San Manuel is a

census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

(CDP) in

Pinal County, Arizona Pinal County is a County (United States), county in the central part of the U.S. state of Arizona. According to the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population of the county was 425,264, making it Arizona's List of counties in Arizon ...

, United States. The population was 3,551 at the 2010 census. San Manuel was built in 1953 by Del E. Webb Construction Company as a

company town A company town is a place where all or most of the stores and housing in the town are owned by the same company that is also the main employer. Company towns are often planned with a suite of amenities such as stores, houses of worship, schoo ...

to serve the then-new

San Manuel copper mine The San Manuel Copper Mine was a surface and underground porphyry copper mine located in San Manuel, Pinal County, Arizona. Frank Schultz was the original discoverer, in 1879, but the main body of the deposits were discovered by Henry W. Nichol ...

, mill and smelter complex. In 1955 the San Manuel Arizona Railroad was built to connect with the

Copper Basin Railway The Copper Basin Railway is an List of Arizona railroads, Arizona short-line railroad that operates from a connection with the Union Pacific Railroad (UP) at Magma to Winkelman, Arizona, Winkelman, in of length. The railroad also has a branch ...

at Hayden. When copper prices fell in the late 1990s,

BHP BHP Group Limited, founded as the Broken Hill Proprietary Company, is an Australian multinational mining and metals corporation. BHP was established in August 1885 and is headquartered in Melbourne, Victoria. As of 2024, BHP was the world� ...

, the owner of the mine and smelter complex shuttered both operations in June 1999. The closing saw 2,500 people lose their jobs. The mine and smelter were permanently closed in 2003. The community is on the edge of the

Sonoran Desert The Sonoran Desert () is a hot desert and ecoregion in North America that covers the northwestern Mexican states of Sonora, Baja California, and Baja California Sur, as well as part of the Southwestern United States (in Arizona and California). It ...

with its

saguaro The saguaro ( , ; ''Carnegiea gigantea'') is a tree-like cactus species in the monotypic genus ''Carnegiea'' that can grow to be over tall. It is native to the Sonoran Desert in Arizona, the Mexican state of Sonora, and the Whipple Mountains ...

s and overlooks the San Pedro River valley and panoramic Galiuro Mountains. Today, San Manuel is a leisure destination popular for hunting, sightseeing, and is a hub for off-road adventure for dirt bikes, UTV's and ATV's. UTV. Several museums include a mining museum and a motorcycle museum. It is also a gateway city of The Arizona Trail. Nearby towns are

Oracle An oracle is a person or thing considered to provide insight, wise counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. If done through occultic means, it is a form of divination. Descript ...

and

Mammoth A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus ''Mammuthus.'' They lived from the late Miocene epoch (from around 6.2 million years ago) into the Holocene until about 4,000 years ago, with mammoth species at various times inhabi ...

. Both are within of San Manuel and make up a tri-community area.

Geography

San Manuel is located at (32.605048, -110.633340), in the San Pedro River

Valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains and typically containing a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams over ...

at an elevation of about . San Manuel is approximately northeast of

Tucson Tucson (; ; ) is a city in Pima County, Arizona, United States, and its county seat. It is the second-most populous city in Arizona, behind Phoenix, Arizona, Phoenix, with a population of 542,630 in the 2020 United States census. The Tucson ...

. According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the CDP has a total area of all land.

Climate

Highway access

The main road connecting San Manuel to the rest of the state is Veterans Memorial Boulevard, which runs in a northwest–southeast direction from San Pedro River Road to a grade–separated interchange with

Arizona State Route 77 State Route 77 (SR 77) is a long state highway in Arizona that traverses much of the state's length, stretching from its southern terminus at a junction with I-10 in Tucson to its northern terminus with BIA Route 6 at the Navajo Nation boundar ...

. From 1962 to 1988, Veterans Memorial Boulevard was part of Arizona State Route 76. SR 76 served as a direct connection from San Manuel to SR 77, the San Manuel copper mine and ultimately the rest of the state. In the early 1970s, construction started on an extension of SR 76 to

Interstate 10 Interstate 10 (I-10) is the southernmost transcontinental highway in the Interstate Highway System of the United States. It is the fourth-longest Interstate in the country at , following I-90, I-80, and I-40. It was part of the origina ...

in Benson, called the Benson–Mammoth Highway. However, the highway was ultimately abandoned at the beginning of construction, with only two sections being completed near San Manuel and in Benson, respectively, along with an abandoned and unfinished highway grade. The unfinished grade still remains at the southern end of Veterans Memorial Boulevard, blocked by a permanent traffic barrier. SR 76 was later decommissioned as a state highway and handed to local jurisdictions for ownership and maintenance. Additionally, any land the state of Arizona had acquired for the Benson extension was sold off.

Airport

San Manuel Airport – E77 known as San Manuel Ray Blair Airport is public and located NW of San Manuel, Arizona. It has one paved runway of with lights and a paved taxiway.

Local & area attractions

* JWJ Cycles, Motorcycle museum * San Manuel Historical Museum, Mining history * Arizona Trail, Located just west of San Manuel * Peppersauce Cave, Primitive cave

Events

*San Manuel Copper Classic, annual off-road motorcycle race in March hosted by The Trail Riders of Southern Arizona *Copper Town Days, annual event in San Manuel the second Saturday in October with a car show, food and entertainment *San Manuel Chili Cook-Off, music, games, vendors and taste testing *Santa Catalina Weekend, bicycle races

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 4,375 people, 1,458 households, and 1,204 families residing in the CDP. The population density was . There were 1,832 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the CDP was 69.1%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.4%

Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 1.4% Native American, 0.3% Asian, 0.1%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

, 24.8% from other races, and 4.0% from two or more races. 46.2% of the population were

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race. There were 1,458 households, out of which 43.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 66.3% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 10.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 17.4% were non-families. 15.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 6.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 3.00 and the average family size was 3.31. In the CDP, the population was spread out, with 32.6% under the age of 18, 8.8% from 18 to 24, 27.0% from 25 to 44, 21.1% from 45 to 64, and 10.5% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 32 years. For every 100 females, there were 102.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 98.1 males. The median income for a household in the CDP was $40,019, and the median income for a family was $42,563. Males had a median income of $36,463 versus $21,304 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the CDP was $16,534. About 10.3% of families and 12.8% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 18.4% of those under age 18 and 5.6% of those age 65 or over.

References

External links

*
JWJ Cycles - Motorcycle MuseumAnnual Chili Cook-off
{{authority control Census-designated places in Pinal County, Arizona Census-designated places in Arizona Company towns in Arizona Populated places in the San Pedro Valley (Arizona) Populated places established in 1953 Mining communities in Arizona