Volume 7 Issue 6
$5.99 Nov - Dec 2018 Serving Contracting Firms and the Arizona Community. . . Then & Now
Arizona’s Timeless MagAzine
The Casa Grande Issue
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Gorraiz Book Celebrates Casa Grande’s Past Casa Grande’s Futuristic Domes Seek a Concrete Future An Architect on the Move: Hiram Hudson Benedict Arizona Machinery’s James Bowlin Jr.’s Pinal County Legacy A “Noble” Endeavor: Casa Grande’s New Sign Park Life in a Cotton Crossroads: Friendly Corners
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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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Luke M. Snell Article on page 27
Marilyn Szabo Article on page 48
I have spent most of my professional life teaching and consulting on concrete projects. My career path started in college, assisting civil engineering graduate students on their research projects. I performed grunt work such as running the materials lab that included testing fresh concrete and concrete cylinders. Two professors encouraged me to build on these experiences. They co-authored my first paper on concrete testing and provided support for my further studies in graduate school. After seven years of consulting and troubleshooting on concrete projects, I had an opportunity to start a Construction Management Department at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. By working with construction workers and students, I thought I could improve the quality of their concrete. Concrete has given me some unique opportunities. I have been asked to go to some unusual places to help start concrete programs and certifications, including Algeria, China, Mongolia, Saipan, Taiwan, and Tunisia. I enjoy sharing, what it took me years to learn, with students and professionals in our industry. Arizona Contractor and Community magazine has given me an opportunity to tell some of my stories, communicate good concrete practices, and document the history of concrete. Hopefully, my contribution will improve concrete practices in Arizona, and maybe bring a smile to readers as we relive some not-so-successful concrete stories.
Photographer Marilyn Szabo has been capturing striking imagery fueled by her love of history for 25 years. She was trained in photography and received her BA from Virginia Commonwealth University in history. Her portfolio includes images from her extensive domestic travels and while living in Paris. Her photography creates stunning and intimate works by exploring a variety of diverse subjects including architecture, landscape, and people. She prefers to create compositions as part of a series. Szabo’s artwork has been featured in numerous publications including Triumph of Our Communities, Bilingual Press, Tempe, Black and White Magazine, and The Sun. She received the Alligator Juniper’s 2010 National Photography Award, and her work was featured on the cover. She has won five arts commission awards, garnered many grants, and her work is found in numerous collections. In 2003, Szabo began curating the At Work in Arizona Collection commissioned by Alliance Bank of Arizona. The collection consists of 375 black and white images depicting the economic history of the state. The book, At Work in Arizona: The First 100 Years featuring 80 of Szabo’s photographs, was published in 2014. Her most recent solo show was Life&Death:Portraits at the Mesa Arts Center. She is currently working on an accompanying portrait book and the Gorraiz book project.
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Construction Around Arizona: Projects • People • Practices
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Back When: A “Grande” Slam - Douglas Towne
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P: 928 567-6585 E: btippett@networxcs.com. www.networxCS.com Eight
From The Editor: Art Deco Reimagined: Casa Grande’s Railroad Station - Douglas Towne
Streets with No Name: Bowlin’s Audacious Sign Language - Laura Joy DeLay Bowlin Futuristic Domes Seek a Concrete Future in Casa Grande - Douglas Towne Building On The Past: 1957: Banking on Casa Grande’s Growth A “Noble” Endeavor: Casa Grande’s Sign Park Douglas Towne Friendly Corners: Life in a Cotton Crossroads Douglas Towne Documenting a City: The Gorraiz Book Project Marilyn Szabo Architect’s Perspective: Hiram Hudson Benedict, AIA: Always on the Move - Doug Sydnor
Digging Through the Archives: Roman Candelaria William Horner
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Bid Results - Bidjudge
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ACC Advertisers’ Index
Front Cover - A sign erected by the Casa Grande Jaycees on Arizona Highway 87 in the mid-1950s. Article on page 48. Inset - Filling a water truck during construction of I-10 near Picacho, 1960. Article on page 56.
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R
ailroads were the genesis of many Arizona settlements. Steam locomotives, roaring into town belching smoke, brought in more than just passengers and freight, however. The ornate stations constructed by the railroads were often the architectural showpiece of the communities. Some communities have been fortunate to repurpose these irreplaceable buildings. One example is the El Paso & Southwestern Railroad station in Douglas, a striking example of Classic Revival architecture that opened in 1902 and is now used as headquarters for the city police department. Sadly, Casa Grande is not one of those Top: Architect’s rendering, 1939. Below: Casa Grande Railroad Station, 1940.
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Editor’s column
Art Deco Reimagined: Casa Grande’s Railroad Station Douglas Towne
cities that managed to preserve its station. This is especially tragic since it was a rare Arizona example of an architectural style unique to the Southwest. The station opened in 1940, and its Pueblo Deco architecture resulted from regionalization of the Art Deco style. How did Casa Grande come
to have an outstanding example of this unique style? The Southern Pacific railroad founded Casa Grande, unceremoniously, while laying tracks in 1879. The work was progressing eastward from California when construction was temporarily halted because
Nov-Dec 2018
Casa Grande Railroad Station, 2006.
The following year, the Southern Pacific railroad released an architectural sketch of the new depot that was of Pueblo design with Native American ornamental enrichments. The station was designed at the Southern Pacific headquarters in San Francisco, where J.H. Christie was the chief architect; staff architect William F. Meaney signed the drawing. The facility was to be semi-fireproof with wire fabric and stucco on the exterior and plaster and cement stucco on the interior. The floor plan provided for a waiting room and ticket office, baggage room, and freight room. On January 16, 1940, the new Casa Grande railroad station was dedicated by Arizona Governor Robert Jones and officials from Southern Pacific. The building was Pueblo Deco, an American regional architectural style, popular in the early 20th century. The design fused elements of Art Deco and Pueblo Revival and was influenced by architect Mary Colter’s work. The term was popularized in the 1984 book, arizcc.com
Pueblo Deco: The Art Deco Architecture of the Southwest by Marcus Whiffen and Carla Breeze. Casa Grande’s prized railroad station, however, was to suffer an ignoble demise. By the late 1990s, the building was closed and its windows boarded up. After Southern Pacific was acquired by the Union Pacific Railroad, the city made overtures about obtaining the station. Architect Bill Otwell prepared a Historic Building Preservation Plan for the community in 2009. Casa Grande officials had an agreement with the railroad to take over ownership of the building, provided it would be moved to a new site. Moving the building was not practical though, according to a 2009 article in the Arizona Republic. That same year, the station was damaged by fire, necessitating the demolition of the best example of Pueblo Deco architecture in Arizona. “The afternoon and evening of the fire can be counted as one of my saddest memories of losing Casa Grande’s history and fine architecture,” says Marge Jantz, chairwoman of the city’s Historic Preservation Commission. A few pieces of the station were saved, and are on display at the Museum of Casa Grande. It is unfortunate the plea contained in Pueblo Deco: The Art Deco Architecture of the Southwest couldn’t be realized. “One can only hope that a use will be found for it [as] it merits preservation both as a building of intrinsic architectural quality and as the only example in Arizona (apparently) of the combination of Pueblo form and Indian ornament.” Arizona Contractor & Community
Images courtesy of Author
of heat and a lack of supplies at what is now Casa Grande. The temporary camp established at the railhead was named Terminus, for its location at the “end of the line.” The settlement, which consisted of five people and three buildings, persisted once work resumed and the railhead moved east in 1880. A railroad station built in 1887 served Casa Grande for the next 50 years until it was destroyed by fire in 1937. The building, however, had been due for replacement. “We had plans 10 years ago for a new station at Casa Grande, but the Depression made it necessary to abandon the project,” William Wilson, Southern Pacific division superintendent, told the Casa Grande Dispatch. Residents were astonished when plans for the new station were announced in the Dispatch on April 1, 1938. Groundbreaking for a new Southern Pacific railroad depot was an “…elaborate modernistic type of building with all of the facilities of the Grand Central Station in New York City. The building will be 10 stories in height built of marble shipped from Georgia. Solid-gold hardware will be used through the building…” At the conclusion, the Dispatch noted that it was April Fool’s Day.
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Images courtesy of Author
y first paying construction job was working summers during high school for Achen Gardner. On days I wasn’t practicing on drums with my high school marching band, I would ride to work with my Dad, Uncle, and Cousin. I recall this period as a lot of fun. I was being chauffeured to work, making good money, and keeping in shape by shoveling and chasing stakes. In my off-hours, I played in a punk rock band and did other fun teenage activities. Achen Gardner had several jobs in Casa Grande, including the Maricopa Highway/ Cottonwood Lane project. This Top: Bill Horner cutting curb was three miles of road construcgrade along Sacaton Street tion starting at State Highway south of Florence Blvd, 1996. Left: Billy Horner and his dad, 387 (also known as Pinal Avenue) that passed by the Frito Lay plant Bill, working for Achen Gardner near Casa Grande, 1996. arizcc.com
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