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Sacate, Arizona

Coordinates: 33°10′38″N 112°04′51″W / 33.177222°N 112.080833°W / 33.177222; -112.080833
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Not to be confused with Sacaton, Arizona.
Sacate, Arizona
Populated place
Sacate, Arizona c. 1913 (USGS Maricopa quadrangle, map held at Perry-Castañeda Library)
Sacate, Arizona c. 1913 (USGS Maricopa quadrangle, map held at Perry-Castañeda Library)
Sacate is located in Arizona
Sacate
Sacate
Location within the state of Arizona
Sacate is located in the United States
Sacate
Sacate
Sacate (the United States)
Coordinates: 33°10′38″N 112°04′51″W / 33.177222°N 112.080833°W / 33.177222; -112.080833
CountryUnited States
StateArizona
CountyPinal
Elevation
[1]
1,093 ft (333 m)
Time zoneUTC-7 (Mountain (MST))
 • Summer (DST)UTC-7 (MST)
ZIP codes
86326
Area code520
FIPS code04-61710
GNIS feature ID25339

Sacate is a populated place in the Middle Gila River Valley area, within Pinal County, Arizona, United States.[2] Located 8 mi (13 km) north of Maricopa on the south side of the Gila River near Pima Butte, Sacate was an Pima village, a railroad station of the Southern Pacific Railroad, and a Catholic mission. It had originally been called Sacaton Station[3] but the name was shortened to its current version in 1904.[4]

This town and neighboring communities and landmarks with similar names were all likely derived from Spanish, specifically the records of Spaniard Francisco Garcés who visited the area in 1775–76, and described the grasslands of the area using the word sácate or sácaton: "Zácate, more frequently sácate, from the Nahuatl çacatl, is the usual name for grass such as horses and cattle eat, also called indifferently by Garcés pastos and pasturas, pasturage, forage, herbage. Such 'grass' is distinguished from sácaton, the tall rank herbage, such as reeds, rushes, and the like, unfit for forage."[5] A place called Sacate was the site of the Battle of Pima Butte between Yuma and Maricopa Indians in 1857–58.[6]

Sacate along the railroad between Maricopa and Phoenix circa 1933

As a 1920 Department of Agriculture report noted, "Cities and towns in the Middle Gila Valley are few and small..."[7] Sacate was originally a station along the Maricopa and Phoenix Railway, laid out in 1887.[8] According to the U.S. Geological Survey, "The lines west of El Paso were built in separate portions by local Southern Pacific organizations, since 1902 combined in the one general company. The [first Southern Pacific] tracks were laid from Yuma to El Paso in 1879-81." Southern Pacific applied to abandon the line in 1934.[9]

In the late 1800s, colonial settlement of Arizona Territory changed the hydrology of the Gila River valley, disrupting traditional agricultural and irrigation systems. The people of what is now Gila River Indian Community turned to harvesting firewood for sale: "A local newspaper reported in 1901 that more than 30,000 cords of mesquite were stacked at Sacaton Station...Over a span of a dozen years we cut nearly 100,000 acres of mesquite trees so we could feed our families; many of these trees never came back due to the lack of water."[10] Circa 1904 a U.S. Geological Survey report stated that there were about 2,800 Pima living east of the railroad and that they had been suffering from a severe water shortage/drought since 1890.[11]

A 1901 guidebook for travelers to Arizona Territory described the scenery along the rail route:[12]

The traveler on the Southern Pacific leaves his train at Maricopa. It is only a matter of thirty-five miles to get to Phoenix from the main line of the Sunset Route. The Gila River and a curious Indian settlement are soon passed. A half-hour more and an irrigation canal is crossed. Above the ditch is the unbroken plain, greasewood and cactus and sage its sparse vegetation. But this is passed, and now for miles the train speeds through avenues of cottonwood trees, by alfalfa fields of deepest emerald that stretch away to the very horizon east and west, past orchards and vineyards, through Tempe, a prosperous town, and across a great bridge that spans the Salt river's channel.

At some point between 1906 and 1915, Sacate was the site of a gunfight in which Maricopa Slim killed two or more Mexicans.[13]

By 1915–16 it was known as Sacate Siding, along what had become Arizona Eastern Railway. Sacate Siding had no post office. The only business listing was Phoenix Wood & Coal Co.[14] In 1917 Phoenix Wood & Coal was entertaining the idea of buying mesquite beans from Sacaton Reservation vendors in case of wartime food shortages, but there was an open question of locating a mill for mass production of mesquite flour.[15]

Other Pima villages in the vicinity of Sacate circa 1921 were Vah-Ki, Bapchule, Casa Blanca, and Sweetwater, all on the south side of the river before heading east before reaching the site of the Pima "Indian agency" at Sacaton.[16]

1904 map of Pima Indian Reservation showing locations of Sacaton station versus Sacaton

In 1936 the population was 12 people, mail would be delivered to Maricopa, and the nearest parish church with a resident pastor was 13 mi (21 km) to the northwest in Komatke.[17] A Franciscan friar named Father Antoine ran the St. Francis in the Desert mission at Sacate in 1941. James Stevens, sometimes called Jimmy, an Apache artist who married a Pima, painted murals inside the church at Father Antoine's mission as well as several other mission churches in the area.[18] Sacate Catholic Day School, serving the Pima-Papago people of the area,[19] operated at the mission from 1930 until 1969. The priest in 1965 was Rev. Celestine Chinn.[19] Stevens' murals were destroyed when the church building burned down in 1993.[20] There is a cemetery in Sacate.[21][22][23]

Sacate is listed as part of the medically underserved settlement of the Gila River Indian Community, along with Bapchule, Blackwater, Burns, Camp Rivers, Casa Blanca, Co-Op Village, Cottonwood, Dock, Firebird Lake, Gila Crossing, Gila River Indian Reservation, Komatke, Lone Butte Ranch, Maricopa Village, Morgans Ferry, Olberg, Poston, and Sacaton.[24] Sacate has an estimated elevation of 1,093 feet (333 m) above sea level.[1]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b "Feature Detail Report for: Sacate". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
  2. ^ "Sacate (in Pinal County, AZ) Populated Place Profile". AZ Hometown Locator. Retrieved March 2, 2017.
  3. ^ "Casa Grande Dispatch 30 Aug 1967, page 19". Newspapers.com. Retrieved 2023-01-06.
  4. ^ Barnes, Will Croft (2016). Arizona Place Names. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. p. 372. ISBN 978-0816534951.
  5. ^ Garcés, Francisco Tomás Hermenegildo; Coues, Elliott (1900). On the trail of a Spanish pioneer; the diary and itinerary of Francisco Garcés (missionary priest) in his travels through Sonora, Arizona, and California, 1775-1776; translated from an official contemporaneous copy of the original Spanish manuscript, and ed., with copious critical notes. American explorers series III. Vol. I. New York: F. P. Harper. p. 87.
  6. ^ Kroeber, Clifton B.; Fontana, Bernard L. (1986), "The Battle: Indians' versions", Massacre on the Gila, An Account of the Last Major Battle Between American Indians, with Reflections on the Origin of War, University of Arizona Press, pp. 21–32, ISBN 978-0-8165-0969-0, JSTOR j.ctvss3z72.6, retrieved 2023-01-05
  7. ^ "Soil Survey of the Middle Gila Valley Area, Arizona". Arizona Memory Project. 1920. p. 7. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  8. ^ Janus Associates Inc. Transcontinental Railroading in Arizona, 1878–1940 (PDF). Arizona State Historic Preservation Office.
  9. ^ "The Maricopa and Phoenix Railroad - Abandoned Rails". www.abandonedrails.com. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  10. ^ Community, Gila River Indian (1993). Gila River Indian Community Water Rights Settlement. The Community.
  11. ^ Lee, Willis T. (1904). "The underground waters of Gila Valley, Arizona". Water Supply Paper (104). U.S. Geological Survey: 65–68. doi:10.3133/wsp104.
  12. ^ McClintock, James H. (1901). Arizona, with Particular Attention to its Imperial County of Maricopa (PDF). Phoenix: Press of the Arizona Republican. p. 48.
  13. ^ ""Maricopa Jurist Takes His Departure," Arizona Republican, 1915-11-14". Arizona Memory Project. p. 5. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  14. ^ "1915-1916 Arizona State Business Directory". Arizona Memory Project. p. 484. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  15. ^ ""Mesquite Bean May Be Used in Crisis of War, Arizona Republican, 1917-05-09". Arizona Memory Project. p. 6. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  16. ^ Robinson, Bert. "Akimoel Awatan: The River People, Arizona Highways, July 1955". Arizona Memory Project. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  17. ^ "1936 Catholic Directory of the Diocese of Tucson Statistical Handbook and Telephone Guide to All Rectories, Schools, Institutions". Arizona Memory Project. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  18. ^ ""St. Francis in the Desert," Arizona Highways, May 1941". Arizona Memory Project. pp. 26–29. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  19. ^ a b "Clipped From Arizona Republic". Arizona Republic. 1965-01-03. p. 29. Retrieved 2023-01-06.
  20. ^ "St. Francis Borgia Church, Arizona • Beyond Nevada Expeditions". beyond.nvexpeditions.com. Retrieved 2023-01-05.
  21. ^ "Clipped From Arizona Republic". Arizona Republic. 1963-12-10. p. 32. Retrieved 2023-01-06.
  22. ^ "Clipped From Arizona Republic". Arizona Republic. 1969-10-30. p. 29. Retrieved 2023-01-06.
  23. ^ "Sacate Cemetery". Arizona Memory Project. Retrieved 2023-01-06.
  24. ^ "Arizona Medically Underserved Areas (AzMUA)" (PDF). azdhs.gov. March 2015. Retrieved 30 August 2023.

Further reading

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