4/21/2025 - Casa Grande Ruins National Monument

In April 2025, my mom and me went to the Casa Grande Ruins NM located in Coolidge, AZ.  It has been a few years since I have been there.

There are some exhibits to look at:

Here is a sample of the layout of the building that were around in the 1200-1400.

Here are somethings that they found at the ruins.

This is called the "Great House."  It was a gathering place for people or a waypoint marker in an extensive of canals and trading partners.

 Builders found building material underfoot: caliche, a concrete like mix of sand, clay and calcium carbonate limestone.  It took 3,000 tons to build the Great House.  Caliche mud was layered to form walls four feet thick at the base, tapering toward the hop.  Hundreds of juniper, pine and fir trees were carried or floated 60 miles down the Gila River to the village.  Anchored in the walls, the timbers formed ceiling or floor supports.  The roof might have saguaro ribs were laid across the beams, covered with reeds and topped final caliche mud layer.

You can see some of the walls that were part of the buildings around there.

Around the trail there is info stands that you can read about the people and what was done around there.  They also have codes that you can scan to listen to someone talk about some stuff around there.  You have to have the NPS.gov app on your phone to listen.

A Meeting Place and Landmark

This multi-storied, earthen-walled structure surrounded by the remains of smaller buildings and a compound wall was constructed by Hohokam, who farmed the Gila Valley in the 1200s.  Casa Grande was abandoned by the mid-1400s.

Casa Grande Ruins National Monument (U.S. National Park Service)