*Mayer is situated where, in
1882, Joe Mayer built a store that also had overnight accommodations for
travelers. It was so
successful that he added a stage station and saloon. Mayer's store was
the handiest place around. Cattlemen would lodge there while laying out
$3,000 or $4,000 for reprovisioning.
As mines opened at Stoddard, Copper Mountain, and Poland,
the town expanded. It received a post office in 1884, and two years
later Joe Mayer constructed the two-story Mayer Hotel. The Prescott and
Eastern Railroad arrived in 1898, further solidifying the community's
importance as a center of commerce.
Joe Mayer was a natural entrepreneur. A 1902 issue of the Prescott
Journal-Miner reports that Mayer, in partner-ship with E.S. Rogers,
planned to market toothpicks made from cactus thorns as "Indian Souvenir
Toothpicks."
The newspaper had received a sample lot and was duly impressed. The most
obvious landmark in Mayer is the lone smokestack, 120 feet high, of the
Great Western Smelter. Built in 1916, it was planned as part of a
complex that would raise the daily capacity of the smelter from 200 to
700 tons.
Today, Mayer remains a sleepy little community and the
home of our friends at
Grand Canyon Harley Davidson.
If you find yourself in the area,
stop in and say hi to our good friends Jim Payne in sales and Pete in
service. Tell them the coffee is on us. You're on your own with the new
Harley!
*All text source
about Mayer extracted from "Arizona Ghost Towns and Mining Camps" by
Philip Varney, Arizona Highways Books
