Phoenix in the forties

In 1941, Arthur Horton, a professor at Arizona State Teachers College, the precursor of ASU, published a remarkable Survey of Phoenix and the Valley of the Sun. What makes it still valuable is that it provides us with the most authoritative examination of Phoenix in that decade, or at any time until perhaps the 1960s.

The exhaustive report is also helpful in understanding a decade that meant far more than American involvement in World War II and its effects on Phoenix (which I wrote about here). That lasted less than four years out of 10. Much more was going on.

The decade began with a strong local economy, almost entirely thanks to the New Deal’s enormous largesse toward Phoenix and Arizona. The stimulus spending worked and helped pull Phoenix out of the Great Depression. By 1940, Americans were doing better and traveling, including visiting the mostly new resorts including the Arizona Biltmore, Camelback Inn, Jokake Inn, Adobe House, Ingleside Inn, Wigwam Guest Ranch and San Marcos at Chandler, as well as Phoenix’s premier hotels. The “Valley of the Sun” tourist promotion launched by the Chamber of Commerce and the railroads was paying off. To be sure, not everyone was doing better: 10,000 in the county (population 186,000) were on relief.

Agriculture remained the mainstay of the Salt River Valley’s economy. According to Horton, Arizona had 1.1 million grapefruit trees, 625,000 orange trees; 17,000 lemon trees; 5,000 tangerine trees, and 2,675 lime trees. Most of these were in the American Eden in and around Phoenix.

Cotton and alfalfa were among the other major crops. But, as Horton noted, “Almost everything will grow where there is sufficient water for irrigation because of the soil and climate.” Farmers, including my great-grandparents, also grew cantaloupes, honey, dates, sugar beets, grains and hay. Also, 289 acres of vineyards remained from a larger scope of grape production earlier in the century.

Phoenix was a major center for beef cattle with the Tovrea feedlots and slaughterhouses, as well as dairies and poultry operations. In 1939, crops in the valley were valued at nearly $16 million (more than $275 million in 2016 dollars). Livestock and beef products sold for $3 million (nearly $52 million today). The Salt River Valley helped feed the nation.

The city held 65,514 people in about 15 square miles. Arizona had actually been losing population early in the Depression. But with the New Deal turnaround, Phoenix grew by 36 percent — below the 66 percent of the 1920s but growth nonetheless. By comparison, El Paso, which Phoenix was determined to unseat as the business capital of the Southwest, lost 5.5 percent of its population in the 1930s. Tucson, which by 1940 was only about half Phoenix’s size, had added only 10 percent over the previous decade.

Horton tells us that 1939-40 had seen the “greatest retail trade” posted in Phoenix history. The city and surrounding areas had 19 department, dry goods and variety stores; 71 apparel shops; 46 auto dealers; 295 food stores; 165 gas stations; 55 bars, and 45 drug stores. Retail was locally owned and mostly small scale.

The city had three radio stations, as well as 11,852 residential telephones, and 8,721 business phones run by Mountain States Telephone Co. Twenty-three Western Union telegraph messenger boys were kept busy. At the main telegraph office and at Union Station, some 6,000 wires a day were sent or received.

With national railroad service, Phoenix was a significant wholesale center, with 194 establishments. Other industry was small, from Arizona Flour Mills to Allison Steel (which fabricated the KTAR radio tower) and the Holsum Bakery. Phoenix’s claim to manufacturing fame was air conditioning (mostly swamp coolers): 30 manufacturers. But this, too, was modest. Employment totaled 200. One of the largest industries was making ice, for businesses, homes, and the railroad refrigerator cars that transported Valley produce.

The first streamliner train arrived at Union Station in 1940. But more of the sleek passenger trains would have to wait until after the war. Sky Harbor was served by three airlines. Nearly 46,000 cars were registered in the county.

This was the city, by numbers, that greeted the new decade.

II.

In the 1940s, Phoenix remained a Southern and a Western city. Schools and many establishments were segregated. Chinatown was intact downtown, although Chinese entrepreneurs operated groceries throughout the city. Blacks and Hispanics could not buy property or live north of Van Buren Street. About 500 teenagers from reservations were enrolled at Phoenix Indian High School But American Indians could not vote in Arizona, even though President Calvin Coolidge had made all indigenous tribal members American citizens in 1924. This miscarriage of justice would not be righted until the Harrison and Austin v. Laveen lawsuit of 1948, brought by two American Indian World War II veterans.

Although the county was nearly 21 percent Hispanic, far fewer lived within the city limits. Of the 6,200 "Negroes" counted in the Census, only 1,750 lived in the city. The Chinese population was about 600. African-Americans were heavily represented in what had been named one of America's worst slums, south of the railroad tracks around Seventh Avenue and Buckeye. This was where Father Emmett McLoughlin worked, pushing for the Matthew Henson Homes project, which opened in 1940, and founding St. Monica's Hospital nearby. He left the priesthood in 1948 after long conflicts with his superiors, who said he was spending too much time working to improve the slums and aid residents by such endeavors as being the first head of the city housing authority.

The police department had 15 radio cars and the fire department eight pieces of apparatus. But beyond the equipment, law enforcement was often deeply corrupt. Phoenix was a wide-open town, with brothels and gambling dens along with bars. The brothel owners paid "fines" to city coffers and were protected by the police. Much of the gambling, especially the wire betting nationally, was controlled by the Chicago Outfit and its local kingpin, Gus Greenbaum. Operating from offices in the Luhrs Tower, Greenbaum was friendly with the political establishment, the merchant princes Barry and Robert Goldwater and Harry Rosenzweig, and wealthy contractor Del Webb. In 1945, the mob forced him to move to Las Vegas to run its casino interests, but Gus kept his main home in Phoenix. He also successfully fended off the efforts to take over his off-track betting by powerful liquor baron and landowner Kemper Marley.

Only very rarely did the inherent tensions explode the bubble of respectable Phoenix. The most prominent example was in 1944, when Phoenix Police Officer David "Star" Johnson, an African-American, was gunned down by white Detective "Frenchy" Navarre. Navarre was acquitted by an all-white jury but was later shot to death at police headquarters by Johnson's partner. The crime had complex roots beyond racial animus, including Frenchy's connections with organized crime.

The reality and image of corruption, especially when the city was briefly placed off-limits to soldiers by the military, gave rise to a generation of civic reformers. Chief among them was lawyer and fixer Frank Snell, who was 41 years old in 1940. Together with Mark Wilmer, he created the most prominent law firm in the state. Wilmer worked the courtroom while Snell worked the boardrooms, so the saying went (for example, he led the effort to have Central Arizona Light and Power, forerunner of APS, acquired from eastern investors in 1945). Snell wanted a "clean" Phoenix. He led the 1942 "card room putsch" during the war to oust the police chief and city manager. But after the City Commissioners reneged on the deal, Snell dedicated himself to changing Phoenix city government. The result would be a city council, a strong city manager, and the non-partisan Charter Government Committee, whose council candidates would rule until the 1970s. This came after repeated battles through the decade.

Other reformers included the Goldwaters, Newton and Harry Rosenzweig, and Eugene C. Pulliam, an Indianapolis newspaper published who bought the Arizona Republic and Phoenix Gazette in 1946. Pulliam used this powerful megaphone to crusade against corruption and in favor of a business-friendly, well-run city. All of them saw a post-war Phoenix that would grow into a major city.

But the crusade has definite political shadings. The old City Commission was Democratic and pro-union. The Democratic Party was dominant in the city and state, and organized labor held substantial influence. Pulliam, especially, as well as the Goldwaters and Rosenzweigs were Republicans and wanted to flip the political calculus. Greenbaum, who was a behind-the-scenes political player, saw the shift ahead and switched from being a Democrat to a Republican. Nor did corruption ever go away. As author and journalist Dave Wagner recounts, Harry Rosenzweig said of his successful candidacy for City Council: "Barry and I ran. We were against gambling, prostitution, and vice... And Barry said, 'The three things I like the best.' "

III.

Phoenix had three high schools: Phoenix Union, George Washington Carver (for Negroes) and the new North High School, with handsome buildings on a lovely, verdant campus on Thomas Road at the edge of the city. Old-timers trace this as the origins of cruising on Central, where students could meet their counterparts from other schools — and find romantic partners. (The federal Works Progress Administration, the WPA, built North, as well as Phoenix College).

The decade saw Phoenix straddling the amenities and ambitions of a small town of the West and a modern city. The Carnegie Library, with 67,000 volumes, was too small. The Phoenix Symphony Association, founded in 1929, held only two free concerts a year, along with one by the Oratorio Society. There was the Little Theater, also amateur. The Lyceum Society brought in famous lecturers, including H.G. Wells and Archduke Felix of Austria. The latter spoke on "Is a United States of Europe Possible?" The city was badly behind in developing parks.

On the other hand, some cultural bones were in place that would be important as Phoenix grew. Maie Bartlett Heard had donated the house that became the Heard Museum in 1929. The Arizona Museum was on west Van Buren. Pueblo Grande had been well-restored and preserved as an archeological site and museum by the New Deal. Under the leadership of Gertrude Webster, a group of citizens had established the 140-acre Desert Botanical Garden in 1938. All these were enhanced in the 1940s.

The big events included the Masque of the Yellow Moon, Fiesta Del Sol sponsored by the Thunderbirds, the Cotton Festival, and the JayCees World Championship Rodeo. After the war, Phoenix tried something more ambitious, sponsoring a post-season college football game. The Salad Bowl, complete with a parade on Central, lasted from 1948 to 1955, played in Phoenix Union High School's imposing Montgomery Stadium.

Downtown was the unquestioned business, retail, and commercial center of the city, county, and state. Malls were years in the future. Park Central's site was the prosperous Central Dairy. The Phoenix Street Railway operated streetcars on six lines for a total of 33 miles. Unfortunately, most of its rolling stock was destroyed in a 1947 fire at the car barn. This was the era when General Motors was (criminally) pushing cities to adopt buses, a decision Phoenix made.

IV.

World War II brought tremendous stresses to Phoenix. So did its aftermath. Little new construction had happened in the 1930s and wartime material restrictions, along with the draft, ensured that the first half of the 1940s saw few new houses or apartments built. Yet the city grew fast, even within the 17 square miles it occupied by decade's end. Population grew by 63 percent. During the war, people were encouraged to take in boarders. Afterwards, contractors slowly ramped up to the building boom that would mark Phoenix's next decades.

The end of the war saw a sudden, sharp downturn in business as military bases and wartime factories closed. Phoenix leaders had been unprepared for the situation, even though such cities as San Diego had been planning for a post-war economic transition for years. Some Phoenicians worried that the Depression might return. With Snell in the lead again, and helped by Cold War defense contracts, Phoenix gradually attracted new employers. The most prized among them was Motorola, which opened a research and development lab in 1949, the first of many more operations. The future was coming fast. Unfortunately, it would destroy much of the magic of the old city.

Here is how the Santa Fe Railway described 1940s Phoenix to its passengers, in the guidebook, Along the Route:

Alt. 1,080; pop. Metropolitan Phoenix 141,000. County seat of Maricopa County and capital of Arizona; founded in 1867. Located on north side of Salt River in fertile Salt River valley. Noted winter resort, climate warm, dry and sunny; many resort hotels and guest ranches; numerous sanitariums. Ideal farming section; lands under irrigation from Roosevelt reservoir and Salt River project of U. S. Reclamation service and other projects. Large groves of orange, olive, lemon, grapefruit, date and plum trees. Long avenues of palms, pepper trees and other semi-tropical foliage in suburbs. Phoenix controls its own water supply from Verde River. Transportation system municipally owned. State capital is situated in a beautiful park. Many fine office and business buildings -- churches, schools, hotels, theaters, etc. Headquarters, Tonto National Forest. Fine resort hotels.... Business, social and country clubs. U. S. Indian School, one of the largest in the United States. Papago Park four miles east of city. Encanto Municipal Park. Remains of large prehistoric pueblos and irrigation canals in the valley.

Gallery — Phoenix in the forties:

Click to see the image larger

Dorris-Heyman and Goldwaters, two of downtown's largest retailers, at First Street and Adams.

A Goldwater's display window facing Washington Street, with coed testimonials. McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives

A traffic cop (future police chief Charlie Thomas) handles rush hour at Central and Adams. The Republic and Gazette are still in the Heard Building. The handsome Gooding Building (Emmett's) is still there, buried under "modern" facing.

A moody night outside Gass Brothers Chop House on Central just north of Washington.

The Luhrs Tower is lit up and First Avenue shows off downtown's cluster streetlights. McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives

First Avenue and Washington, across from the courthouse, retailers include Newberry's and Kress.

A slightly different angle of this busy commercial block reveals the Busy Bee Cafe, right, a longtime 24-hour beanery. It's Christmas 1944 and the Battle of the Bulge is being fought in Europe. Downtown Phoenix is busy and decked for holiday shoppers.

North Manor Drive in the new Country Club development, which was outside the city limits.

Harpo Marx and his wife Susan "The Girl With the Million-Dollar Legs" Fleming at the Biltmore.

Camelback Mountain, from 40th Street.

Central Avenue looking north from McDowell. The land on the right will become the Phoenix Civic Center in the 1950s.

The "bellhop races" during a parade at Central and Monroe Street.

Another night shot, this one showing Van Buren looking east from Sixth Avenue. Street lights were not abundant outside of a few prominent locations in the central business district. McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives.

The Gibbs Cafe is one of the businesses on this commercial block on Van Buren between Sixth and Seventh avenues. This is the same location shown in the night shot above.

The density and walkability of downtown extended to Seventh Avenue and Van Buren, Five Points, as shown by the name of the tailor shop. McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives.

The Palms Theater at Central and Cambridge, one of the first new commercial buildings finished after the war.

Even gas stations could be an architectural feast. Paul Bennett's Super Service was located at 1st Avenue and Van Buren.

Phoenix Union High School auditorium in 1940.

The Salad Bowl Parade passes Fillmore Street on Central in the late 1940s.

Looking northeast from the Luhrs Building.

In 1949, the Hotel Westward Ho was topped with a radio mast. But it remains as built in this late 1940s shot looking north on Central. The substantial building a little north of the hotel was Central Methodist Church. My great aunt's designer dress shop was in the vicinity, too. McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives.

Here's a closer view of Central Methodist Church, at Central and Pierce. It moved to Central and Palm Lane in 1950 and the building was demolished for a surface parking lot.

At 20th Avenue on Van Buren, you have left the city behind and are headed into farm country.

Another rural scene circa 1940. This is 16th Street crossing Camelback Road. (McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives).

Outside the city limits, Van Buren became the Tempe Road. We're looking east in 1940 (McCulloch Brothers/ASU Archives).

This northwest view was shot from the Security Building. Note the dense residential areas past the car dealerships.

Outside of Phoenix, the land was still wild. Here is Superstition in the 1940s.

You'll find more photos from the 1940s here.

Related: Wartime Phoenix.

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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.

Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.

 

Comments

[Dawgzy]

Thanks, Rogue. It was a charming place.

[Diane D'Angelo]

Wonderful essay, Jon.

[Robert H. Bohannan]

"Wonderful essay, Jon."
My sentiments, exactly!

[Cal Lash]

Excellent Jon,
Note that the Superstitions still retain great beauty despite our best efforts to build on them. Every 15 minutes is a different color picture.

[Mombo Number Five]

I don't ever recall a time when charming and Phoenix went together in a sentence. It's a desert. It wants to kill you. It will kill you. It's intent is never, never, never to charm you.

[Cal lash]

Mombo, true but there is beauty in death.
And "some of the dead are still breathing."
Charming is not beauty. It's like a baby is cute even though they are ugly and are purely selfish. However in my 65 years in the desert I quickly found what I thought was "beauty". The best desert beauty is where the sand meets the sea.

And as Phoenix is in a desert, Phoenix will go the way of the Hohokam. And horn toads will again roam what we're once illegal green places where idiots chased little white balls.

[NormW]

Really enjoy the historical series of essays, Jon. As a seasonal "migratory Canadian" who winters in a decommissioned mining town in western Pima County, it provides some context for what I see (and don't see) whenever we visit the Valley of the Scum (air-quality reference only).

[Cal Lash]

Regarding the Front Pages, I had previously read the articles on Bolles and Sanders.
I sent Nate Silver a note on his trolling for Clinton and not proving his case that the Fix is not in.
Regarding Winter's article on Bolles, nice piece. Not much new in the article but some interesting semantical presentation.

[Jerry McKenzie]

Thanks for the history scoop! I really enjoyed it.

[cm]

"Looking back from 2016, one pertinent characteristic seems obvious: no matter how tenuous, the precariat had jobs. The new dying Americans, the ones killing themselves on purpose or with drugs, don’t. Don’t, won’t, and know it."

"If there’s no economic plan for the Unnecessariat, there’s certainly an abundance for plans to extract value from them."

"What does it mean, to see the world’s narrative retreat into the distance? To know that nothing more is expected of you. One thing it means is: if someone says something about it publicly, you’re sure as hell going to perk up and listen."

https://morecrows.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/unnecessariat/

[Cal Lash]

CM, I read your word press forward and more crows than eagles and some stuff that was linked in from a conservative blog.
And I think I know what you are saying above but I am not quite sure. For an old farm boy can you maybe put it in simpler talk.

[Doug K]

Thank you for sharing this history. Although I grew up here and was part of the 50's and 60's period, I always gain new insights from your behind the scenes stories. Keep up the good work !

[Michael Hegedus]

Wow, thank you for your excellent article.

[Roberta Richardson]

Who built the housing development at west Northern Ave and 29th Ave.? I grew up near there and knew it as Alta Vista. I think we also referred to it as Hoffman Homes. Now the name Alta Vista seems to apply to other areas and Hoffman records don’t include it. I was surprised to see that homes in that area now are listing around $250,000.

[Joe Schallan]

Ms. Richardson,

Looking at satellite views on Google Maps, I see nothing that looks like a tract home development south of 29th Avenue and Northern, but north of that intersection, along the east side of 29th Avenue, we have Alta Vista, currently labeled as such by Google Maps when viewed a bit zoomed out.

From ads I found in the Arizona Republic, Alta Vista appears to have been launched by Hoffman Homes in 1953. To the west of 29th are what looks like later infill houses, plus townhouses (Northern Manor) by Hallcraft, 1973.

I would say that your memory is spot on!

[Chuck Albertson]

Loved the picture of North Manor Drive W. For much of 1964, my family lived at 2953 (out of picture to the right). Dell Webb's ex (I think) lived next door in the two-story dwelling, Barry Goldwater's mom across the street.