Button trading at NHD Nationals

 One of the most beloved traditions at the NHD National Contest is button trading! 

Throughout the week, students from across the world gather to exchange state-themed buttons, share stories about their projects, and make new friends from every corner of the world. 🗺️
What starts as a simple trade often becomes a conversation about history, research, and the communities they represent. 

Education Team at AHS

 Wow. We have a GREAT group of educators at Arizona Historical Society . . .

Dr. Kristen Rex writes, "Have I mentioned lately I love working with this team? Teamwork makes the dreams work. We are in Alpine, Tucson and Tempe collaborating this morning writing a grant to recruit rural teachers to participate in NHD project based learning opportunities for their students!"

— with Emily Hahn, Leonard Moody

The Historical League is proud to support all their work!

Juneteenth at new location

 

Delores Tomasek 1942-2026, long-time Historical League member

It is with great sadness we share that Delores Tomasek passed away May 27, 2026.  Delores has been a league member since 1993. She was a past president 2003-2004, a Past Historymakers co-chair 2008, and also co-chaired the Children's Holiday Party. She has been fighting cancer for more than a year. May her memory be a blessing to all who knew her. Her smile was infectious and we will miss her.

A funeral Mass celebrating Delores’s life was held on Saturday, May 30, 2026, at Church of the Ascension in Fountain Hills. Many Historical League members attended the beautiful service and lovely luncheon that followed. Cathy and Tom Shumard, Margaret and Larry Baker, Jolynn Clarke, Chris Hackett, Nancy and Stan Evans, Diane Smith, Carolyn Mendoza, Mary and Bill Parker, Susan Dale, Mary McMahon, Clede Gorrell, Jan Murray, Diane Linthicum, Joan Galloway, Lindy Isacksen, Bonnie Newhoff, Anne Lupica, Donna Esposito. 

Delores was preceded in death by her beloved husband, Francis Edward Tomasek with whom she shared 45 years of marriage.

WWII Papago Park POW huts

 Restoration and preservation of those surviving WWII Camp Papago POW Huts is an ongoing project at the Arizona Heritage Center at Papago Park.

One of the wildest forgotten stories in Arizona history happened right beneath what is now Papago Park in Phoenix.
During World War II, Camp Papago held mostly German naval prisoners captured during the war. But in December 1944, 25 German POWs pulled off the largest Axis prison escape ever from a U.S. camp.
Using homemade tools, they secretly dug a 176-foot tunnel beneath the camp and escaped into the Arizona desert under the cover of darkness. Their plan was to follow rivers south toward Mexico… except they didn’t realize most Arizona riverbeds were completely dry.
Lost, exhausted, and running out of supplies, the escapees were eventually captured one by one or turned themselves in. What started as a daring wartime breakout became one of the strangest stories in Arizona history.
Today, thousands visit Papago Park without realizing a WWII POW camp once stood beneath the desert landscape.

NHDAZ student Mateo researches Alice Cooper

 What an incredible National History Day Arizona success story!

Earlier this year, Mateo dedicated himself to researching Arizona music legend Alice Cooper for his National History Day project, writing a 12-page essay that showcased the power of student-driven historical research.

Thanks to the support of an outstanding educator, a determined school principal, and a community that believes in celebrating student achievement, Mateo’s project made its way to Alice Cooper himself!

Not only did Alice Cooper take the time to read Mateo’s work, but he also signed the essay with an “A+” and gifted Mateo an autographed album — creating a memory that will last a lifetime.

This is what National History Day is all about: inspiring students to explore the past, develop their research skills, and discover meaningful connections between history and the world around them.

Congratulations, Mateo! Your hard work, curiosity, and dedication truly paid off.

Sandra Day O'Connor, 1992 Arizona Historymaker, continues to make a difference

 Before the American Revolution became legend, it was lived.

 They were organizers, writers, soldiers, printers, petitioners, diplomats, and spies. Many were not famous. They argued, sacrificed, and acted without knowing whether the country they imagined would survive.

 Before It Became History, a new podcast series from the Sandra Day O'Connor Institute, tells those stories and others from America's founding era to the near present.

 Each episode asks not only what these Americans did, but what their choices demanded of them—and what citizenship demands of us. Justice O'Connor spent her post-retirement years making a similar argument: democracy depends on citizens who understand their history, their institutions, and their responsibilities. Start the series today! oconnorinstitute.org/before-it-became-history/

The Historical League honored her as Arizona Historymaker in 1992. She continues to inspire us through the Sandra Day O'Connor Institute.