History of Phoenix, Arizona

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The history of Phoenix, Arizona, goes back millennia, beginning with nomadic paleo-Indians who existed in the Americas in general, and the Salt River Valley in particular, about 7,000 BC until about 6,000 BC. Mammoths were the primary prey of hunters. As that prey moved eastward, they followed, vacating the area.^[1] Other nomadic tribes (archaic Indians) moved into the area, mostly from Mexico to the south and California to the west. Around approximately 1,000 BC, the nomadic began to be accompanied by two other types of cultures, commonly called the farmers and the villagers, prompted by the introduction of maize into their culture.^[2][3][4] Out of these archaic Indians, the Hohokam civilization arose. The Hohokam first settled the area around 1 AD, and in about 500 years, they had begun to establish the canal system which enabled agriculture to flourish in the area. They suddenly disappeared by 1450, for unknown reasons. By the time the first Europeans arrived at the beginning of the 16th century, the two main groups of native Indians who inhabited the area were the O'odham and Sobaipuri tribes.^[5]

While the first explorers were Spanish, their attempts at settlement were confined to Tucson and the south before 1800. Central Arizona was first settled during the early 19th century by American settlers. The city of Phoenix's story begins as people from those settlements expanded south, in conjunction with the establishment of a military outpost to the east of current day Phoenix.^[6]

The town of Phoenix was settled in 1867, and incorporated in 1881 as the City of Phoenix. Phoenix served as an agricultural area that depended on large-scale irrigation projects. Until World War II, the economy was based on the "Five C's": cotton, citrus, cattle, climate, and copper. The city provided retail, wholesale, banking, and governmental services for central Arizona, and was gaining a national reputation among winter tourists. The post World War Two years saw the city beginning to grow more rapidly, as many men who had trained in the military installations in the valley, returned, bringing their families.^[7] The population growth was further stimulated in the 1950s, in part because of the availability of air conditioning, which made the very hot dry summer heat tolerable, as well as an influx of industry, led by high tech companies. The population growth rate of the Phoenix metro area has been nearly 4% per year for the past 40 years. That growth rate slowed during the Great Recession but the U.S. Census Bureau predicted it would resume as the nation's economy recovered, and it already has begun to do so. It is currently the fifth largest city in the United States by population.^[8] However, on June 1, 2023, the State of Arizona announced the historic decision to halt new housing development in the Phoenix metropolitan area that relies solely on groundwater, due to a predicted water shortfall to support continued unregulated growth, in conjunction with climate change.^[9]