year, Litchfi eld Park and Avondale can thank the soft, white fi brous substance for much of what they see today. If it weren’t for the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.’s need to
The cotton club S
The West Valley was forever changed by a now-obsolete type of tire
ince statehood, cotton has been one of the state’s Five C’s — cattle, cotton, copper, citrus and climate, — the elements that help keep Arizona’s economy strong. Residents living in Southwest Valley cities of Good-
grow strong-fi ber cotton, who knows what the Southwest Valley would look like today?
War I interrupted the fl ow of the long-staple variety need for the tires that was being produced in Egypt’s Nile Valley. At the same time, the boll weevil insect was devastating the same variety of cotton being grown on the Sea Islands off the coast of Georgia and the Carolinas. So, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. sent a young executive by the name of Paul Weeks Litchfi eld to Arizona in 1916 in hopes he could convince farmers to start growing cotton. Litchfi eld knew the U.S. Department of Agriculture had conducted suc- cessful experiments growing cotton in the Salt River Valley of Arizona. Yet, he was unable to sway farmers in converting land to cot-
ton fi elds, so the company decided to purchase its own land and formed the Southwest Cotton Co. The company bought about 8,000 acres of land near Chandler and another 30,000 where Litchfi eld Park, Goodyear, Avondale and Sun City now stand. “Almost overnight an army of men started moving in, hun-
100 V18
dreds of Mexicans who threw up brushwood and adobe shelters, and still larger force of adventurers, drawn from all over the
years See TIRES on V19 Vista — West Valley View, Avondale, Arizona Spring/Summer 2012
One of the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.’s blimps fl ies high over the West Valley in this 2006 West Valley View fi le photo. Decades ago, the blimps were assembled in the West Valley. Now they’re made and operated out of Orlando, Fla. The current fl eet has three blimps. In any given year the blimps will make several trips to or over the Phoenix area.
Cotton was used to build cord truck tires. However, World
A farm worker picks cotton in a Goodyear fi eld in this 1941 photograph. Before steel belting, tires were made with cotton belting. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. grew much of its cotton in the West Valley — including in the city it would help create — Goodyear.
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