History Adventuring

As someone who is interested in Phoenix history, when I mention Maryvale to people I get a lot of different responses. My opinion about Maryvale is that I find it fascinating. And I'm interested in its past, present, and future. Let's time-travel back to Phoenix after World War II. After the dark days of the war, the United States' economy was booming. Yet, one of the worst things that happened to young people who wanted to start a family was the terrible housing shortage. It seemed like homes just couldn't be built fast enough, and just about anything with four walls was acceptable. So, houses were being thrown up everywhere, and people were glad to have them. John F. Long (on the left) in Maryvale in 1961, with spokesman actor Ronald Reagan. But Maryvale was different. The developer, John F. Long, didn't just want to build a bunch of houses. He wanted to build a community. He wanted shopping centers, hospitals, and parks. Nowadays we call that a ...

If you've ever been on the campus of Glendale Community College, at 59th Avenue and Olive in Glendale, Arizona, you've walked past some historic palm trees that are over 100 years old. Of course, unless you're fascinated with Phoenix history like I am (and a tree-hugger), you really can't be blamed for walking right past them and not seeing them. But once you start seeing them, then some pretty cool history of Glendale starts to appear. Walk with me. It's 1899 and we're going to pay a visit to William Bartlett at his ranch, which is a few miles north of the little settlement of Glendale, Arizona. As we get closer, we begin to see the entrance, which is lined with tiny little palm trees. Bartlett is a pretty wealthy man, so he had a lot of seedlings sent over from California to line his driveway, which was just west of where 59th Avenue is nowadays, at Olive. No, they're not date palms, they're simply California fan palms. They don't produce d...

Contrary to popular belief, the railroad tracks weren't there before Grand Avenue was built. Grand Avenue was there for many years before the railroad tracks. Everyone know the story of how towns grow up in the old west - the railroad is built, and towns grow up along the tracks. But it didn't happen that way to Glendale, Arizona. Time-travel with me. Let's go to Van Buren and 7th Avenue in 1885. We're at the city limits of Phoenix, Arizona. And as we look northwest, there's nothing but empty desert out there. Sure, Wickenburg is waaaayyyy out there, but there's really nothing in-between. And there's certainly no railroad. But we're hanging around with William Murphy and his "unrealistically optimistic" investors, and we're told that he wants to build a road out to the end of the canal that was just finished, about twelve miles northwest of where we're standing. I don't know about you, but I'm not investing! He's a...

Christown Mall (now called Christown Spectrum), at 19th Avenue and Bethany Home, in Phoenix, Arizona, was named after Chris Harri, who owned the land. Chris Harri I've always had a particular fascination with names, and the fact that they named this mall after a farmer's first name really tickles me. Although I can't imagine that they were ever tempted to call it Harritown, but they could have called it anything, like the Super-Dooper Tropical Paradise Mall, or something. But they called it Chris. It must have been amazing. Time-travel with me to 1961. We are going to step into the air conditioned comfort of the brand new Chris-Town Mall. And whatever we had seen in Phoenix before, in the 1950s and 1940s, just couldn't compare. This mall was an immediate success from the day it opened and still remains a place that people love. And I've asked around to see if I'm supposed to call it Spectrum nowadays, and I guess some people do, but I just checked the...

One of the most common things that I hear people is say is that they wish that they had invested in land in Phoenix. I really have no idea how buying land works, and I have to admit that it kinda puzzles me. From what I understand, you get a loan, and then you pay it back, with interest, for years. Of course, the idea is for the land to become attractive enough that someone else will buy it, for more money, or that you will be able to sell it to a developer who wants to build something there. And I know many places that would have been a good investment, such as the land in the photo at the top of this post, which is looking northeast on Camelback Road at about 24th Street in the 1940s. Of course, you'd have to invest in the land before it started to get pretty darn expensive, which started to happen in the 1960s. And of course you'd have to put up with your friends wondering if you're crazy for buying land "way out in the middle of nowhere". But you would th...

If you look very carefully in downtown Phoenix, on the west side of Central Avenue between Adams and Monroe, you can find the Heard Building. It's only nine stories tall, but in 1920 it must have been absolutely amazing. And it was a symbol of the prosperity of Phoenix, and one of it's most successful citizens, Dwight Heard. 1949 ad for the Dwight B. Heard Investment Company. Note the address is simply "Heard Building". No address necessary. Yes, Dwight is the same guy who created the Heard Museum. That is, he and his wife Maie, who was also his partner in their Real Estate business. To me, Dwight and Maie represent just about the ultimate of "unrealistically optimistic" people about the future of Phoenix. They arrived in Phoenix as a young couple, started their Real Estate Company in 1897 with the help of her father, and well, got rich. Very rich. And in 1920, Dwight must have absolutely blown everyone away with the gigantic "skyscraper"...

I live in Glendale, Arizona and I don't usually go west of the Agua Fria River. When I do cross it, I see names of roads like El Mirage, Litchfield, Dysart, and many more. And I've always been curious about the names of roads in Phoenix. Most of the old roads in Phoenix led to farms, like the Bell farm, the Osborn farm, the Thomas farm, or the Broadway farm, so I was inclined to think that the road got its name like that. But then every once in a while there's a road like Sarival, which is a contraction of Salt River Valley, and I became suspicious again. This is what I found out today. Dysart was named after Nathaniel Dysart, a rancher who lived in the valley a looooonnnnggg time ago. That's his picture up there, and here is a newspaper article from the Arizona Republican about his becoming executor of the will after his mother's death in 1918. He lived until 1957, donated the land for the Dysart School, and yep, Dysart Road is named after him. 1918 articl...

Sarival Avenue, a contraction of Salt River Valley, was named after Sarival Cotton. If you know your Arizona history, you know how important cotton has been for the economy. In fact, the town of Goodyear was created by the Goodyear company to grow cotton, which, back in the 1920s, was necessary in the production of tires. It's not true anymore, of course, but back then tires had to have cotton to hold them together, especially long staple cotton. Time-travel with me, and let's follow the money. And there was a LOT of money to be made producing tires after automobiles were invented, and especially during World War I. The Goodyear Company had to import its cotton from the Middle East, which was very expensive, and they decided to experiment with growing something similar in the United States, in an area that was very similar to Egypt, the Salt River Valley, where Phoenix is. The original location of Goodyear, Arizona, south of Chandler. From a 1935 map. The first li...

Like a lot of people who live in Phoenix, I left Minnesota to get away from snow and cold. And as a teenager, that's all that I thought about. Then, little by little, I wondered why there was such a big city right in the middle of a desert? My interest in history has made me do some careful research over the years, and I'm still learning. And Phoenix has been so successful, that just about all of the traces of how it came to be have been hidden. And, really, that was the point. Phoenix is an oasis in the desert that sits on the edge of a watershed. So, if you live in the Phoenix, Arizona area and wonder why it's here, when it doesn't appear to rain very much, you really can't be blamed for being puzzled. The watershed for Phoenix, Arizona. The most common misconception I've heard is that the Phoenix, Arizona area was a lush, green, landscape with flowing rivers, etc., before it was ruined by people. That's simply not true. The Sonoran Desert h...

The term "gentrification" is applied to an neighborhood that is, uh, less than fashionable, or to use a term that no one uses anymore - "blighted", and is going through the process of restoration or replacement  of old buildings. Right now I'm watching Sunnyslope, Maryvale, and downtown Phoenix going through the process of gentrification. As an old Californian, I know that gentrification means that an area becomes too expensive for the people who have been living there, sometimes for generations, and the ordinary grocery stores become replaced with expensive "boutique" shops. The neighborhoods get prettier, but it displaces a lot of people who need affordable housing. When I moved back to Phoenix from Los Angeles in 1989, I was particularly fascinated with Sunnyslope. To my eyes it just seemed impossible that an area with such beautiful mountain views could be so, uh, less-than-fashionable. I wondered why Central Avenue didn't just go up int...

I live in Glendale, Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix, and it was only recently that I realized that there's a mountain pass between two ranges just south of me, South Mountain and the Estrellas. A very big mountain pass! And it seems to be invisible to most people living in Phoenix. It's invisible to most people because, if you're like me, the mountain range south of Phoenix is simply "South Mountain". It isn't. South Mountain only goes as far as 51st Avenue, then there's a large pass, and then the Estrellas begin. I discovered this a couple of years ago when I started learning about the plans to complete the freeway loop, and people were saying that it would have to be built "through the mountain". So I decided to take a look. Ride along with me. To see the invisible mountain pass, you need to go south on 51st Avenue. If you're familiar with the area, which is Laveen, on down to the Gila River Indian Community, you know that it's ...

When I mention the LA River, people usually say "Huh? Los Angeles has a river?" Or they say that they've seen the river in movies, but that's it. Most people have no idea where the river is, or why it creates such a problem with Los Angeles freeways. If you want to, you can see the LA River using Google Satellite view. Actually, it's just a concrete channel, and has been for decades. It's more of a wash than a river, because Los Angeles is a desert city, where rivers and creeks only flow after a heavy rain. And the city would be flooded if the water was channeled away, which was completed long before anyone who is reading this post was ever born. But here is where it creates a problem for the freeways - bridges. Some of the most congested freeways in Los Angles cross over the river on a bridges that were built in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s. And those bridges are in exactly the same place. That's why the freeway goes from eight lanes to two so suddenly...

As a history adventurer, I have started to learn to recognize buildings that have been "modernized". There are several around Phoenix that were built in territorial times and then covered up with stucco to give them a more modern look. A lot of times you can still see the original bricks from over 100 years ago, if you take a look around the back of some buildings. But if you're in Tempe, luckily, you don't have to look so hard at the Laird and Dines building, which is on the southeast corner of Mill Avenue and 5th Street. This building was "modernized" in the 1930s. I have no memory of it from when I was at ASU in the 1980s, it was just another crummy-looking building on Mill Avenue. But I love looking at it now. I understand why old buildings get modernized. My guess is that the building was starting to look pretty run-down by the 1930s, and putting stucco all over it probably sharpened it up, for a while. What the Laird and Dines building looke...

Even in my younger days I was often interested in exploring, rather than just going with the crowd. Of course, I hiked up Squaw Peak (what is now called Piestewa Peak) several times. It's a great hike, and it's part of the Phoenix Mountains Preserve, so I recommend it. It's just north of the Biltmore, at about 24th Street and Lincoln. But I often took a different route, the one that went south on the foothills. I always enjoyed the view of the city from there, and of course, there was never anyone around. And there was a narrow concrete sidewalk to walk on, which interested me. I called it the Pink Sidewalk, as did most of the people who were familiar with it did. My research about why exactly it was built, and by and for whom, has been inconclusive. I had always heard that it was built in the 1930s for William Wrigley, Jr. to walk his dog. It could have been built for the guests of the Biltmore to walk on. Of course when I last walked on it, in the 1980s, it was obvio...

California has a lot of valleys. But only the the valley. The San Fernando Valley. And yes, I know how big California is, and how many mountains it has, and how many valleys. But if you mention the valley, you are talking about the San Fernando Valley. The San Fernando Valley is, technically speaking, part of Los Angeles. Places like Van Nuys, Sherman Oaks, and Canoga Park are actually just part of the city of Los Angeles. That is, they are city of LA water, city of LA police, that sort of stuff. To make it even more confusing, there's Burbank, which is in the valley, but they actually are their own city, with their own mayor, police force, etc. I lived in the San Fernando Valley in the 1980s, and since I'm a bit of a map geek, I started being very specific about where I lived. That's because there's the Conejo Valley (where Thousand Oaks is), the San Gabriel Valley (where Pasadena is), and LOTS of other valleys. But when someone at a party in Santa Barbara ask...

Today I explored a parking garage. Yes, I know it sounds like the most pointless thing in the world to do, but if you come along with me I'll try to tell you what I see, and why I find it so fascinating. The location of this parking garage is on Block 23, between Washington and Jefferson along 2nd Street, where the 1953 JC Penney's building was, in Phoenix, Arizona. You may have parked there while you were at the big game - I saw a lot of people doing that today. But if all you're seeing is a parking garage, you're missing so much. Time travel with me. Looking west on Washington towards 2nd Street, and JC Penney's, in the 1950s, Phoenix, Arizona. It's 1953 and the Del Webb Company has just finished the ultra-modern JC Penney's building in downtown Phoenix. This really was the last great effort to try to keep shoppers coming downtown, instead of shopping in the new malls that were being built. So while the building itself was impressive, the parki...

Among the many strange things that I've done living in Phoenix is to ride my bike to work. It was actually a very tiny distance, from about Butler to just north of Dunlap, but it pretty much convinced my co-workers that they had a very strange person among them. To me, however, it made perfect sense. As a fairly athletic man, a simple bike ride of about a half-mile was, literally, no sweat for me. I wore a shirt and tie at work, so I rolled my dress clothes up into a bag, and changed at the Fitness Center in the building where I worked, which was Corporate Center. You know, the building over by Fajitas. As a kid from Minneapolis, Phoenix was absolute bicycle heaven to me. No hills! If you've ridden hills, you know what I mean. I spent my childhood bicycling around Minneapolis, and since it was mostly transportation, struggling up hills wasn't something I enjoyed. Phoenix is flat! And the weather! People who asked me if it wasn't ever too hot had obviously nev...

If you've been following the story of Block 23 in Phoenix, you may have read about the plans to build a grocery store there. As of this writing, April 2016, it's just been announced, but no construction has begun. Block 23, by the way is between Washington and Jefferson and 1st and 2nd Streets. If you lived in territorial Phoenix, you would have called Block 23 City Hall Plaza. This chunk of land was set aside when the city was platted in 1870, and until the late 1920s it was a public space, mostly filled with trees, a fountain, and a gazebo where generations of Phoenicians gathered to socialize, and to watch parades. Of course Phoenix has always had growing pains, so by the time the new City Hall/Maricopa County Courthouse was planned to be built over on Washington and 1st Avenue (now Historic City Hall), the old Territorial Court House was really in need of being retired. And so the city turned over Block 23 to commercial use, and a gigantic theater was built there, ca...