Pioneer Museum

    In 1906, the Pioneers Society of Northern Arizona was founded in Flagstaff, Arizona It was reorganized in 1942 and again in 1953 and renamed the Northern Arizona Pioneers Historical Society (NAPHS). In 1985, after serving the community as a private non-profit organization for more than 30 years, NAPHS transferred its holdings to the Arizona Historical Society.
    The Arizona Historical Society s Pioneer Museum is located in the historic Coconino County Hospital for the Indigent. The building was built in 1908 and served as the County Hospital until 1938. Local residents referred to the building as the poor farm because many of the patients were elderly men without families to care for them. The building was later used as a boarding house and as a private residence leased by farmers who lived in it while leasing the surrounding farm land from the County. In 1960, NAPHS bought the structure and converted it into a museum, which opened to the public in 1963.
    Also located on the museum grounds is a barn and root cellar that date from the period of the hospital. The barn was built in 1910 to house county workhorses. It is now the museum annex where many large collections are stored. The root cellar, located behind the museum, is where the hospital stored vegetables grown in the garden, which was located next to the hospital (now Sechrist School).
    In 1967, the 1908 Ben Doney homestead cabin was moved to the museum grounds from its original site on the east side of Flagstaff. The cabin now serves as a center for craft demonstrations that are held throughout the year.
    The 1929 Baldwin Articulated Locomotive, which sits at the front of the Pioneer Museum grounds along State Highway 180, was moved to the museum site in 1994.

Pioneer Museum
2340 N. Ft. Valley Road
Flagstaff, Arizona 86001
Phone: (928) 774-6272 Fax: (928) 774-1596