Visiting downtown Phoenix, Arizona in 1933


One thing you can always say about Phoenix is that it's constantly changing. If you go away for a few years, and come back to Phoenix there are always new buildings. And the old buildings have disappeared! Of course, if you look very carefully, you can see familiar buildings. Let's visit downtown Phoenix in 1933.

We're on Central between Adams and Monroe, looking southwest. The first thing that I notice is the Heard Building, where Dwight Heard publishes the two newspapers, the Arizona Republic and the Phoenix Gazette. It's no longer the tallest building in town since the Luhrs Building, at Central and Jefferson, went up in 1925.

But the buildings north of it have disappeared. The old Occidental Boarding House is gone. In its place is a modern-looking building with the Great Western Business College (I think that's Lamson Business College!), and on the ground floor is McDougall and Cassou, Lucille's (I think that's a dress shop) and a Florist. Hey, it's owned by the Donofrio family - they make the best ice cream! It's a beautiful Art Deco building, and it sure out-classes the old Occidental, which was built back when Arizona was still a territory. I guess progress marches on. Hopefully this beautiful building will never be "modernized" in the future, and have its facade covered!

The brick building to the right is new, too. The old Central Methodist Church is long gone, they've moved up Central to a bigger place now. Looks like Honan's is a hat shop. Strange how they just jammed that building right up against the building next to it. I guess Phoenix does that kind of stuff. Call me old-fashioned, I like the bricks. Hopefully they'll never be covered up!

As of this writing, all of these buildings in the photo at the top of this post are still there. The Heard Building is the most recognizable, although it's gone through some minor face-lifts. The rest of the buildings were "modernized" beginning not long after the 1933 photo was taken. The building at far left, the Gooding Building (right behind the sign that says "Indian Store"), was modernized when it became Raskin's Jeweler's in the 1950s, and still has a very plain facade. The facades of the other buildings were also "smoothed out" to be modernized. 



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