The Douglas Sonoran Historic District, called the Sonoran District, is an historic district located in Douglas, Arizona. It is southwest of the business district, its rough boundaries are H Avenue on the west, from 6th to 9th Street, consisting of contiguous flush-fronted, single story, Sonoran tradition row buildings built between 1901 and 1935. The majority of the buildings were constructed using local gypsum-cast stone. This is the largest number of cast-stone buildings in the state. The District includes twenty-one buildings, of which seventeen are contributing structures.
Historical context
Douglas was established due to the mining operations of the Phelps-Dodge Company. They operated mines in Bisbee, Arizona and Nacozari in Sonora, Mexico. The site of Douglas lies approximately midway between the two, and they built their Copper Queen smelter in Douglas. In addition, the Arizona Mining Company also built a smelter in Douglas. The two companies eventually worked together to lay out the grid plan for the Douglas townsite. The railway arrived in 1901, with a depot constructed on Pan American Avenue.
The most significant era of growth of the town was between 1901 and 1930, when copper mining was booming in Arizona. Both the downtown commercial and residential areas were developed during this timeframe. When Arizona became a state in 1912, Douglas was the largest city, and Cochise County was the most populous county. That year, Douglas produced more the $26 million in metals. Its proximity to the international border made it a center for commercial trade between the two nations.
The town reached its peak population in 1917, with 17,875 people, with the largest employers in town being the two smelters and the El Paso and Southwestern railroad. After World War I there was downturn in the copper industry, due to the large stockpiles which had been accrued during the war. Both of the town's smelters closed down for almost a year, but by 1922 they were both re-opened, and there was a resurgence in copper which lasted until the crash of 1929.
Some of the town's first settlers were several Lebanese families, who settled near Ninth and H Avenues, mostly operating family businesses such as grocery, produce and feed stores. The neighborhood was very densely populated, and consisted of small houses and Sonoran row houses (flats). Many of the businesses were run out of their homes. The row houses provided inexpensive housing for Douglas laborers. due to the boom and influx of workers, investors built the flats between the railroad tracks, international border, and G Avenue.
Douglas was a typical mining town and many of the businesses catered to single men who worked in the smelters and for the railroad. By 1905 the town contained seventy-five saloons. A red-light district developed around Sixth Street, with as many as two hundred prostitutes working south of Sixth and west of H Avenues. Since the end of the copper boom in the 1930s, few changes have impacted Douglas' historic buildings, and quite a few have been listed in the National Register of Historic Places, including the Douglas Municipal Airport, Gadsden Hotel, Grand Theatre, El Paso and Southwestern Railroad YMCA, and the Douglas Post Office and Customs, as well as the Douglas Historic District and the Douglas Residential Historic District.
Description of the District
The district is composed of buildings along the west side of H Avenue from Sixth Street on the south to the alley between Eighth and Ninth Streets on the north. The curb line of H Avenue provides the eastern boundary of the district. The western edge is located toward the middle of several blocks along the western property line; of contributing properties. This area.contains the only remaining significant concentration of Sonoran style buildings, in Douglas. The district possesses a continuity of buildings united by a similar architectural style.
To the north of the district, the area changes rapidly with modern buildings ringing the governmental and civic center of Douglas where municipal buildings are located. To the east, the character of the area outside the district shifts toward newer residential buildings that, in turn, give way to commercial structures along G Avenue, the central business thoroughfare of Douglas. South of the district, the area beyond the boundary is composed of modern residential buildings with commercial and government buildings along the international boundary with Mexico, To the west, the area outside the district boundary contains vacant land along Pan American Avenue leading to the border crossing into Agua Prieta, Mexico.