HISTORY...How hot was it? Before this landmark was the Hotel/Mineral Baths it became famous for, The Buckhorn was a place to stop in the desolate desert to fill up on gas, buy trinkets and view an array of still wildlife.
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The Buckhorn Baths Motel at 5900 East Main Street at the corner of North Recker Road in Mesa, Arizona was a small mineral hot springs resort which offered a bathhouse as well as both cottages and motel rooms for overnight stays.
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After completion of Diving Lady, preservation interest switches to Buckhorn Baths
“The Buckhorn will be a herculean effort,” said Vic Linoff, the president of the Mesa Preservation Foundation and the board chair of the Mesa Historical Museum. “It makes the diving lady look like a piece of cake.”
Last fall, Mesa voters approved a $70 million bond which grants money, in part, for the city to use in procuring the Buckhorn property.
“The city is in ongoing negotiations with the property owners,” said Marc Heirshberg, parks, recreation and commercial facilities director for the City of Mesa. . ."
Buckhorn Baths Motel & Museum (Arizona Photo Spot)
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MESA – Nestled on the corner of Main Street and Recker Road in Mesa is a structure that looks like any old, dilapidated building that has fallen into disrepair.
But this tiny roadside building, known as the Buckhorn Baths Motel, is one of the reasons why the Cactus League is what it is today, and was one of the founding pieces of spring training in Arizona.
Ted and Alice Sliger bought a plot of land in 1936 on what today is East Main Street in Mesa. It was their home, it was a gift shop and a place for Ted to show off his huge taxidermy collection.
After three years of having to haul fresh water between downtown Mesa and their property, the couple decided to dig a well and see if they could find water.
What came next changed their lives.
They found water — but it was about 120 degrees and full of minerals. The water wasn’t drinkable but had lots of healing benefits. Not long after the water was found, the motel was built and a spa along with it.
Word got around to New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham. After he made his way out to the Buckhorn for a stay he decided to move his team to Mesa for spring training to play Cleveland, which had moved to Arizona to escape the radical Jim Crow laws of the South.
Stoneham started bringing his top players to Mesa about a week early to stay at the Buckhorn and receive treatment, and soon the entire team had moved into the little roadside motel.
✓ It was the start of a long and storied history between the Buckhorn Baths Motel and the Giants, who stayed there for a 25-year span that included the team’s move from New York to San Francisco.
“They were like a family,” said Mesa Historical Museum Executive Director Susan Ricci.
Eventually, word got out around the league, and more teams started to use the Buckhorn as their hotel. The Chicago Cubs, who moved to Mesa from Catalina Island off the coast of California, used the Buckhorn for their first couple of years in Arizona.
Now with three teams in Arizona, and the Baltimore Orioles eventual move to Yuma, the Cactus League was born.
The baths closed its doors in 1999, and the hotel shut down in 2007. Ever since then, the hotel has been in a sort of limbo.
“There’s a term we use in preservation called demolition by neglect. That’s kind of where it is,” said Mesa Historical Museum President Vic Linoff.
Plans for an apartment complex have stalled, Linoff reports, and any plans to develop any part of the land have reached a standstill. So at the moment, the fate of the Buckhorn is up in the air.
But if walls could talk, the Buckhorn would have a speech like no other from the things the old hotel has seen. And, Linoff says, rumor has it that the pipes in the hotel still hold that mineral water Ted found when he was trying to find drinking water.
And it might work, too. Alice Sliger, who lived on the property until six months before she died in 2010, lived to be 103 years old."
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And what about minerals? Do minerals really help antler growth? Calcium and phosphorus are scientifically known to be important, and other minerals play a critical role as well. The National Deer Association noted a University of Georgia study found 11 different minerals in whitetail antlers. The top four included calcium (19 percent), phosphorus (10 percent), magnesium (1 percent), and sodium (0.5 percent).
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OFFICIAL STORY + VIDEO
MPF involvement: directed effort to save Buckhorn Baths and raised awareness of its potential development within the city.
The Buckhorn Baths Motel was famous for its mineral-rich waters and welcomed a vast array of guests from baseball players and movie stars, to high level businessmen and politicians. Mesa Preservation Foundation hoped to preserve the history and personality of this unique piece of land. This project's preservation efforts have stopped due to matters outside of MPF's realm. However, its history is worth remembering.
History of the Buckhorn Baths
Buckhorn
Baths were the vision of Ted and Alice Sliger who developed their land
on East Main Street, then U.S. Highways 60-70 and 80-89, between about
1935 and 1947. The Buckhorn is about 4.2 miles East of the Diving Lady Sign on same "Main Street."
After establishing their residence on the Buckhorn property on the northwest corner of Main Street and Recker Road, the Sliger's built a store and gas station to accommodate the growing auto tourism. They sold Indian curios in the store and Alice cooked homemade meals for weary travelers.
In 1938,
Ted began displaying his taxidermy collection of Arizona wildlife at The Buckhorn the addition. Before this landmark was the Hotel/Mineral Baths it became famous for, The Buckhorn was a place to stop in the desolate desert to fill up on gas, buy trinkets and view an array of still wildlife.Finding the Springs
In
1939, Ted got tired of traveling to bring water to their place so he
decided to drill the land for water. He struck an unknown hot
spring reservoir that produced 127 degree water (average jacuzzi heats
to 104 degrees)!
Baths to Baseball
In
1947, the New York Giants (now the San Francisco Giants) baseball team
came to town. The presence of the Buckhorn Baths led them to make the
Valley their spring training home and the Cactus League was born. For
the next 25 years, the Buckhorn Baths were the Giants' home away from
home and baseball greats like Ty Cobb, Willie Mays, Gaylord Perry, Leo
Durocher, Mel Ott and Juan Marichal became part of the Sliger family.
The
architectural and historical significance of the Buckhorn Baths makes
the site highly noteworthy and it was listed on the National Register of
Historic Places in 2005..." READ MORE
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The Buckhorn Baths Motel was famous for its mineral-rich waters and welcomed a vast array of guests from baseball players and movie stars, to high level businessmen and politicians. Mesa Preservation Foundation hoped to preserve the history and personality of this unique piece of land. This project's preservation efforts have stopped due to matters outside of MPF's realm. However, its history is worth remembering. History of the Buckhorn Baths After establishing their residence on the Buckhorn property on the northwest corner of Main Street and Recker Road, the Sliger's built a store and gas station to accommodate the growing auto tourism. They sold Indian curios in the store and Alice cooked homemade meals for weary travelers. In 1938, Ted began displaying his taxidermy collection of Arizona wildlife at The Buckhorn the addition. Before this landmark was the Hotel/Mineral Baths it became famous for, The Buckhorn was a place to stop in the desolate desert to fill up on gas, buy trinkets and view an array of still wildlife.Finding the Springs Baths to Baseball The architectural and historical significance of the Buckhorn Baths makes the site highly noteworthy and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2005. With the passing of Alice Sliger on November 9, 2010 at the age of 103, the future of the Buckhorn Baths is imperiled. The Mesa Preservation Foundation worked with all interested parties to ensure the Sliger legacy is maintained through preservation of the most significant structures and adaptive reuse of the remainder of the site, possibly including baseball fields. |
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