VOLUME 10 ISSUE 3
$5.99 May-June 2021 Serving Contracting Firms and the Arizona Community. . . Then & Now
Paving the Way for Four Generations: The Chesley Family Old School Equipment: Elevating Bucket Loaders Fisher’s Tools: A Third-Generation Family Treasure Sinagua Paving: 27 Years of Blacktop Success Slingin’ Hash About the past at Helsing’s Coffee Shops
Arizona’s Timeless Magazine
As Subtle as Neon: Arizona’s Unforgettable Motel Signs A Stucco Strip Tease: Phoenix’s Hidden Signage
A LOOK AT ARIZONA’S
Roadside
Ramada Inn:
Arizona’s Homegrown Motel Chain Expert Tips on Construction Bids
McCarthy Completes Mirabella Project at ASU
Sunland’s First Bridge Spans I-10 in avondale
Wilson Electric hosts CAC Students on Tour
Sunstate’s new training center
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Kingman
Lost Dutchman Gold Mine
Editor Douglas Towne douglas@arizcc.com
I’ve visited all my dream spots in Arizona
Contributors Alison Bailin Jim Bolek Peter Corbett Carly Hanson Drew Simmons Luke M. Snell Doug Sydnor
Canyon de Chelly
For Information Contact: Brent Reuter (623) 695-1204 • brentr@rec-reuter.com www.reuterequipment.com
Petrified Forest National Park
PLACE IN AZ YOU’VE ALWAYS WANTED TO VISIT?
Publisher William Horner billy@arizcc.com
Camping in Chiricahua Mountains
Production Manager Laura Horner Monument Valley laura@arizcc.com
Grand Canyon
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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 © 2021 All rights reserved.
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Contributors - Jim Bolek & Peter Corbett
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From The Editor - My Twilight Life - Douglas Towne
17 “TELL US WHAT YOU NEED AND WE WILL WORK WITH YOU TO MAKE IT HAPPEN”
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YEARS IN BUSINESS SINCE 1984
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Back When - Slingin’ Hash About the Past Douglas Towne Paving the Way for Four Generations: The Chesley Family - Douglas Towne As Subtle As Neon: Arizona’s Unforgettable Motel Signs - Douglas Towne A Stucco Strip Tease: Phoenix’s Hidden Signage Jim Bolek Ramada Inn: Marion Isbell’s Homegrown Arizona Motel Chain - Peter Corbett
62
Old School Equipment: Elevating Bucket Loaders
64
Building on the Past - 1955: Helsing’s Coffee Shop
SIDE DUMP-EXCAVATOR-LOADER-GRADER
Construction Around Arizona: Projects • People • Practices
68 BELLY DUMP-SUPER 16-END DUMP-LOW BOY
Contents
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Architect’s Perspective - Preserving Architectural Hand Drawings - Doug Sydnor, FAIA
Digging Through the Archives - Sinagua Paving William Horner
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Bid Results
78
Advertising Index
Ramada Inn Hotel groundbreaking ceremony in Scottsdale, with Michael Robinson at left, 1959. Article on page 54 Ten
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®
im Bolek is a graphic designer who, for the past 30 years, has specialized in sign and environmental design. He has created interpretive pieces and sign systems for the National Park Service, Arizona State University, the Arizona State Capital, Valley Metro, the Arizona Centennial, and many other clients in Arizona and throughout the country. While working at JRC Design, he and co-author Jamie Cowgill developed a series of guide symbols for Hablamos Juntos’ healthcare facilities, a program of The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. He has taught seminars on three-dimensional graphic design at the University of Arizona and dropped out of both ASU and Northern Arizona University; he has no preference in any inter-school rivalries. He is currently researching old signs and sign shops in Arizona, interviewing as many old-timers as possible. If you know any old sign folks, let him know; he would love to talk to them. He owes a lot to his wife, Sheila, for indulging and participating in his whims and interests. In his spare time, Jim loves to discover and photograph vintage signs and airplanes, build models, perform with his banjo and steel guitar, and play with his grandson, whom he insists is the “World’s Cutest Toddler in The World.
Article on page 54 fter graduating from Northern Arizona University, Peter Corbett worked for 35 years as an Arizona journalist. He was employed at weekly newspapers in Flagstaff and Verde Valley before joining the Scottsdale Progress as a reporter and then city editor. In 1992, he joined the Phoenix Gazette and then The Arizona Republic for a combined 23 years before taking a buyout in 2015. Corbett covered real estate and tourism for the Republic, which included reporting on Phoenix-based Aztar, a spinoff company from Ramada that held on to the hotel chain’s casino properties in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. A native of Omaha, he grew up in Columbus, Ohio, before moving to Flagstaff in 1974 to attend NAU. He studied English with a minor in American Studies. Corbett lived for 5 years on Route 66 in Flagstaff, roughly a mile from the original Ramada Inn. During his 47 years here, he developed a keen interest in Arizona history while traveling widely across the state. Corbett worked for more than 2 years at the Arizona Department of Transportation, where he contributed blogs on the history of the state highway system. In 2015, he launched On the Road Arizona, a travel and history blog that was honored as Arizona’s Best Travel Blog by Phoenix New Times. Corbett and his wife have two adult children and reside in Scottsdale. May June 2021
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Arizona Contractor & Community
From the editor: My Twilight life Douglas Towne
W
e all want to make our mark on the world, but figuring out what to do with our talents and passions can be challenging. As a kid growing up in Denver, I was instinctively attracted to old buildings. Historic preservation was just coming into vogue, and a growing chorus was advocating for the protection of Victorian mansions, Gothic cathedrals, and civic buildings like the Denver Mint. As a contrarian, I needed my own cause. Like a religious epiphany, I discovered it glowing in the night: neon signs of Mom-and-Pop motels. These homespun advertisements from an era when eccentricity dominated motel signs, names, and architecture, stood out in the darkness as if drawn by a magical luminous pen. Entrepreneurs, seeking a slice of the American Dream, inadvertently created a “commercial folk art” with their choice of names and signage that often reflected and enhanced the region’s history, culture, and natural beauty. Starting in the mid-1980s, it became my mission to photograph these signs in their nighttime splendor. Bypassed highways winding through dying towns and blighted urban neighborhoods became my habitat. I spent many evenings in motel rooms lit with neon glow oozing through
row,” with its boomerang-like midcentury lines. A decade later during an overnight visit, I admired its stylish furniture and tile bathrooms, which were a decadent delight compared to my modest digs at home. Located on an interstate offramp, I thought the motel was destined for a bright future. The second was the Desert Moon Motel on Boulder Highway near Downtown Las Vegas. It was well past midnight when I
Images courtesy of Author
Top right: Motels of the Southwest poster. Below: Cameron Motel, Denver, Colorado.
curtains that didn’t quite close, whose fixtures shuddered from freight trains rumbling along nearby tracks. I captured a potpourri of nighttime optical surprises not easily forgotten. Wranglers turned massive kinetic lassos in bursts of golden yellow, while buxom blonde aqua maids sprung from a high dive, straightening out their bodies while plummeting 30 feet in a series of neon flashes. Two motels built in the 1950s, with contrasting arcs, inspired my mission. The first was the Cameron Motel, located in my childhood neighborhood. To my young eyes, it really did seem like the “Motel of Tomor-
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May June 2021
Have an idea for a construction or history article? contact us: Billy Horner, Publisher: Billy@arizcc.com Douglas Towne, Editor: Douglas@arizcc.com
Visit us online at: www.arizcc.com Above: Desert Moon Motel, Las Vegas, Nevada.
caught my first glimpse of its otherworldly sign rising towards the heavens. It evoked a sense of awe more than any casino on the strip or the wall-to-wall neon in Glitter Gulch. I didn’t spend the night there, however, as that seemed a likely way to get an early peek at the next day’s police blotter. The motel was almost certainly on its last legs. There have been some surprising changes in the intervening 35 years. The Cameron Motel is boarded-up, and its final days were a horror show, judging by internet reviews. On the flip side, the Desert Moon Motel looks fantastic after its transition to “hipster” lodgings. In my personal quest, I created the poster, Motels of the Southwest, in 1997. The collage of 52 neon signs located in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Wyoming found moderate success, with overseas orders from Germany, Indonesia, and Switzerland. Domestically, fans were concentrated in Austin, Texas and New York City, or resided in small communities like Bear, Delaware and Clarksville, Indiana. I still have a few copies left for $15; just send me an email at douglas@arizcc.com to make the connection that will undoubtedly help light up your evenings. arizcc.com
Arizona Contractor & Community
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May June 2021
Image courtesy of Sunland
Projects . PEOPLE . PRACTICES
CONSTRUCTION AROUND ARIZONA Projects
CONSTRUCTION AROUND ARIZONA
Sunland’s First Bridge Spans I-10 in Avondale
“D
on’t limit your challenges. Challenge your limits,” is a popular motivational quote. Sunland Asphalt & Construction, LLC (Sunland) recently took this saying to heart, completing the company’s first bridge project in the West Valley. The Fairway Drive Traffic Interchange was a $21 million project that bridged I-10 in Avondale. Work started in February 2019, and the historic project led by Kevin Fisher, Senior Project Manager, was completed in July 2020. With the Fairway Drive TI project, Sunland is now able to self-perform new facets of construction, such as retaining walls and concrete barriers. arizcc.com
“Many of our younger employees were able to learn from industry veterans on this project,” Fisher says. “It’s rewarding to see skills and knowledge passed down. Overall, the project elevated Sunland to a new level in the construction industry and opened the door to new projects previously inaccessible.” The scope of work consisted of a traffic interchange, bridge across I-10 for the traffic interchange, and 0.2 miles of an arterial street along I-10 at Fairway Drive. Sunland crews self-performed 41,000 square feet of retaining wall, over 12,500 linear-feet of concrete barrier, 97,700 cubic yards of over-excavation, 5,000 CY of roadway excavation, 20,800 CY of drainage excavation, 40,500 CY of wall foundation
backfill with an additional 20,600 CY of special backfill material for the walls, 274,000 CY of borrow (in-place) and 9,500 CY of Class II aggregate base. There were also several thousand feet of storm drain pipe and reinforced concrete pipe that Sunland installed. The bridge itself is a one-span bridge, and construction was relatively straightforward, according to Fisher. “As this was the first bridge Sunland built, we were closely monitored by the public and ADOT,” he says. The project, however, was not without a few challenges. “Getting people, equipment, and materials in and out of the median proved difficult,” Fisher says. “It was only through consistent and effective Arizona Contractor & Community