Historic Preservation

Current Project

Los Barrios Viejos
Landmark Nomination

In 2012, the National Park Service launched an initiative to recognize American Latino Heritage by identifying more Latinx communities and highlighting their contributions through National Historic Landmark (NHL) designations. In late 2018, I joined the Logan Simpson Design Inc. team that is preparing the application for an NHL designation of the Barrio Viejo district in Tucson. This area has the largest concentration of traditional, flush-front, mud adobe Sonoran architecture in the nation. As the historian on this project, my role is to communicate the importance of the Mexican American community in the city, southwest, and country.

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The proposed district survived urban renewal in the late 1960s but the surviving older structures and the neighborhoods' collective Sonoran character need additional protections. The NHL designation would add another layer of protection against incompatible modifications to individual homes and/or demolition in this residential area.

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For a fun "ride" through Barrio Viejo watch C-SPAN "Cities Tour Tucson."

Preserving Historic Documents

Watch my presentation for the Family and Community Archives Event at the University of Arizona Special Collections Library that took place in 2019.