Serving Contracting Firms and the Arizona Community. . .
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Canion & Bond Arizona Construction elders
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●The "Wrap" on Phoenix's Reynolds Aluminum Plant ●Support Found for arizona’s tallest adobe building ●The Importance of Schwenn and Clark Architects ●Racing along with Bloomquist Pump Service ●Route 66 in Holbrook Remembered ●Don't be Taken to the (Dry) Cleaners Arizona contractor & Community
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Publisher William Horner Billy@arizcc.com Editor Douglas Towne Douglas@arizcc.com Contributors Michael Bernstein Marlene Blakeney Buddy Escapule Jennifer M. Levstik Roland Murphy Luke Snell Doug Sydnor Production Manager Laura Horner Laura@arizcc.com Magazine Advisor Chuck Runbeck Chuck@arizcc.com Publisher’s Representatives Tom Hogarty Tom@arizcc.com Barry Warner Barry@arizcc.com Advertising 602-931-0069 Arizcc.com/advertise Visit us online at arizcc.com
Serving Contracting Firms and the Arizona Community… Then & Now Arizona Contractor & Community (ACC) magazine is published bi-monthly (Jan/Feb, Mar/Apr, May/June, July/Aug, Sept/Oct, and Nov/Dec). ACC is a professional publication designed for the contracting industry, engineers, architects, equipment rentals, suppliers, and others interested in Arizona and its history. Content including text, photographs or illustrations may not be reproduced without the written permission from the publisher. The publisher does not assume responsibility for unsolicited submissions. ACC reserves the right to reject any editorial and advertising material and reserves the right to edit all submitted content material. Arizona Contractor & Community Copyright © 2018 All rights reserved.
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CONTRIBUTORS
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Buddy Escapule Article on page 21
Jennifer M. Levstik, M.A. Article on page 52
Buddy Escapule has been immersed in mining, construction, and ranching since he was a child. He was raised in Tombstone, where his family has worked in those fields for several generations. This family influence steered Buddy into a construction career. Buddy still recalls his excitement as an 8-year-old when his dad asked him if he wanted to help clean out the shotcrete pump hoses at a job site. His dad ran a sponge through the tube while Buddy sat on it. Suddenly, the pump pressured up, causing the sponge to shoot out of the hose like a cannonball and render Buddy airborne too. In high school, Buddy would borrow equipment from his father's job sites on weekends to do side jobs, such as grading driveways and leveling lots. He has worked for 5D Mining and Construction for the last eight years. His job tasks range from operating heavy equipment to running dirt crews to estimating and managing projects, such as demolition, excavation, grading, HDPE pipe installation, and concrete. Buddy is currently managing a two-year project in Hayden, moving dirt and doing concrete work as part of a major upgrade to a smelter. Since January 2017, his crews have been working around the clock to pour around 5,500 yards of concrete.
Jennifer Levstik works as an architectural historian and historic preservation specialist for Logan Simpson, an environmental consulting, urban planning, and landscape design company based in Arizona. She serves as the head of Logan Simpson's historic preservation program and is based out of their Tucson office. Jennifer has more than 19 years of experience in Cultural Resource Management and Historic Preservation. She has worked throughout Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, California, Utah, Oregon, and Idaho and has broad experience as an architectural historian, archaeological field director, and is the former Lead Planner for the City of Tucson Historic Preservation Office. She has also served as an adjunct instructor with the University of Arizona’s College of Architecture, Planning, and Landscape Architecture. She has authored hundreds of technical reports, national register nominations, academic and public history articles, as well as online publications for the Society of Architectural Historians. In addition to managing a wide variety of projects including directing prehistoric and historic archaeological projects; historic building, district, and landscape documentation projects, and managing the rehabilitation and restoration of historic buildings and vintage signage, Jennifer has experience in both the private and the public sectors, having managed projects for numerous federal and local government agencies.
May-Jun 2018
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Arizona contractor & Community
Volume 7 Issue 3
CONTENTS 10. 13. 30. 32. 38. 40. 44. 46. 50. 52. 56. 58. 61. 62.
From The Editor: A Snapshot in Time: Holbrook, 1981 Douglas Towne Construction Around Arizona: Projects • People • Practices Back When: Hite Grows on Phoenix - Douglas Towne The “Wrap” on Phoenix’s Reynolds Aluminum Plant Douglas Towne Digging into Canion Contracting: Robert E. Canion Sr. Marlene Blakeney Digging into Canion Contracting: Robert E. Canion Jr. Marlene Blakeney Digging into Canion Contracting: Robert E. Canion Jr.’s Best Construction Stories - Marlene Blakeney “Bonding” Over Work: Two Construction Elders Douglas Towne Building on the Past: 1972: Spring Air Mattress Support Found For Arizona’s Tallest Adobe Building: Tucson’s Marist College - Jennifer M. Levstik, M.A. Architect’s Perspective: Schwenn and Clark Architects: Reminds Us of What is Important Doug Sydnor, FAIA Digging Through the Archives: Bloomquist Pump William Horner Bid Results - Bidjudge ACC Advertisers’ Index
Image courtesy of Laura Horner Photography
Front Cover Robert Canion Jr. and James Bond reminisce about their construction careers, which first overlapped at the Central Avenue underpass project in 1939. Article on page 46.
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Arizona contractor & Community
Editor’s Column: A Snapshot in Time: Holbrook, 1981 Douglas Towne
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extra-kitschy Wigwam Motel and the only 90-degree turn on the entire highway, is one of its Holy Grails. Since 1926, Route 66 has been the lifeblood of Holbrook, bringing traffic 24/7 through town looking for gas, food, lodging, and tchotchkes. When Interstate 40 bypassed Holbrook in 1981, the town’s Route 66 businesses suffered and many closed. The most famous highway in Amer-
ica, including the stretch through Holbrook, became an afterthought to most motorists. It wasn't until a few decades later that Route 66 found a bit of its mojo again when nostalgic travelers set out to rediscover what a two-lane blacktop cross-country road trip felt like. By then, the town’s stretch of Route 66 was like a prehistoric civilization preserved in amber.
Images courtesy of Author
ravelers interested in the past are a funny breed. They are more excited about photographing a boarded-up diner than having a delicious meal. And they’ll choose a motel based on its dazzling vintage neon sign, unconcerned about the condition of their room. Route 66, also known as the “Mother Road,” is fertile ground for these roadside historians, and Holbrook, featuring the
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Holbrook, Arizona, 1909.
Many of Holbrook’s Route 66 businesses had been shuttered for decades. Some buildings were abandoned, and the curious took photographs, documenting the slow decay. Even the most famous Route 66 business in town, the Wigwam Motel that opened in 1950, was closed from 1982-1988 until the road once again came back into vogue. Holbrook’s rebirth has inspired local resident Linda Kor-Fisher, editor at The Tribune-News/Silver Creek Herald. She is refurbishing a lodge formerly known as the Sundown Motel, which was built in 1949. Located adjacent to the Wigwam Motel, the business has been closed since the early 1980s. This renovation project is emblematic of Holbrook’s neglected commercial landscape and the passion many have for the “Mother Road.” Holbrook’s highway strip features several prominent rock shops. In the early 1880’s, Holbrook was a rough-and-tumble Wild West town. It was also the headquarters of the Aztec Land and Cattle Company, better known as the famous Hashknife Ranch, for the shape of its brand. After President Theodore Roosevelt established the nearby Petrified Forest National Monument in 1906, the town’s economy got a boost from the tourist trade. The town became a rock collector’s paradise, with shops such as the Pow Wow Trading Post, which converted its motel units into sales displays that offered petrified wood, desert roses, and geodes. Some of these establishments, such as the Rainbow Rock Shop, not content to let nature’s gifts do their marketing, featured advertisements including life-sized, green cement dinosaurs to lure in customers. Holbrook’s most unusual relic might not involve a prehistoric creature but a shuttered restaurant. Painted underneath the restaurant’s front window is “B-B-QED BOLOGNA.” Was this their specialty? Unfamiliar with this dish, a Google search www.Arizcc.com
revealed that barbequed bologna is sometimes called “Redneck steak.” Numerous online reviews tout it as a surprisingly tasty meal, especially if good quality bologna is used that doesn't have "mechanically separated" meat or injected preservatives.
I’ve added the dish to my bucket list, but I’ll have to venture somewhere else besides Holbrook (maybe the South?) to sample it. And isn’t that the whole point of being on the road, to see and try new things?
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Construction Around Arizona
Projects
Projects ∙ People ∙ Practices
Construction Around Arizona
Courtesy Chevrolet Tees it Up for Charity
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vercast skies didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of participants at the Third Annual Courtesy Chevrolet Fleet Customer Appreciation Day at the Arizona Biltmore Golf Course on February 16, 2018. Long before the mid-morning registration check-in, eager golfers were on the practice green tuning up their putting strokes, touring booths set up nearby by a variety of vendors, and even enjoying customrolled cigars. The crowd’s mood, already jovial from getting a Friday off from work, was heightened by the event’s good cause that ben-
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efitted the Boys & Girls Club of Metro Phoenix. A tasty lunch catered by El Toro BBQ featured pulled-pork, with Arizona pecan wood. Courtesy Chevrolet management then took the stage to thank participants and hand out prizes to raffle winners. Golfers then assembled in their carts, with visions of birdies and eagles, and headed out for the tournament’s shotgun start. No word on how many “snowmen” showed up on participants’ score cards. The auto dealership, known by many for having the Valley’s most beloved midcentury sign, the towering blue and yellow Courtesy Chevrolet arrow sign on Camelback Road, is to be applauded for their dedication toward improving the lives of youth in the Valley. The first two clubs opened in Phoenix in 1946, and since then
the Boys & Girls Club of Metro Phoenix has expanded to provide services to more than 27,000 local youths annually at 13 clubs and one dental clinic. Courtesy Chevrolet has been serving the Valley almost as long, having been founded in 1955 by Edward J. Fitzgerald and prominent California car dealership owner R. Mitchel McClure. The dealership was partially acquired in 1981 by Fitzgerald’s son-in-law, William “Bill” R. Gruwell. His grandson, Scott Gruwell is currently the general manager. “We have been able to stay very strong just on the founding principles of taking care of employees and customers,” Gruwell says. “If you treat your employees well, they treat the customers well, and it comes full circle.”
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