Stretching as far back as 1923, Sedona's red rocks were a fixture in major Hollywood productions – including films such as Angel and the Badman, Desert Fury, Blood on the Moon, Johnny Guitar, The Last Wagon, and 3:10 to Yuma. Sedona played host to more than sixty Hollywood productions from the first years of movies into the 1970s. Inside the chapel there is a window and a cross with benches and pews. The most prominent feature of the chapel is the cross. The chapel rises 70 feet (21 m) out of a 1,000-foot (300 m) redrock cliff. In 1956, construction of the Chapel of the Holy Cross was completed. Important early settlers included the Steele family, originally of Scotland. As of 2007, there are no large tracts of undeveloped land remaining. Most of the development seen today was constructed in the 1980s and 1990s. Sedona began to develop as a tourist destination, vacation-home and retirement center in the 1950s. Some parts of the Sedona area were not electrified until the 1960s. In the mid-1950s, the first telephone directory listed 155 names. In 1902, when the Sedona post office was established, there were 55 residents. The early settlers were farmers and ranchers.
Thompson, moved to Oak Creek Canyon in 1876, an area well known for its peach and apple orchards. Her mother, Amanda Miller, claimed to have made the name up because "it sounded pretty". She was celebrated for her hospitality and industriousness. Sedona was named after Sedona Arabella Miller Schnebly (1877–1950), the wife of Theodore Carlton Schnebly, the city's first postmaster. Sedona is also the home to the nationally recognized McDonald's with turquoise arches, instead of the traditional Golden Arches. The red rocks form a popular backdrop for many activities, ranging from spiritual pursuits to the hundreds of hiking and mountain biking trails. The formations appear to glow in brilliant orange and red when illuminated by the rising or setting sun. Sedona's main attraction is its array of red sandstone formations. It is within the Coconino National Forest. As of the 2010 census, its population was 10,031. Sedona / s ɪ ˈ d oʊ n ə/ is a city that straddles the county line between Coconino and Yavapai counties in the northern Verde Valley region of the U.S.