Jerome, Arizona

Jerome, Arizona
Town
Civic Building in 2013
Flag
Location of Jerome in Yavapai County, Arizona
Jerome Location in Arizona Show map of Arizona Jerome Jerome (the United States) Show map of the United States
Coordinates: 34°44′56″N 112°06′50″W / 34.74889°N 112.11389°W / 34.74889; -112.11389[1]
Country	United States
State	Arizona
County	Yavapai
Incorporated	1899
Government
• Mayor	Christina "Alex" Barber
• Vice Mayor	Jane Moore
Area [2]
• Total	0.79 sq mi (2.04 km2)
• Land	0.79 sq mi (2.04 km2)
• Water	0.00 sq mi (0.00 km2)
Elevation [1]	5,066 ft (1,544 m)
Population  (2020)
• Total	464
• Density	590.33/sq mi (227.90/km2)
Time zone	UTC−7 (MST)
ZIP Code[3]	86331
Area code	928
FIPS code[4]	04-36290
GNIS feature ID	30522
Website	Town of Jerome
Population density has been calculated by dividing population by land area and rounding to the nearest hundred per square mile.

Jerome is a town in the Black Hills of Yavapai County in the U.S. state of Arizona. Founded in the late 19th century on Cleopatra Hill overlooking the Verde Valley, Jerome is more than 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level. It is about 100 miles (160 km) north of Phoenix along State Route 89A between Sedona and Prescott. Supported in its heyday by rich copper mines, it was home to more than 10,000 people in the 1920s. As of the 2020 census, its population was 464.

The town owes its existence mainly to two ore bodies that formed about 1.75 billion years ago along a ring fault in the caldera of an undersea volcano. Tectonic plate movements, plate collisions, uplift, deposition, erosion, and other geologic processes eventually exposed the tip of one of the ore bodies and pushed the other close to the surface, both near Jerome. In the late 19th century, the United Verde Mine, developed by William A. Clark, extracted ore bearing copper, gold, silver, and other metals from the larger of the two. The United Verde Extension UVX Mine, owned by James Douglas Jr., depended on the other huge deposit. In total, the copper deposits discovered in Jerome's vicinity were among the richest ever found.

Jerome made news in 1917 when labor unrest involving the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) led to the expulsion at gunpoint of about 60 IWW members, who were loaded on a cattle car and shipped west. Production at the mines, always subject to fluctuations, boomed during World War I, fell thereafter, rose again, then fell again during and after the Great Depression. As the ore deposits ran out, the mines closed for good in 1953, and the population dwindled to fewer than 100. Efforts to save the town from oblivion succeeded when residents turned to tourism and retail sales. Jerome became a National Historic Landmark in 1967. By the early 21st century, it had art galleries, coffeehouses, restaurants, a state park, and a local museum devoted to mining history.