Abandoned Towns
Aerial view of desert washes and a dirt road running north past the Sundad site

Mill, lumber and company town

Sundad

A desert health colony from the 1920s that never took off. What's left is a scatter of foundations on federal land, and its name spelled out in rocks beside the road.

33°10′53″N 113°14′10″W · ≈970 ft

Aerial imagery: USGS The National Map (public domain).

Ruins · 2016 report

Sundad is on public land managed by the Bureau of Land Management, according to current federal land-status data. The newest description we found, an off-road guide from about 2016, lists rock symbols, cement foundations and scrap wood. We found no dated report on the road. The site is remote. Bring water and a spare tire, and don't count on finding anyone out here.

Overview

A health colony that didn't take

Sundad sits in the low desert hills north of Agua Caliente, just inside Maricopa County. In the 1920s someone tried to start a health colony here, most likely a sanatorium for people with tuberculosis, who came to Arizona for the dry air. It failed, and we found no record of who was behind it. A 2009 Arizona Republic article summed it up in its headline: Sundad failed as a facility for TB patients. The place never had a post office.

Mining kept a few people around. A small copper and silver mine sits just east of the townsite, and as late as 1966 a couple lived in a one-room mining shack here with no telephone and no neighbors. By then the newspapers were calling Sundad a ghost town, as they did in 1953 when nine Air Force crewmen parachuted into the desert nearby after a midair collision.

What visitors find now are concrete foundations, a water tank and, above all, rocks. Someone laid out the name SUNDAD in white stones in several places, along with an anchor, a star and other figures, some of them beside the county road. Nobody knows when. The land belongs to the public and is managed by the Bureau of Land Management, which counts Sundad as a historic site.

Timeline

What we know

The 1951 USGS Dendora Valley sheet marks Sundad, a few buildings and a well
The 1951 USGS Dendora Valley sheet marks Sundad, a few buildings and a well · Map: U.S. Geological Survey, USGS catalog, Public domain
  1. Sundad is laid out in the desert north of Agua Caliente as a health retreat, by most accounts for tuberculosis patients. It fails. Wikipedia's article says a mining camp came first.
  2. Sundad never gets a post office.
  3. The USGS Dendora Valley sheet shows Sundad as a few buildings with a well, at the end of a spur off Agua Caliente Road.
  4. A B-47 bomber and a tanker collide during a refueling exercise. Nine Air Force crewmen parachute into the desert near Sundad, which the papers call a ghost town, and are picked up by helicopter.
  5. Lee R. Bailey dies at Sundad. A newspaper reports that his widow, Velma, is now alone in their one-room mining shack, with no telephone and no neighbors.
  6. R. Agin owns the Sundad copper and silver mine, also called the Maricopa Chief, on federal land just east of the townsite.
  7. The USGS Yellow Medicine Butte sheet shows the access loop, a mine shaft and prospects, but no town name.
  8. The Arizona Republic notes that the old mine site is hard to find and is marked by rocks spelling out Sundad.
  9. A visitor maps two areas: a big rock display at the turnoff, and the townsite with foundations, a concrete water tank and a shaft.
  10. The BLM lists Sundad as a historic site in its Lower Sonoran resource management plan.
  11. The most recent description we found: rock symbols, cement foundations, nails and scrap wood, with the main site down a rough track.

What's left

Foundations and stone letters

Visitors describe two areas. The first is a triangle of land where the Sundad spur leaves the county road. It is outlined in rocks and holds stone figures: stars, crosses, an anchor and the name. One 2002 account measured the main display at about 75 feet across. The second, roughly half a mile up the spur, is the townsite itself, where a dirt road is lined with concrete foundations and more rock designs, some decorated with broken glass and old bottles. A concrete water tank and a shaft are close by.

The historic maps below show how little was ever here. The 1951 Dendora Valley sheet marks Sundad with a few building dots and a well. By 1986 the 1:24,000 sheet drops the name and shows only the loop of the access road, with a mine shaft and prospect pits on the slope to the northeast. The 1942, 1960 and 1971 sheets are small-scale regional maps.

  • Concrete foundations along the old road
  • Concrete water tank
  • Lot outlines
  • SUNDAD spelled in rocks, more than once
  • Rock anchor, star and other figures
  • Mine shaft and prospects, just northeast
USGS topographic map with Agua Caliente Road on the left and a spur road ending at the Sundad label
USGS The National Map, topo. The spur leaves Agua Caliente Road, at left, and ends at the townsite.
Aerial view of desert washes with a dirt road curving in from the west and a loop track
Aerial imagery, same area. The access road curves in from the west; the loop track runs through the townsite between the washes.

Record and legend

Claims to check

A tuberculosis sanatorium? An undated listing and azghosttowns.com call Sundad a failed health facility, and Wikipedia cites a 2009 Arizona Republic column headlined "Sundad failed as facility for TB patients." An off-road guide notes that it found no other published confirmation. We treat the TB story as likely but thinly documented.

Mining town first? Wikipedia's article says Sundad began as a mining town before the sanatorium plan, citing a 2006 trail guide. The mine records we found date from 1970, and an off-road guide reports no registered claims within several miles. The order of events is unclear.

Who laid out the rocks? Nobody we read knows when the stone letters and figures were made, or by whom.

Historic maps

Sundad on USGS maps, 1942–1986

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 Sundad, 1942
Vicksburg sheet, 1942, 1:250,000 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Map & directions

Getting there

Gila Bend is the nearest town with services. Both routes below run west on I-8 to the Sentinel exit, then north on county roads; the last ten miles are unpaved. They were computed from OpenStreetMap and we haven't driven them, and the slow times reflect the dirt roads. From the north, Agua Caliente Road also reaches Sundad from Arlington, about 32 miles of dirt by one off-road guide's count; we haven't routed it.

USGS topographic map from Gila Bend west along I-8 and north to Sundad, 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 downtown Gila Bend57.2 miabout 3 h 17 min
  1. From downtown Gila Bend, take Pima Street (I-8 Business) west and join I-8.2 mi
  2. Follow I-8 west to the Sentinel exit, exit 87.27.6 mi
  3. Turn right on South Agua Caliente Road and continue north as it becomes South 571st Avenue.14.7 mi
  4. Turn right on Hyder Road.2.3 mi
  5. Turn left on Agua Caliente Road. At its end turn right on Lahman Road, which becomes Agua Caliente Road again. These roads are unpaved.9.6 mi
  6. Turn right on the track to the townsite.0.9 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • I-8, South Agua Caliente Road and South 571st Avenue are paved. OpenStreetMap shows Hyder Road partly paved and partly gravel, and Agua Caliente and Lahman roads as unpaved or compacted dirt.
  • Sources disagree on the last stretch. An undated listing rates the road 2WD, a 2002 guide recommends high-clearance 2WD, and a 2016 off-road guide says the half mile to the main townsite needs a high-clearance 4x4 or a walk.
  • We know of no services on this route past Gila Bend. Carry water, fuel and a spare.
  • Summer heat here is dangerous. Go between October and April.
  • Sundad is on public land. Leave the rock designs as you find them, and stay clear of the mine shaft.

Photos

Have photos of Sundad?

We haven’t added more photographs of Sundad yet. If you’ve visited, share your photos and a field report below.

Visitor reports

Been to Sundad?

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.

Mill, lumber and company

More mill, lumber and company ghost towns

The nearest in Arizona.

The long white Agua Caliente resort hotel with a covered porch on a stone base, beside a paved roadGuide

Agua Caliente

32.99, -113.32

Maricopa County, Arizona

Hot springs that drew missionaries, travelers and resort guests for two centuries, until irrigation wells drained them. The 1897 hotel still stands…

Private · closed (2023)Mill, lumber and company
Palm Lake at the Hassayampa River Preserve in June 2026, with green willows and summer clouds reflected in still waterGuide

Allah

33.93, -112.69

Maricopa County, Arizona

A pioneer ranch on a desert river that became the Garden of Allah resort, with its own train stop and post office. The grounds are now a nature…

Open Wed–SunMill, lumber and company

All 51 mill, lumber and company ghost towns →

Nearby

Other sites near Sundad

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

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "Sundad": fact sheet fields (roads, legal description, climate, best time, remains), the failed health facility, no post office.
  2. Wikipedia, "Sundad, Arizona", retrieved October 2026: GNIS coordinates, the BLM historic-site listing (2011), and newspaper items cited there: the Arizona Republic's 2009 "Sundad failed as facility for TB patients," the September 10, 1953 reports of the airmen's bailout, the December 8, 1966 Arizona Daily Sun report, and the April 19, 1991 Republic hiking piece.
  3. azghosttowns.com, "Sundad" (visit of June 2002): the two areas, the rock displays, foundations, water tank and shaft, road advice.
  4. AZ Off Road, "Sundad" (undated; its sources were read in January 2016): the approach from Arlington, the rock symbols and foundations, the 4x4 track, the unconfirmed TB story.
  5. Western Mining History, "Sundad", from the USGS Mineral Resources Data System: the copper-silver mine, its other name, its 1970 owner and location on BLM land.
  6. Town of Gila Bend, "Museum/Visitor Center": museum hours, address, entry through Town Hall and its collection, as of October 2026.
  7. Coordinates: USGS GNIS "Sundad" (feature ID 11956), as on Wikipedia, matching the 1951 USGS Dendora Valley sheet. Land status: BLM Surface Management Agency data. Legal description: BLM PLSS (CadNSDI). Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026; road surfaces from OpenStreetMap. Not field-checked. Status checked against the sources above on October 19, 2026.

Photo and map credits

Record5 of 10
  • Coordinates
  • Land status
  • Site on USGS maps, 1951
  • Historic maps, 1942–1986
  • Remains, as of 2016
  • Who founded it
  • Dates of the health colony
  • Road condition now
  • Photos
  • Field report since 2016
Missing items are what we'll ask readers and local sources to fill.