Flagstaff Audio Tour: Echoes of Legends and Landmarks

Back in the mid 1920s, tourism was surging, and locals realized they desperately needed first class accommodations. So, in April 1926, everyday citizens and prominent figures like novelist Zane Grey pooled their money in a massive fundraising campaign. In just one month, they raised 200,000 dollars, which is roughly 3.5 million dollars today, to build this place themselves. Originally called the Community Hotel to honor the taxpayers who funded it, the property was renamed Monte Vista, meaning mountain view, by a 12 year old schoolgirl who won a local naming contest. The Monte Vista quickly became a beacon of local pride and frontier innovation. Right there in Room 105, Mary Costigan, the theater owner we met earlier, made history. In 1927, she became only the second woman in the entire world granted a commercial radio broadcasting license, moving her station here to send out a 100 watt signal for three hours every day. But a frontier settlement always casts a shadow, and the Monte Vista holds some deeply dark local lore. The most infamous story centers on Room 306. In the early 1940s, legend claims a man brought two women up to that room from Flagstaff's nearby red light district, which was an illicit neighborhood known for illegal brothels and saloons. The story goes that these two women were brutally murdered and thrown from the third story window to the street below. To this day, male guests staying in Room 306 frequently report waking up with the terrifying sensation of unseen hands covering their mouths and throats. Yet, paranormal investigators and historians point out a glaring issue with this grisly tale. A double murder of that magnitude would have been front page news, but absolutely no historical evidence corroborates the crime. It seems the hotel's close proximity to the red light district simply fueled a dark mythology that refuses to die.

This home perfectly captures that classic frontier grit, where people built their lives around shifting opportunities and relentless drive. You see, Flagstaff was once split in two. But when the railroad moved its depot east to avoid a steep hillside, an ambitious merchant named P.J. Brannen immediately followed the tracks and built a sturdy store right across from the new station, anchoring this brand new neighborhood. A few years later, a man named Thomas Devine moved into this house. Born to Irish immigrants, he started out doing grueling work as a brakeman for the logging train. But his physical career ended abruptly when a devastating train accident cost him his leg. Rather than letting the loss defeat him, Thomas Devine pivoted his career and found new ways to thrive. He took a job with the local electric company and soon threw himself into politics, winning two highly successful terms as county treasurer. He eventually moved away, and his young son Andrew, who toddled around these very floors, grew up to be the famous Hollywood character actor Andy Devine. Tragically, Flagstaff still claimed Thomas in the end. He returned for a town celebration in 1926, contracted severe food poisoning, and passed away a month later. Today, this historic home is an Airbnb, known for a totally different kind of history. Guests frequently report eerie sounds and even sightings of a ghost... specifically, an apparition of a young woman in a yellow dress wandering through the dining room.

Back in 1926, the congregation was known as the Glad Tidings Chapel Car, and it operated entirely out of a converted Pullman passenger railcar. Picture a dedicated teenager named Harrold Harper serving as the caretaker, carefully rubbing down the golden oak pews, dusting the fine Estey organ, and polishing the ornate pulpit inside a train car before every single service. Talk about devotion in a tight space! Eventually, they decided to move their mobile church to a permanent location. When the congregation tried to haul the heavy railcar slowly down Beaver Street, the agonizing move was halted first by a sudden snowstorm and then by mechanical failures. It turned into a hilarious Flagstaff comedy, with residents entirely unsure if the church would ever actually reach its destination! They eventually outgrew the train car, which Reverend Dixon later dismantled by hand, pocketing a literal ton of brass screws in the process. By 1939, this community forged ahead with unyielding spirit to build the permanent home you see right here. Designed in the Gothic Revival style, an architectural tradition known for steeply pitched roofs and tall pointed arches meant to draw the eye toward the heavens, it is deeply rooted in local earth. The volunteers built a rustic foundation of black malpais volcanic rock, and framed the edges with red Moenkopi sandstone. They finished it in just seven months! The project was saved by a final donation of one thousand dollars in 1939, which is about twenty-two thousand dollars today. Money was still so incredibly tight that when the church finally opened, they had no pews, no organ, and no bell!

The sheer scale of their hidden sacrifices is written in these walls. Families sold homemade tamales and enchiladas to buy that same dark volcanic malpais stone we saw at our last stop. The parishioners laid every heavy block by hand. The total cost was sixteen thousand dollars, which is about two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars today, aided by a land donation and a small religious grant. A prominent architectural firm had drawn up professional blueprints, but they were abandoned. Instead, Reverend Edward Albouy drew the plans himself and personally oversaw the heavy labor. When the doors opened in 1926, the interior was completely bare. The only artwork was a solitary picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe, hand drawn by Jesus Gil, the devoted caretaker and bell ringer, until wooden statues were finally donated a decade later. Over the years, the basement became a vital hub for weddings and quinceañeras, traditional coming of age celebrations for fifteen year old girls, and was eventually renovated into an arts center honoring the neighborhood's roots. This sacred space almost vanished recently. In 2016, police caught two men who had smashed the outdoor shrine, throwing statues into the street and starting a fire. The men confessed they caused the destruction and lit the blaze simply because they were freezing outside.

Built in 1935 by federal relief programs, South Beaver Elementary was initially constructed as a segregated school for Hispanic students. Local resident Jesse Dominguez recalled the jarring transition, remembering how non-Anglo children from neighborhoods near the church were physically marched out of their old classrooms and relocated directly to this newly designated campus. The reality of racial segregation was incredibly harsh, but the Hispanic community immediately rallied to support their children. The driving force behind creating this school was Dr. Ralph Oliver Raymond, a local physician who fiercely championed minority education. During historic snowstorms, he would personally deliver bags of beans and rice to the impoverished surrounding neighborhoods, embodying the kind of community action that ensured these families survived. Later, Native American children from the Navajo, Hopi, Havasupai, and Tohono O'odham nations were also integrated into these classrooms. These young students traveled from a federal dormitory, where they slept in large open wings filled with tightly packed bunk beds. But here is where Flagstaff showed its true grit. In 1952, a full two years before the Supreme Court legally mandated school integration across the entire country, local leaders took decisive action. Superintendent Sturgeon Cromer and principal Wilson Riles proactively transferred African-American students from the closing Dunbar School right here into South Beaver to learn alongside the Hispanic students. It was an incredible, early triumph of integration. We see that same powerful, full-circle progress in a local educator named Mr. Garcia. His grandfather immigrated to work the local sawmills, and Garcia himself grew up facing the region's intense discrimination, yet he eventually returned to this exact building to serve as its principal. For decades, the school thrived. They even partnered with Northern Arizona University to pioneer hands-on environmental science programs. Despite becoming the district's first magnet school, which is a public school that offers specialized courses to draw diverse students from across the city, a massive enrollment drop forced South Beaver to close in 2010. That controversial closure broke deep, multi-generational community ties. Fortunately, the university purchased the property in 2015. Because the distinctive Malpais stone facade is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the exterior must be strictly preserved.