AZ Postcard Contest winner from Yavapai Elementary School, Scottsdale

 Third grade student Jose Hernandez Salgado proudly displays his winning entry to the AZ postcard contest. This program from the Arizona Historical Society makes history fun for these students, celebrating with a pizza party for the whole class. Thanks to Dr. Kristen Rex!

Mary Perona delivers cookbooks to Quartzsite Historical Society

 Who has been to Tyson's Well Stage Station in Quartzite? Dale and Mary Perona stopped at the Quartzsite Historical Society (one of AZ Certified Historical Institutions) to deliver a box of Tastes & Treasures II A Storytelling Cookbook of Historic Arizona. Mary comments, "The directors were very happy to get the books. They have an interesting little site there and the volunteers love to tell stories about their community. It's also known as Tyson's Well Stage Station Museum."

Phoenix Mountain Preserve Event/ Historymaker Ben Avery

 Outdoor + family fun with engaging information about our preserves, the biodiversity of the desert, and a short hike. www.phoenixmountains.org

Without Ben Avery (1909 - 1996) we might not have the Phoenix Mountain Preserve. He was honored as AZ Historymaker in 1995 for all he did as a Journalist and Outdoor Recreation Advocate.

In the early 1950s, the women of the Phoenix Garden Club succeeded in involving Mr. Avery in a crusade to prevent the building of a restaurant and nightclub atop Camelback Mountain. The City of Phoenix initiated a campaign to acquire the top of Camelback and finally achieved this objective in 1968. That controversy motivated Avery’s interest and involvement in parks, which led to the acquisition of the county regional park system and the establishment of the Arizona State Parks and the Phoenix Mountain Preserve.

more info at www.HistoricalLeague.org/Historymakers/Ben-Avery

East Lake Park NCAA Final Four Legacy Project Mural features Arizona Historymakers

Several Arizona Historymakers (Calvin Goode, Cloves Campbell, Morrison Warren, Mrs. Elizabeth White, Warren Stewart) are part of the East Lake Park "All Stars" NCAA Final Four Legacy Project Mural celebrating the Pioneers in the Community. Honored while they were living so we could do an oral history, formal portraits. Stories and pictures at www.HistoricalLeague.org/historymakers.

The mural features George Greathouse; Alexis Thomas; Lincoln Ragsdale; Morrison Warren; Virgil J. Berry Sr.; Calvin Goode; Cloves Campbell; Helen Mason; Benjamin Thomas; Elizabeth White and Warren Stewart.

Honored as one of the 2023 Arizona Historymaker, Mrs. Elizabeth White, 101, attended the Legacy Project ceremony April 2 and stood in front of her image at the Community Center.

Eastlake Park, known as “Phoenix Park” in the 1890s, has been the focal point of the city’s African American history for much of its existence.

NHDAZ judging at NAU

 Dr. Kristen Rex is at NHDAZ judging at Northern Arizona University. She writes:

North NHDAZ perfect weather, excellent student projects and fabulous volunteer judges!!!

March Tour

 A driving tour of South Phoenix? So much to see. The Historical League tour covered nearly 30 miles and featured 8 points of interest south of the Salt River. Highlights included a visit to the South Mountain Preserve, a cruise past a home on the Historic Properties Register surrounded now by brand new million-dollar houses, a brief visit to the Sotelo-Heard Cemetery, a drive down "Funky Broadway" past the historic Precision Auto Parts and foundational Black churches and schools, and a stop to browse at Baseline Flowers, the last remaining shop of the Japanese Flower Gardens dynasty. Lunch was at historic Ponchos Mexican Food and Cantina, on Central Avenue, a mainstay for over fifty years.

Nakagawa Flower Shop on Historical League March Tour

 It's 1939 and a prominent Japanese farming family, the Nakagawa’s, starts a flower farm along Baseline Rd in South Phoenix. Long considered unfarmable, boulders and rocks scattered the soil and had to be removed by hand before the ground was plowed. Once the fields were cleared, the area was found to be excellent for large flower fields. The mountain created a down draft that kept the warm air on the ground and protected the crops.

In 1942, their lives were abruptly interrupted by Executive Order 9066, which forced Japanese Americans to sell or abandon their land and possessions and report to a government internment camp. The Nakagawas, and other local Japanese Americans were interned in the Gila River Internment Camp in southern Arizona. When they were finally released and allowed to return to their farms at the end of World War II, they found their lands ransacked and were forced to start again.

However, despite the interruption to their lives and the destruction to their lands, the Nakagawas, and multiple other families recreated thriving flower farms by the early 1950’s. For almost three decades, the Japanese flower farms acted as a colorful oasis in the middle of a rapidly urbanizing Arizona capitol. Every spring, tourists traveled miles to drive past the fields, smell the flowers, and purchase beautiful bouquets. At their height, the farms collectively shipped 259 boxes of flowers a day across the nation.

Now, the original flower fields are replaced with suburban housing. In 2006, the family sold the last of the flower fields. Baseline Flower Growers, the Nakagawa’s shop, is still open, selling flowers imported from South America and California. Though the flowers no longer fill Baseline Road’s 16-block stretch from 48th street through 32nd street, they still exist in photos and the memories of millions of Phoenix residents.

Thanks to tour organizer Jolynn Clarke, the March Historical League tour brought back all these memories. Thanks to Katie Tovar for the great photos and AHS for the history.