A new layer of living applied to Steam Pump Ranch

By Dave Perry for the Town of Oro Valley
Photo credit to Randy Metcalf

At Steam Pump Ranch, families on overnight campouts eat hot dogs on the same ground where, 130 years ago, weary little dogies – cattle – drank heavily, so they’d weigh more at the Tucson rail siding.

Guests listen to rock music on the green grass near the restored barbecue. More than a half-century ago, Steam Pump Ranch resident and retired Big League baseball player Hank Leiber roasted meat on that spit while ballplayers, in Tucson for spring training, relaxed in the yard.

Today, brides-to-be take one last look in a tall mirror within the charmingly redecorated, newly refurbished bunkhouse. Not so long ago, in that bunkhouse, ranch hands hung their dusty duds and rested after a day hauling hay.

A new layer of living is being applied to Steam Pump Ranch, Oro Valley’s oldest intact European settlement.

“We always call it the historic heart of Oro Valley,” said Pat Spoerl, who co-founded the Oro Valley Historical Society with the late Jim Kriegh in 2005.

“Come and walk through it on a weekday,” she said. “It’s quiet. You can get a real feeling for something that was important here, that existed in the past.”

Come on a weekend, and hear the sounds of children, music, the Saturday Heirloom Farmers Market, movies, parties, and celebrations. Steam Pump Ranch has become a memorable, inexpensive wedding venue. Its summer camps and sleepovers are sellouts. In any given week, up to 2,000 people visit Steam Pump Ranch, according to Matt Jankowski, deputy director of parks and recreation.

“It’s unusual the way the community has embraced this property,” said Jankowski, noting it’s been a public, town-owned property for only 16 of its 140-ish years.

Users of yesteryear “can’t be anywhere near the number who come here now,” he said. “There is such a connection. I do think it is unusual, and in a good way.”

Events and activities give people “reason to come this historic site who might not know this is a historic site,” Jankowski said. With a little knowledge, they soon realize “how fortunate we are to have it.”

“Everyone who comes here, it’s shocking to them it exists,” said Jon Schumacher, outdoor recreation and natural resource manager for the town. “This is amazing!” they exclaim.

Often, people say “I didn’t know it was here.”

“I’ve been driving by this place for years, and wondered what those old buildings were,” guests have told Sue Chambasian, an OVHS board member and director of collections. Once within, guests are “fascinated. It’s an amazing thing to me, how many don’t know, so it follows they can’t appreciate it.”

Chambasian sat in the Pusch House, most likely Oro Valley’s oldest standing home, restored by the town in 2010 to “what it looked like in the late 1800s,” Spoerl said. It is now, officially, the Pusch House Museum, operated by the historical society and open Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon September through mid-April. Most Saturdays, about 80 guests wander over from the farmers market.

Right now, the Pusch House Museum features an exhibit about women in Oro Valley history. There’s a photo of smiling Catherine Reidy, the rattlesnake queen, with a spread of snake skins before her. Another photo shows the athlete Ina Gittings (she pronounced it “eena,” but we call her namesake road “eyena”), clad in full-length skirt, at the apex of a pole vault over an uncertain landing area.

In the last three years, Oro Valley has vaulted about $2 million into Steam Pump Ranch, rehabilitating the garage, barbecue, and bunkhouses. It’s expensive, yes, but the investment made “three spaces that were uninhabitable” into places for community use, Jankowski said.

“I am very happy to see how Steam Pump Ranch looks today,” Spoerl said. “It’s taken a lot longer than I ever thought. I thought it’d be fixed up by 2012. But progress has surely been made, which is very good.”

Rehabilitation has “allowed us to make this a place where we can have staff year-round,” Jankowski said. Today, Schumacher and assistant recreation managers Dylan Hiatt and Catherine Kastens work from the garage. Steam Pump Ranch is staffed at least six days a week. “That allows us to do a better job as stewards of the property,” Jankowski said. Employees can answer questions for wanderers, too.

With an onsite presence, “we’ve been able to raise the bar of Steam Camp” in the summertime, Schumacher said. “Parents can’t rave enough.” Slots fill instantly. Kids have fun and learn in a safe environment.

Parents have told staff the campouts are “the greatest thing you could ever do.” Kids want to camp; parents know it’s work. Children run with glowing sticks under the stars on Steam Pump Ranch grass. And they never forget it.

“Installation of this lawn was a game-changer,” Jankowski said.

Modern activities give pause to Spoerl, a trained archaeologist. Then she recognizes a concert, or a party, is essentially “the same use” as in the past.

“I start out as a purist, and I get over it real quick,” Spoerl said. “There are activities that have no bearing on the history, but still some minor component” of it. And they bring people to the historic site.

“We take the historical integrity of this property very seriously,” Jankowski said. Yes, Parks and Recreation may do “silly things” to attract visitors, “but never to the detriment of this property.”

Spoerl appreciates as much. She wants more interpretative signage, and more historical references for visitors, to “spread history across the property.” Spoerl sees new possibilities for collaboration between the town and the historical society.

“We can do a lot more together, and I think it’s time,” she said. 

There remains a timelessness to Steam Pump Ranch.

Far up a eucalyptus tree, two redtail hawks have built an enormous nest on a dead branch. The raptors soar on the thermals rising from the west side of the Santa Catalinas. Hawks, and thermals, and monsoons, have filled the Steam Pump air for centuries. “The weather at this location can be crazy,” said Schumacher.

That aforementioned eucalyptus tree may be 80 feet tall. It is likely the oldest living tree ever planted in Oro Valley, and one of the tallest. Nearby, decades-old palms scrape the sky. A lovely, large, unusual chinaberry tree stands near the barbecue.

“It’s a public park,” said Hiatt, who “absolutely” loves what he does, and it shows. “People can come here.” He sees plein air artists and resting cyclists off the Loop. Visitors sit for wondrous views, scarlet tanagers, or a glimpse of a very friendly roadrunner the kids call Bruce. At sunrise, the din of birds drowns out any noise from Oracle Road.

“There are not many public parks ... like this,” Schumacher said.

Today, the town of Oro Valley draws upon the Canada del Oro aquifer for the water we drink. The ingenious steam pump rigged up by George Pusch and John Zellweger 140 years ago tapped that same water source for lagging little dogies. The pump’s remnants stand beneath a protective “ghost structure” made of its own skin, corrugated tin roofing. Without that cover, Spoerl said, “it would just be melted adobe. There would be nothing left.”

There’s plenty left of Steam Pump Ranch.

Steam Pump Ranch is located at 10901 N. Oracle Road.