Tucked into a narrow valley between the Apache Mountains to the northeast and
the Pinal Mountains to the south and west, Globe is a handy stopping place for travelers.
The town's 3,500-foot elevation provides a pleasant climate most of the year.
Though its times of glory as a big copper-mining center have long passed, Globe
still has a lot of character. On a drive down Broad Street you can visit its museum,
view ruins of the Old Dominion Copper Mine, and see many buildings dating from the
early 1900s.
The chamber of commerce, also on Broad Street,
offers a leaflet, Walking Tour of Historic Downtown Globe, that details the
history of these old structures. You can also pick up a Globe-Miami Drive Yourself
Highway Mine Tour leaflet describing six mines, historic and modern, visible
from US 60 in the Globe and Miami areas; none of the mine sites is open to the public.
Antique, craft, and gift shops abound in Globe and Miami; the chamber has a list.
History
In 1875, prospectors struck silver in the hills of the western
part of the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation. The most remarkable find, a globe-shaped
silver nugget, reportedly had the rough outlines of the continents scarred on its
surface. Miners set up camp on the east bank of Pinal Creek, but their presence,
and the government's taking back of reservation lands here, didn't go over
well with the Apache, who regularly menaced the camp until Geronimo's surrender
in 1886.
The silver began to give out after only four years,
but by then rich copper deposits had been discovered beneath the silver lodes. The
Old Dominion Copper Company moved in, and during the early 1900s its copper mine
ranked as one of the greatest in the world. Globe prospered too—the town's
50 restaurants and saloons operated around the clock and about 150 sporting women
worked out of little shacks along N. Broad Street. George W.P. Hunt arrived in 1881
as a young man and became a leading merchant and banker before going on to serve
as Arizona's first governor. Labor troubles and declining yields began to eat
into mining profits, and the Depression shut down the Old Dominion completely in
1931. Copper mining shifted to nearby Miami, leaving Globe as a quiet county seat.
Gila County Historical Museum
This varied collection (1330 N. Broad
St., 928/425-7385, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Mon.-Fri., 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Sat., donations welcome)
illustrates the area's Native American, pioneer, ranching, and mining history.
The Indian Room displays prehistoric pottery and some fine modern baskets. Period
exhibits—mine superintendent's office, ranch room, printing shop, and
Governor Hunt's bedroom—recall life in early Globe. The museum building,
which dates from 1914, served as the company's mine rescue station for many
years. It's next door to the chamber of commerce and opposite the Old Dominion
Copper Co. Mine.
Cobre Valley Center for the Arts
Local artists banded together to open
an art gallery (101 N. Broad St., 928/425-0884,
www.cvarts.org, noon-4p.m. Sun., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri., 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sat.,
free) in the old Gila County Courthouse, built in 1906-07. The imposing old building
stands downtown at the corner of Broad and Oak Sts.; handicap access is on Oak Street.
A theater upstairs hosts performances by the Copper Cities Community Players. Go
downstairs to see works of the stained-glass studio, the craft guild shop, and a
scrapbooking shop. A gift shop sells colorful art and crafts.
Besh Ba Gowah
Archaeologists count 200 rooms at this pueblo, built
and inhabited between A.D. 1225 and 1450, at a time when Salado villages lined both
sides of Pinal Creek. An earlier village of pithouses associated with the Hohokam
stood on this site about A.D. 600-1150. Exposed to the elements, Besh Ba Gowah has
been weathered more than the Tonto National Monument cliff dwellings, but its extensive
foundations and few remaining walls testify to its original size. The name Besh
Ba Gowah comes from an Apache word meaning "metal camp."
The museum (928/425-0320, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. daily, $3 ages 12 and up, $2 seniors) offers
an introductory video, displays of pottery and other Salado artifacts, a scale model
of the village as it might have looked in 1325, a small research library, and a
gift shop. Follow the self-guided trail through the ruins—some restored, some
only stabilized, some still unexcavated. Baskets, pots, ladders, and other implements
in the restored rooms appear as if the Salado had just departed.
Besh Ba Gowah is 1.5 miles south of downtown Globe; follow S. Broad Street to the
sign, turn right across the bridge, curve left on Jesse Hayes Street one mile, make
a sharp right up to Globe Community Center, and follow signs around to the far side
of the ruin. The adjacent park offers covered picnic tables, ball fields, and a
summertime swimming pool. An ethnobotanical garden next to the ruin entrance contains
crops once grown by the Salado. Globe Botanical Garden, on the hillside below, is
reached by a trail from the ethnobotanical garden or from parking off Jesse Hayes
Street.
Round Mountain Park
The conical hill on the northeast side of town
offers hiking, views, and picnicking. Four interconnecting trails provide a way
to the top (a 426-foot climb) in loops of 1.7, 2.4, or 3 miles. From downtown, head
east on Ash Street, then turn left (north) 0.6 mile on South Street, just past the
Comfort Inn.
Pinal Peak
A dirt road winds up the timber-clad slopes to the summit
at 7,812 feet. Weather permitting, you'll enjoy great views, hiking, picnicking,
and two of the coolest campgrounds in the Tonto National Forest. See "Campgrounds"
below for those along the summit road and nearby.
For the
18-mile drive from Globe, follow S. Broad Street, turn right across the bridge,
curve left on Jesse Hayes Street to the junction of Ice House Canyon and Six Shooter
Canyon Rds., turn right 2.5 miles on Ice House Canyon Road, turn right three miles
on Kellner Canyon Road/Forest Road 55 (pavement ends), and then left 12.5 miles
on Forest Road 651 to the summit. An alternate approach follows Russell Road from
US 60 (opposite the AZ 188 turnoff); keep right on Russell Road at a fork 0.3 mile
in and continue south on what becomes Forest Road 55. Pavement ends 2.3 miles from
US 60 and the road climbs up to the junction of Forest Road 651 in another 3.4 miles.
In summer, you can drive all the way to the top of Signal Peak, the highest point;
at other times you walk the last bit. Ice House Canyon, Six Shooter, Telephone,
Kellner Canyon, Squaw Spring, Bobtail Ridge, and Mill Creek Trails climb steeply
from the valleys below. The Globe Ranger District office has trail descriptions
and maps.
Copper mining and smelting continue on a large scale in several areas near the town of Winkelman, between Globe and Tucson on AZ 77. Mountain and desert scenery provide the biggest attractions for visitors; AZ 77 between Winkelman and Globe follows a beautiful section of the Gila River just north of Winkelman and winds through the Mescal Mountains. AZ 177 between Winkelman and Superior also crosses rugged mountains, and you can stop at an overlook of ASARCO's Ray Mine, a vast open-pit copper mine. White Canyon Wilderness is west of AZ 177 via some rough roads; contact the Bureau of Land Management's Phoenix Field Office (602/580-5500) for information on this area. Aravaipa Canyon Wilderness has a western trailhead off AZ 77 south of Winkelman. Note that even day-hikers must obtain a permit to visit here; contact the BLM office in Safford (928/348-4400).
Winkelman and Vicinity
Smelter smokestacks tower over this community
and its twin, Hayden. A park beside the Gila River offers picnicking and camping
amid giant cottonwood trees; turn in at the AZ 77-AZ 177 junction.
Miami
A strange landscape greets you on the approach to this town west
of Globe. Many-tiered terraces of barren, buff-colored mine tailings and dark slag
dumps dominate the view. Miami and Claypool stretch along Bloody Tanks Wash, named
for a massacre of Apache in 1864 by a band of whites and allied Maricopa Indians.
Developers arrived in 1907 to lay out a town site named after Miami, Ohio. Giant
copper-ore reduction plants built by the Miami Copper and Inspiration Companies
resulted in the nickname "Concentrator City." Miami (www.miamiaz.org)
has had its ups and downs since, following the rise and fall in copper prices, but
production continues.
The town has many historic buildings,
some now restored as antique and craft shops. Follow signs for the Business District
one block north to Sullivan Street. At its west end, you'll see the 1923 Greek
Revival-style Bullion Plaza School, now a museum (roughly 11 a.m.-3 p.m.
Fri.-Sat.) about the people of Miami.
Miami to Superior Drive
Highway 60 climbs over jagged mountains between
these two towns. Six miles west of Miami you'll see the vast open-pit Pinto
Valley copper mine. The road continues climbing to the small community of Top of
the World, then descends into Devils Canyon. Oak Flat Campground (elev. 4,200 feet,
open all year, no water or fee) lies in more open country nearby; turn south a half
mile on Magma Mine Road at the sign near Milepost 231. West of Oak Flat, the highway
drops through scenic, steep-walled Queen Creek Canyon to Superior.
Superior
Opening of the rich Silver King Mine in 1875, followed by
development of the Silver Queen, brought streams of fortune hunters into this mineral-laden
region. As at Globe, miners found rich deposits of copper when the surface silver
began to play out. Superior lies just west of scenic Queen Creek Canyon in a valley
surrounded by rugged mountains.
North of town you'll see
the high smokestack of an idle smelter and extensive tailings from the Magma Copper
Mine, where shafts plunge nearly 5,000 feet down. The mine was closed at press time,
though exploration continues. Perlite is also mined and processed in the area.
All travelers' facilities lie along US 60, which bypasses downtown. Buckboard
City has the "world's smallest museum" (520/689-5800, donation),
which packs local, natural, and cultural history into a tiny building.
Main Street in downtown Superior practically looks like a ghost town—paint
peels from the closed shops. Bob Jones Museum, named after Arizona's
sixth governor and housed in his former home, has a small historical collection
at Main and Neary; you may find it open Fri.-Sun. except in summer.
You can see more than 3,200 different desert plants here in Arizona's oldest
(1920s) and largest (323 acres) botanical garden (US 60, three miles west of Superior,
520/689-2811 recording, 520/689-2723 staff,
www.btarboretum.org/, 8
a.m.-5 p.m. daily except Christmas, $6 adults, $3 children 5-12). Exotic species
from around the world thrive alongside native Sonoran Desert plants. Short trails
lead through Sonoran and Chihuahuan desert areas, a cactus garden, riparian areas,
an Australian forest, and herb and rose gardens. Buy or borrow the booklet for the
Main Trail, a scenic 1.5-mile loop in Queen Creek Canyon; handouts offer additional
information on many of the other trails and gardens. Most of these trails branch
off from the first part of the Main Trail, so you don't have to walk far to
see the highlights. Much of the trail system is wheelchair-accessible. The Curandero/Sonoran
Desert Trail describes traditional herbal medicines of the Sonoran Desert. (Curanderos
are traditional healers in Mexican culture.) Greenhouses contain cacti and succulents
that might not otherwise survive winter cold at this 2,400-foot elevation. The Smith
Interpretive Center, between the display greenhouses, has exhibits on plants and
local history. A Demonstration Garden offers tips and examples of water-efficient
landscaping design.
More than 200 bird and 72 terrestrial
species have been seen in the area. Ayer Lake and Queen Creek on the Main Trail
are good places to watch for them; you may see endangered Gila topminnow and desert
pupfish in the lake. Nearby Picket Post Mountain (4,400 ft.) soars above the gardens.
A heliograph station, equipped with mirrors to flash the rays of the sun, operated
atop the peak during the Apache wars. No developed trails go to the summit and there's
no access from the arboretum.
The visitor center offers some
exhibits and a gift shop with snacks, books, prints, posters, and seed packets.
You can also purchase cactus, other succulents, trees, shrubs, ground cover, and
herbs. The cooling-tower exhibit at the visitor center creates a cool microclimate;
its 30-foot tower functions as a giant evaporative cooler.
Scheduled events include an Arid Land Plant Show on the first weekend in April and
a Fall Landscaping Festival. A picnic area near the parking lot is available to
visitors. Today the University of Arizona, the State Parks Board, and the nonprofit
Arboretum Corporation manage the arboretum.
Florence Junction
Turn south 16 miles on AZ 79 at this junction for
the town of Florence, home to McFarland State Historic Park and the Pinal County
Historical Museum, or continue on US 60 for Apache Junction and the Valley of the
Sun.
Peralta Trailhead
One of the most popular trailheads for the Superstition
Wilderness lies off US 60 about nine miles northwest of Florence Junction, or eight
miles southeast of Apache Junction. Follow graded-dirt Forest Road 77 in for seven
miles, $4/day parking or free with a golden passport or National Parks Pass w/hologram.
Three very scenic trails branch off into the wilderness here, including Peralta
Trail #102, which goes up Peralta Canyon to Fremont Saddle, where you get a
great view of Weaver's Needle. It's four miles roundtrip and a 1,400-foot
climb to the pass; carry water and avoid the heat of a summer day. Peralta Trail
continues down the other side past the base of Weaver's Needle, connecting with
other trails in the Superstitions.