsdale Area Chamber of Commerce survey found that fewer than 11 percent of registered voters even knew they lived in the West's Most Western Town.

But this fight ain't about residents. With some rooms at the Kay El running past $3,000 per week, there's real money at stake.

Brooks said that Wickenburg's dude ranches and other Western attractions speak for themselves. The town has called tourists to come "Out Wickenburg Way" since the 1930s, long before Scottsdale even thought about a slogan.

Wickenburg also has some real Western history, like Indian massacres and gold rushes.

"We're not competing with Scottsdale in any manner regarding their types of lodging," said Brooks, Wickenburg's Chamber director. "The real question is - is Scottsdale still the West's Most Western Town?"