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Grand Canyon

It's universally agreed that no one has ever been able to do justice to the Grand Canyon, the crown jewel of natural wonders and America's number-one beauty spot. Located 60 miles north of Williams and 80 miles north of Flagstaff, it lies inside the state of Ari­zona. For convenience's sake, it is divided into four areas, the South, West, North and East Rims, with most of the activity centered on the South Rim.

The course of history can be tracked through the Canyon's layers. The upper layers of rock, the Kaibab and Toroweap formations of the Permian Age, were formed around 250 million years ago. At the foot of the Inner Corge are some of the oldest exposed rocks on earth — the hard black rocks of the Precambrian Age. The Colorado River began curving its way through the rock between 6 and 25 million years ago.

The Canyon was first sighted by white people in 1540, when a group of Spanish soldiers led by Captain Garcia Lopez de Cardenas stumbled across it. But the Captain had been sent on an expedition by Vasquez de Coronado to find settlements described by Hopi Indians; he had embarked on a treasure hunt for the legendary Cities of Gold and was not in the least impressed by the canyon, which to him was an obstacle and an irritation.

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In their book When Illness Strikes the Leader Jerrold Post and Robert Robins show that the medical advisers to heads of state have a difficult task. It is no longer true that the royal physician who lets his illustrious patient die will suffer the same fate, but professional ruin and notoriety will follow any physician who by his mistakes allows his most important client to die, and so changes the course of history.

Sir Morrell MacKenzie was the most famous ear, nose and throat surgeon of Victorian England, and would have been commemorated as such but for one mistake. He was called to Berlin to examine the crown prince, the future Frederick III of Prussia. A pleasant, liberal Anglophile, the prince had begun to lose his voice. Cancer was suspected, but MacKenzie was adamant there was no malignancy. By the time he had changed his mind Frederick was terminally ill. He was succeeded by his son, William II, the infamous Kaiser Bill, who did more than any other man to bring about the First World war.