Abandoned Towns
The Arivaca Schoolhouse, a small whitewashed adobe building with a tin roof and a historical marker in front

Farm and ranch town · Silver mining town

Arivaca

An old ranch and mining town in the hills north of the Mexican border. It came close to emptying in the 20th century, but it never did, and its 1879 schoolhouse is listed as the oldest standing school building in Arizona.

31°34′38″N 111°19′53″W · 3,640 ft

Photo: The Old Pueblo, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Overview

A ranch town that never quite emptied

Main Street, 2015
Main Street, 2015 · Photo: The Old Pueblo, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Arivaca sits on the north side of the Arivaca Creek valley, 23 miles west of I-19 and about 11 miles from the Mexican border. Spanish settlers worked small mines in the hills, and in 1833 a Mexican land grant made the valley a cattle ranch called La Aribac, from a Pima word for small springs. Charles Poston bought the ranch in 1856, and reduction works for the Heintzelman silver mine at Cerro Colorado went up here.

The town itself dates from 1878, when a post office opened. A year later Pedro Aguirre, a freighter and rancher, built a schoolhouse, which still stands and is listed as the oldest standing school building in Arizona. More than 100 mines were worked in the surrounding hills on and off into the 1950s, and ranching carried the town between booms. Cavalry units camped here during the Mexican Revolution.

By 1960 one count found only 26 people, and a 1980 guidebook called Arivaca a semi-ghost town. Growth followed electricity in 1956, the 1972 sale of ranch land in 40-acre parcels and the paving of Arivaca Road in 1976. The 2020 census counted 623. Today Arivaca has a post office, a library branch, a community center and a clinic, with old adobes standing among newer buildings.

Timeline

Ranch, mill town, ghost and back

  1. The valley is probably a Pima or Tohono O'odham village, abandoned after the Pima Revolt of 1751.
  2. A Mexican land grant of about 8,700 to 8,900 acres, sources differ, becomes the La Aribac ranch. An Apache raid drives the family out for a time.
  3. Charles Poston buys the ranch. Reduction works for the Heintzelman silver mine at Cerro Colorado are built here.
  4. Arivaca is abandoned for a time.
  5. The post office opens, with Noah W. Bernard as postmaster. Wikipedia dates the community's founding to this year.
  6. Pedro Aguirre builds the schoolhouse.
  7. The census counts 236 people.
  8. Cavalry units camp at Arivaca during the Mexican Revolution, among them the 10th Cavalry from 1917 to 1920.
  9. Power lines reach the valley, and the population starts to grow again.
  10. One count puts the population at 26.
  11. The Arivaca Ranch sells 11,000 acres to a developer, who splits it into 40-acre parcels.
  12. Arivaca Road is paved.
  13. The 1879 schoolhouse is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
  14. The census counts 623 people in the Arivaca census area.

What to see

The schoolhouse, Main Street and the cienega

The 1879 schoolhouse, 2015
The 1879 schoolhouse, 2015 · Photo: The Old Pueblo, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

The schoolhouse is the landmark, built in 1879 and marked with a National Register plaque out front. Beside the post office stands a large tin-roofed building that was once the stagecoach depot, and adobe ruins stand among the houses. A 2016 photo shows the Arivaca Mercantile on the main street.

Just east of town, a unit of the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge takes in the Arivaca Cienega, a marshy wetland along the creek. A boardwalk trail loops through it. The refuge charges nothing and keeps its trails open around the clock. A second trail is on Arivaca Creek, near the ruins of the Wilbur Ranch, homesteaded by the Cerro Colorado mine's doctor.

The historic maps below show the town's shape. The 1920 sheet marks the schoolhouse and a place called Bernard to the east. The 1941 sheet shows the cemetery and a few blocks of buildings, with the Amado Mine in the hills to the north. The 1979 sheet shows a full street grid, a landing strip and the marsh along Arivaca Creek.

  • Schoolhouse (1879)
  • Post office and former stagecoach depot
  • Adobe ruins
  • Arivaca Mercantile
  • Cemetery
  • Arivaca Cienega boardwalk
  • Wilbur Ranch ruins on Arivaca Creek
USGS topographic map of Arivaca's streets on the north side of Arivaca Creek
USGS The National Map, topo. Arivaca's street grid sits just north of Arivaca Creek. The Arivaca Cienega Nature Trail starts at the east edge of town, inside the refuge.
Aerial view of Arivaca's scattered buildings among mesquite, with green trees along the creek
Aerial imagery, same area. The town's buildings are scattered among the mesquite, with the creek's trees along the bottom of the frame.

Historic maps

Arivaca on USGS maps, 1920–1996

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

USGS topographic map around Arivaca, 1920
Arivaca sheet, 1920, 1:125,000 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Day trip

Plan a day trip to Arivaca from Green Valley

Take it with you

Day trip itinerary

The essentials, the sample day with boxes to tick, what to photograph and the coordinates, on two printable pages. Handy where there's no signal.

Download the PDF (486 KB)

Arivaca makes an easy half day from Green Valley on paved roads. Look at the 1879 schoolhouse and the old adobes from the street, then walk the boardwalk at the Arivaca Cienega on the edge of town. It's a living town, so treat the old buildings as private homes and businesses.

A sample day

  1. Drive down I-19 and west on Arivaca Road, past the Cerro Colorado mine site.
  2. Walk the Arivaca Cienega boardwalk on the east edge of town.
  3. See the schoolhouse, the post office and old stage depot, and Main Street.
  4. Head back the way you came, or continue on Ruby Road toward Oro Blanco. It turns to graded dirt after about six miles.

What to photograph and film

  • The schoolhouse. The whitewashed adobe and its National Register marker, from the street.
  • The stage depot. The big tin-roofed building beside the post office.
  • The cienega. Cottonwoods and the boardwalk over the wetland.
  • Drones. The refuge trail page doesn't cover them. Ask the refuge before flying.

Map & directions

Getting there

Green Valley is the nearest town with full services. Both routes run down I-19 to the Arivaca Road exit, then west on paved Arivaca Road past Cerro Colorado into town. From Arivaca, Ruby Road continues south to Oro Blanco and Ruby.

USGS topographic map from Green Valley and I-19 west along Arivaca Road to Arivaca, with the route drawn on it

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

From Green Valley33.4 miabout 54 min
  1. From Green Valley, take Calle de Las Casitas and West Continental Road to I-19.0.9 mi
  2. Take I-19 south toward Nogales.8.9 mi
  3. Take the Arivaca Road exit and turn right onto West Arivaca Road.0.5 mi
  4. Follow Arivaca Road west past Cerro Colorado to Arivaca.22.9 mi
  5. In town, turn right on 4th Avenue, then left on 3rd Street.0.2 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • Arivaca Road has been paved since 1976.
  • Ruby Road, south of town, is paved for about six miles and then graded dirt on the way to Oro Blanco and Ruby. Ruby itself has been closed to the public since June 2024.
  • Arivaca is a living town. The old adobes are private property; look from the street.
  • The refuge trails at the cienega and on Arivaca Creek are open around the clock, and the refuge charges no fee. Carry water in the warm months.

Photos

Arivaca in photos

Visitor reports

Been to Arivaca?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

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Nearby

Other sites near Arivaca

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Arizona index.

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "Arivaca": fact sheet fields (roads, legal description, climate, best time, remains).
  2. Wikipedia, "Arivaca, Arizona", retrieved October 2026: coordinates, elevation, census figures, the land grant, Poston and the reduction works, the post office, the schoolhouse and its 2012 listing, the cavalry camps, the 1956, 1972 and 1976 milestones, the mining district, today's institutions.
  3. Mary N. Kasulaitis, "Arivaca Yesterdays," The Connection, 2014: the Ortiz grant and its acreage, the Apache raid. Same series, 2010: Arivaca abandoned in the 1860s.
  4. T. Johnson, "Heintzelman Mine," Green Valley Recreation Hiking Club library: Dr. Wilbur, the company doctor, and his Arivaca ranch.
  5. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge trails, and "Visit us", checked October 2026: the Arivaca Cienega and Arivaca Creek trails, trail hours, no fees, no alerts posted.
  6. Jim Forte Postal History, Pima County post offices: Arivaca (1878 to date).
  7. Wikimedia Commons photo descriptions (2011–2016): the schoolhouse, the post office and former stage depot, the Mercantile and Arivaca Creek. Ruby Road and Ruby's closure: our Oro Blanco and Ruby pages.
  8. Elevation: Wikipedia and USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026.

Photo and map credits