February 21, 2023 – The next day we turned our attention from searching for petroglyphs to visiting the ruins of a Hohokam village called Pueblo Grande. (Pueblo Grande has since been renamed S’edav Va’aki.) Pueblo Grande lies in the heart of Phoenix, next to Sky Harbor International Airport.
Around 600 CE, the people of the Hohokam culture began building canals that diverted water from the Salt River to irrigate their beans, corn, squash, and cotton. A map of these ancient canals was prepared by Dr. Omar Turney, an engineer for the city of Phoenix and the Arizona State Historian, in 1929. By my calculations, Dr. Turney’s map shows the canals covered an area of over 500 square miles. They stretched from Mesa in the east to Initial Point in the west and from Camel Back Mountain in the north to South Mountain in the south.
The Hohokam canals are a major reason I undertook the Salt River Manifesto project.
The scope and scale of these prehistoric canals demonstrate an engineering and construction skill that would not be reached again in the Salt River Valley until the early 20th century. Yet, the people of the Hohokam culture disappeared entirely by 1450 CE. Their canals and pueblos were in ruins by the time the Spanish arrived in what is now Arizona in the 16th century.
So, it was with great interest we visited Pueblo Grande. It is one of the few remaining antiquities in the Valley, most of the rest has long since been buried under the concrete and asphalt of the Phoenix metropolitan area. Most importantly, we wanted to see an ancient canal. Or at least what remained of one, if we could.
It turned out Pueblo Grande sat at the intersection of the Grand Canal and the Old Crosscut Canal. It is probable these two canals, which are still in use today, were first excavated by the Hohokam. Of course, they have been renovated and modernized since Hohokam times. On the one hand, we were disappointed not to see one of the ancient canals. On the other hand, we were excited to learn at least this part of the Hohokam irrigation system still found utility.
Pueblo Grande is devoted, however, to the village itself – the canals lie outside its walls. It is composed of the ruins of a platform mound, residential dwellings, a ball pit, and other buildings. A museum there displays various archaeological artifacts from the site. Pueblo Grande also includes reproductions of adobe and pit houses, which were used at various periods by the people of the Hohokam culture.
Perhaps most fascinating for me was not the ruins themselves but the location. It is remarkable that this ancient society built this pueblo and these canals over a mile north of the Salt River with primitive tools and back-breaking labor. And Pueblo Grande is but a piece of what they achieved. It is a true testament to their engineering and construction prowess – not to mention their grit. There is much more that I have to say about the people of the Hohokam culture and its canals. I will save this for a longer essay that I will publish on the Salt River Manifesto.