Tuzigoot National Monument ( yuf-x-yav, ʼHaktlakva, Western Apache: ''Tú Digiz'') preserves a 2- to 3-story

pueblo In the Southwestern United States, Pueblo (capitalized) refers to the Native tribes of Puebloans having fixed-location communities with permanent buildings which also are called pueblos (lowercased). The Spanish explorers of northern New Spain ...

ruin on the summit of a limestone and sandstone ridge just east of

Clarkdale, Arizona Clarkdale (Yavapai: Saupkasuiva) is a town in Yavapai County, Arizona, United States. The Verde River flows through the town as does Bitter Creek, an intermittent tributary of the river. According to the 2010 census, the population of the town ...

, 120 feet (36 m) above the Verde River floodplain. The Tuzigoot Site is an elongated complex of stone masonry rooms that were built along the spine of a natural outcrop in the

Verde Valley The Verde Valley ( yuf-x-yav, Matkʼamvaha; es, Valle Verde) is a valley in central Arizona in the United States. The Verde River runs through it. The Verde River is one of Arizona's last free-flowing river systems. It provides crucial habita ...

. The central rooms stand higher than the others and they appear to have served public functions. The pueblo has 110 rooms. The

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational properti ...

currently administers 58 acres (23 ha), within an authorized boundary of 834 acres (338 ha). ″Tú Digiz/Tuzigoot″ is a Tonto Apache term for "crooked waters," from nearby Pecks Lake, a cutoff

meander A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank ( cut bank) and deposits sediments on an inner, convex ban ...

of the Verde River; from Tú Digiz one principal Tonto Apache clan gets its name. The pueblo was built by the Sinagua people between 1125 and 1400 CE. Tuzigoot is the largest and best preserved of the many Sinagua pueblo ruins in the

. The ruins at Tuzigoot incorporate very few doors; instead, the inhabitants used ladders accessed by trapdoor type openings in the roofs to enter each room. The monument is on land once owned by United Verde/

Phelps Dodge Phelps Dodge Corporation was an American mining company founded in 1834 as an import-export firm by Anson Greene Phelps and his two sons-in-law William Earle Dodge, Sr. and Daniel James. The latter two ran Phelps, James & Co., the part of the o ...

. The corporation sold the site to

Yavapai County Yavapai County is near the center of the U.S. state of Arizona. As of the 2020 census, its population was 236,209, making it the fourth-most populous county in Arizona. The county seat is Prescott. Yavapai County comprises the Prescott, AZ M ...

for $1 so that the excavation could be completed under the auspices of federal relief projects. The county in turn transferred the land to the federal government. Tuzigoot was excavated from 1933 to 1935 by Louis Caywood and Edward Spicer of the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first ...

, with funding from the federal

Civil Works Administration The Civil Works Administration (CWA) was a short-lived job creation program established by the New Deal during the Great Depression in the United States to rapidly create mostly manual-labor jobs for millions of unemployed workers. The jobs were ...

and

Works Project Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, in ...

. In 1935–1936, with additional federal funding, the ruins were prepared for public display, and a

Pueblo Revival The Pueblo Revival style or Santa Fe style is a regional architectural style of the Southwestern United States, which draws its inspiration from Santa Fe de Nuevo México's traditional Pueblo architecture, the Spanish missions, and Territor ...

-style museum and visitor center was constructed. Franklin D. Roosevelt designated Tuzigoot Ruins as a U.S. National Monument on July 25, 1939. The

Tuzigoot National Monument Archeological District Tuzigoot National Monument ( yuf-x-yav, ʼHaktlakva, Western Apache: ''Tú Digiz'') preserves a 2- to 3-story pueblo ruin on the summit of a limestone and sandstone ridge just east of Clarkdale, Arizona, 120 feet (36 m) above the Verde River floo ...

was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

on October 15, 1966. The ruins are surrounded by the

tailings In mining, tailings are the materials left over after the process of separating the valuable fraction from the uneconomic fraction ( gangue) of an ore. Tailings are different to overburden, which is the waste rock or other material that ove ...

pond of the former United Verde copper mine at

Jerome Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian priest, confessor, theologian, and historian; he is co ...

. The tailings have recently been stabilized and revegetated.

Climate

Tuzigoot National Monument has a

semi-arid climate A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of semi ...

( Köppen: ''BSk'') with cool winters and very hot summers.

Gallery

Image:tuzigoot.jpg, Tuzigoot National Monument Image:Tuzigoot, pond 1945.jpg, Tuzigoot, viewed from across the old tailings pond, 1945 Image:Tuzigoot Museum near (Clarkdale, Arizona).jpg, Tuzigoot Museum

References

External links

* * * * {{authority control National Park Service National Monuments in Arizona Archaeological sites in Arizona Archaeological museums in Arizona Museums in Yavapai County, Arizona Native American museums in Arizona Ancient Puebloan archaeological sites in Arizona Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Arizona National Register of Historic Places in Yavapai County, Arizona Protected areas of the Sonoran Desert Protected areas of Yavapai County, Arizona Former populated places in Yavapai County, Arizona Ruins in the United States 1939 establishments in Arizona Protected areas established in 1939 Sinagua

Climate

Gallery

See also

References

External links