VOLUME 9 ISSUE 4
$5.99 Jul-Aug 2020 Serving Contracting Firms and the Arizona Community. . . Then & Now
The “Art” of Lettuce Production in Arizona Stylish Sales: The Neil B. McGinnis Equipment Co. Squirt Soda Pop: Arizona’s Grapefruit Drink The Architecture Freshness of Robert Paul Schweikher Chase Field’s Hidden 96-Year-Old “Sweet” Spot
Arizona’s Timeless Magazine
Matt Brown Keeps on Truckin’ With New Facility
A Look at Farming and Construction in Arizona
Del Webb’s Concrete Skyscraper: Phoenix’s Allied Grain Elevator
ABOVE EVERYTHING, QUALITY!
1990s before technology dominated our lives
Editor Douglas Towne douglas@arizcc.com
1960s for the music and optimism
Bus: (602) 437-3040 Fax: (602) 437-3041 WWW.SHARPCREEK.COM ROC 184941-KA
DBE & SBE Certified
2020 because I’m in the here and now 1950s given the optimism, music, cars, booming economy, and innocence. 1970s for the fashion
What decade would you like to live in?
Publisher William Horner billy@arizcc.com
1920s the Modern Age begins, with Model Ts, stylish radios and a boom before the crash
Contributors Ed Dobbins Royal John Medley Daniel Owen 1820 to see the Luke Snell construction of Doug Sydnor the Erie Canal
Production Manager Laura Horner laura@arizcc.com
Publisher’s Representative Barry Warner 1970s for the barry@arizcc.com music, cars, movies, art, clothes, and colors.
In Memoriam Charles “Chuck” Runbeck 1928 - 2020 Advertising 602-931-0069 arizcc.com/advertise
Subscriptions: 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, 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 © 2020 All rights reserved.
four
Jul-Aug 2020
3
PUBLIC AUCTION HELD THE 2ND SATURDAY OF EVERY MONTH PREVIEW EVERY MONDAY - FRIDAY 7AM-4PM CONSIGNMENTS WELCOME Western Sales Management 1616 S 67th Ave Phoenix, AZ 85043
arizcc.com
623-936-3300 wsmauctioneers.com wsmauctionbiz@yahoo.com
Arizona Contractor & Community
Contents 7
Contributors - Ed Dobbins & Royal John Medley
8
From The Editor - Down on the Farm Douglas Towne
“TELL US WHAT YOU NEED AND WE WILL WORK WITH YOU TO MAKE IT HAPPEN”
480-641-3500
11
31
32
38
42 BELLY DUMP—SUPER 16—END DUMP— LOW BOY SIDE DUMP— EXCAVATOR—LOADER—GRADER
Construction Around Arizona: Projects • People • Practices Back When - Glendale’s Chilling Fire Douglas Towne Del Webb’s Concrete Skyscraper: Phoenix’s Allied Grain Elevator - Douglas Towne Allied Grain: Del Webb’s Foray into Farm Structures Douglas Towne
Lettuce and Landscapes: An Illustrated History of Arizona Commercial Row Crops - Royal John Medley
46
Squirt: Arizona’s Grapefruit Drink - Ed Dobbins
50
Building on the Past - 1951: Arizona Boys Ranch
52
56
Architect’s Perspective - Robert Paul Schweikher: Bring a Freshness - Doug Sydnor, FAIA
Digging Through the Archives - The Neil B. McGinnis Equipment Company - William Horner
60
Bid Results
62
Advertising Index
Front Cover - Terris Manley, Bob Becker, and Archie Kroloff (L-R) at Allied Grain facility in Phoenix, early 1950s - David Rosenthal Inset - Sorghum Sally, 1950.
six
Jul-Aug 2020
Contributors P R I N T | PA C K A G I N G | M A I L I N G | F U L F I L L M E N T E C O - F R I E N D LY S O L U T I O N S
Ed Dobbins Articles on pages 11 & 46
Royal John Medley Article on page 42
E
R
d Dobbins is a retired audiologist and business owner thrilled to be able to spend his days researching, writing, and collecting bits of Phoenix history. He grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, but has lived in the Valley most of his life, where he attended Arizona State University and A.T. Still University of Health Services. Ed spent four years as a field archaeologist before changing careers. Ed’s historical research interests often have ties to the North Mountain-Sunnyslope area, where he lives. Last fall, he prepared an exhibition and presentation on growing citrus above and below the Arizona Canal at the Sunnyslope Historical Society. The subject of one of his articles in this issue, preserving a 1920s packing plant in the walls of Chase Field, came to light during his research on the citrus project. The manager of the citrus growers’ association responsible for building the packing plant was a resident of what is now the Royal Palm neighborhood in Sunnyslope. Ed is continuing his work on citrus orchards along the Arizona Canal and is reconfiguring some of his writings to narrated videos for online presentation. He is also preparing publications on the life and works of C. J. Dyer, a pioneer Arizona cartographer and politician whose maps recorded the late 19th-century growth of urbanization in Phoenix and the Salt River Valley. arizcc.com
oyal John Medley’s passion for vintage crate labels and related agricultural ephemera stems from his early work experiences and those of his parents.
Early on, he worked as a produce department manager at a supermarket in Phoenix. His mother, Margaret Blanche Medley, was a shipping clerk at the grapefruit packinghouse of Yuma Mesa Fruit Growers Association in Yuma. His father, also named Royal John Medley, was manager of the Phoenix farm labor offices of the Arizona Department of Economic Security. His wife, Karen, taught art at regional educational institutions and is currently an artist. Royal John Medley began his career as a Facilities Technician with Central Arizona College in 1976, and is retired after more than 35 years of service at the Aravaipa Campus in rural eastern Pinal County. He and his wife have been residents of Oracle, Arizona for more than four decades. His interest in the history of commercial art used by the Arizona citrus and vegetable industry is long-standing. “My parents worked within the fresh produce industry, my own early work experience dealt with thousand of colorful cartons and crates filled with fresh fruits and vegetables, and my wife is an artist,” he says. “It seems almost natural to me that I would have accumulated an archive of some of America’s best examples of 20th-century commercial art.”
O 602 254 2427 F 602 258 1076 2 0 2 0 N 2 2 N D AV E P H O E N I X A Z 8 5 0 0 9 W W W. L I T H O T E C H A Z . C O M
SAVE UP TO $1.99 AN ISSUE OFF COVER PRICE 1 YEAR, 6 ISSUES FOR $30, OR 2 YEARS, 12 ISSUES FOR ONLY $48!
NAME ADDRESS CITY EMAIL PHONE
STATE
ZIP
SEND, CUT OUT & CHECK TO: ACC, LLC. PO BOX 6912, GLENDALE, AZ 85312 FOR FASTER SERVICE, GO TO WWW.ARIZCC.COM/SUBSCRIBE AND SUBSCRIBE ONLINE Arizona Contractor & Community
From the editor: Down on the Farm Douglas Towne
I
Images courtesy of Author
Image courtesy of AZ Family
n the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, we all have come to appreciate some things we’ve long taken for granted. At the top of the list is the agricultural production and food distribution network. Even though items like flour and butter were in short supply for a few weeks because of stockpiling behavior, most of our favorite foods were available. To celebrate this success, Arizona Contractor & Community is focusing on farming in this issue, looking at it from a construction angle. We’re covering building types, ranging from a historic citrus warehouse that became part of Chase Field, to ice plants and grain elevators. For those more into machinery, we also feature farm equipment. The issue’s most colorful piece is a fun article on fruit crate labels, which have become a prized commercial art form. Personally, my favorite vintage farm-related artifacts are industrial monoliths that appear like relics of an advanced prehistoric society along the backroads of Pinal County. These rusting electric and diesel engines are vestiges from the pioneer days of irrigated farming in Arizona. Where power lines were available, farmers used electric engines to power the turbine pumps that supplied irrigation water. At more remote locations, obnoxiously loud diesel engines were used. Some of these diesel engines were repurposed aircraft engines from P-38s and other World War II planes. These powerful engines and a shallow
Fissures can form after decades of pumping, as dewatered aquifers collapse, causing tension cracks at the ground surface. When fissures develop, nearby structures and roads are damaged. Insurance doesn’t water table created impressive water- typically cover the complex repairs; it’s not works. “The water would shoot out of a a problem solved by dumping a load of soil 12-inch diameter discharge pipe with such into the crevice. And the problem is likely pressure that it only began to drop after to get worse. Pinal County farmers have been supabout 8 feet,” Frank Thomas, who grew up in the Pinal County farming town of Eloy, plementing the groundwater they use for irrigation with Colorado River water delivrecalls. Farming in the sod-busting era after ered via the Central Arizona Project. But a multi-decade regional World War II was a dramatically different they are Industrial monoliths that drought has curtailed renewable supoperation than it is appear like relics of an advanced this ply. The Colorado today. Groundwater prehistoric society along the River drought conwas an inexpensive tingency plan, negoresource and easy to backroads of Pinal County. tiated with California pump. Farm mechanization was in its infancy, so lots of workers and Nevada in 2019, makes major cutbacks were needed to grow and harvest a mix of to their allotment of river water. In a catch-22, the Arizona legislature crops, including potatoes, carrots, lettuce, cabbage, cauliflower, and cotton. When has appropriated $9 million to drill new King Cotton was harvested by hand, Eloy’s wells in Pinal County to make up for the population would swell by 20,000 people water shortfall. How will the increased pumping impact the formation of earth fison a Saturday night. Over time, increased mechanization sures? Will there be any groundwater left and crops consisting mainly of alfalfa and for the many housing subdivisions that are cotton has resulted in fewer farm employ- being built in the area? The only known in this complex equaees, but people aren’t the only thing disappearing from the Pinal County agricul- tion is that we’re leaving future generatural landscape. Groundwater levels are tions with some challenging problems. And retreating too. Farmers need to drill deeper some really cool old engines. and deeper wells to chase the precious resource. Below: Electric engine once used to power an In some areas, draining the under- irrigation pump near Eloy. ground aquifers has resulted in a significant Bottom left: Diesel engine once used to power construction hazard: earth fissures. These an irrigation pump near Eloy. supersized cracks in the earth can be more Below left: A 300-foot fissure at a business in than 30 feet deep and stretch up to 2 miles. Pinal County.
Eight
Jul-Aug 2020
GRADING • PAVING •SEALCOATING DEMOLITION • CONCRETE & MORE
(602) 992-2201 | SHANESPAVING.COM ROC #255891 A-5 & #38635 A-14 21801 N. 16TH ST., BOX 5, PHOENIX, AZ 85024 arizcc.com
Arizona Contractor & Community
Image courtesy of Author
Projects . PEOPLE . PRACTICES
CONSTRUCTION AROUND ARIZONA Projects
CONSTRUCTION AROUND ARIZONA
The former Arizona Citrus Growers’ packing plant, 2020.
Chase Field’s Hidden “Sweet” Spot Ed Dobbins
M
ost think the coolest feature of Chase Field, home of the Arizona Diamondbacks, is its swimming pool or retractable roof. But those fascinated by the past vote for an almost 100-year-old building incorporated into the stadium’s southeast corner. The Arizona Citrus Growers’ packing plant was built in 1924, next to the railroad tracks in Phoenix’s warehouse district. Its purpose was to process and ship the co-op arizcc.com
association’s 85 percent share of the rap- The 150-foot-wide by 150-foot-long wareidly growing local citrus industry. Grow- house contained a full basement and a coners throughout the Valley were moving crete first floor with work areas covered in away from the cotton market, which had hard maple to ease the stress on employrecently crashed, to the expanding grape- ees’ legs. fruit market. The layout of the plant provided an Architects Lescher and Mahoney orderly flow of fruit from the trucks to the designed the bricktrain. Field boxes of walled and met- Razing the two walls enabled the citrus were unloaded al-trussed building in stadium’s southeast corner to be from trucks into the the Mission Revival for curing placed inside the warehouse basement style. Arizona Citrus and storage. Part of Growers president Frank Avery called the the curing process exposed the fruit to ethstructure an “architectural beauty that is ylene gas, which improved the color withan ornament to this section of the city.” out affecting the taste. By the time the Arizona Contractor & Community
DBE/SBE Certified Contractor Jeff Martinez
(602) 622-6789
Jeff.martinez@rtunderground.com
AZROC 306671
PROUDLY SERVING ARIZONA! CONTACT US (602)817-6929
www.calportland.com
EXPECT MORE ... WE DELIVER!
®
KEYSTONECONCRETELLC.COM O: 480-835-1579 SITE CONCRETE DEVELOPMENT BIDS@KEYSTONECONCRETELLC.COM
NOW HIRING • INDUSTRIAL PROJECT MANAGER AND ESTIMATOR NOW HIRING • MECHANICAL PROJECT MANAGER AND ESTIMATOR
• •
INDUSTRIAL PROJECT MANAGER AND ESTIMATOR MECHANICAL PROJECT MANAGER IF INTERESTED PLEASE APPLY ONLINE AT:AND ESTIMATOR
www.rksplumbing.com or call (602)-996-1866 IF INTERESTED PLEASE APPLY ONLINE AT:
twelve
www.rksplumbing.com or call (602)-996-1866
Jul-Aug 2020
CONSTRUCTION AROUND ARIZONA Projects
Images courtesy of NPS Image courtesy of Author Image courtesy of NPS
fruit was ready to be stacked in rail cars, it had been sorted by size, stamped with an appropriate brand name, and individually wrapped in tissue. A machine in the basement capable of making 2,000 wooden crates per nine-hour shift provided the boxes for shipping. Over 30 years, the Arizona Citrus Growers developed the warehouse area into a citrus packing complex consisting of the main building connected to a cold storage plant by tunnel and an adjacent structure for office spaces and additional storage. By the early 1950s, population increase in Phoenix and a trend towards processing more oranges and lemons than grapefruit convinced the association to move from downtown to an updated facility at Camelback Road and Grand Avenue. The main warehouse building was sold in 1955 to Romney Produce Company, a wholesale grocery distributor
arizcc.com
with operations throughout the Southwest. Romney owned the plant for more than three decades until 1988 when local wholesaler Stern Produce of Scottsdale purchased it. When Jerry Colangelo’s investor-ownership group was awarded a major league baseball franchise in 1995, the location of the stadium at Seventh and Jefferson streets had already been selected. Three buildings on the site, including the growers’ warehouse, were designated National Register Historic Places. Two of the buildings were not protected from demolition because the stadium owners’ group was not using federal funding to build the ballpark. The former Arizona Citrus Growers’ packing plant, however, received additional protection because it was also listed on the Phoenix Historic Property Register. The warehouse could not be razed until after
Above: Chase Field construction, 1995. Top left: Stern Produce Co., early 1990s. Left: The former Arizona Citrus Growers’ packing plant, 2020. Below: Chase Field construction, 1995.
12 months of seeking alternative solutions had been pursued. Since a yearlong delay would jeopardize the stadium’s completion by opening day 1998, a compromise was needed. The agreement between the city and the Diamondbacks called for limited demolition of the warehouse. The parts that remained intact were required to retain the building’s historic appearance. The portions removed included most of the north wall, more than half of the west wall, and the associated roof and flooring components. Left standing were the entire east wall with its loading bays and the south front with its distinctive Mission Revival-style facing. Razing the two walls enabled the stadium’s southeast corner to be placed inside the warehouse. Hidden behind the concrete and brick facing, the long axis of a steel support tower parallels the south side of the building. The light-colored walls and partial roof of the old warehouse wrap around the corner of the modern ballpark. Although the growers’ packing plant is no longer on the list of Phoenix historic properties, its walls can still be seen from the sidewalk on the Seventh Street viaduct over the railroad tracks. The area of the stadium where the warehouse once stood remains actively involved in food processing. It is home to Levy Restaurants, which provides food and supplies for the stadium concessionaires. Arizona Contractor & Community