Fed by waters of the Gila River, they constructed some 500 miles of large canals (on average 10 feet deep and 30 feet wide!) linked to smaller ditches, so watering thousands of acres of farmland. From this merger arose the Huhugam people-our ancestors-who conducted trade over great distances and became superb farmers.
Some 6,000 years ago, various cultural groups collectively labeled the Archaic peoples, who lived by hunting and gathering along the river’s banks and adjoining up land terrain, wandered into this realm.Ĭirca 300 B.C., these early inhabitants were joined by peoples from central Mexico, transformed by concepts and technology introduced from the south. First there was the land and the river – the Gila River, which flowed westward across south-central Arizona and the surprisingly fertile Sonoran Desert.
