A campground is planned for the site of the long-closed Minnetonka Trading Post along Route 66 east of Winslow, Arizona.
Blue Miller, known for her well-researched Never Quite Lost historical blog, passed along the good news about the site on the Historic Route 66 page on Facebook.
She wrote:
I am pleased to bring you an update on the Minnetonka on 66 in Arizona. The new owner Duane has reached out to me and said he is turning the place into a campground. He will be keeping the Minnetonka name and retaining as much of the building and history as possible.
According to county property records, the owner is Duane Zwagerman of Mesa, Arizona. He purchased the property in the last year or so.
Miller also linked to a Never Quite Lost post last year about the history of the Minnetonka, which has been closed since 2007 and declining fast since the death of proprietor Julie Johnson.
The trading post, notable for one of its walls being made with petrified wood, also served for years as a post office, gas station, feedstore, tavern and rodeo arena.
Miller reports no one is exactly sure of the trading post’s origins, but the Motley Design Group, in its Historic Resource Survey of Arizona, estimates it was built in 1939.
Philip and Louise Hesch (who once ran the nearby Two Guns site) owned the place during much of the 1950s. Robert and Patricia Shaw bought it in 1962. Robert died a decade later, but Patricia and her second husband Harvey Rogers ran the Minnetonka through the 1980s until Johnson took over.
Miller wrote this description of Johnson’s tenure with the trading post:
The roof was replaced and the interior remodeled, complete with a raunchy picture of a naked lady on the petrified wood wall! A small rodeo arena was carved out behind the building and the Minnetonka played host to a number of events, including the annual ‘Bull Sunday’, part of Winslow’s Heritage Days. Despite being on a cut off piece of road, its proximity to I-40, Highway 87 and many ranches made it a favourite of local cowboys. Occasionally it would be flooded when the Cottonwood Wash broke its banks, but even that never seemed to worry Julie.
After Johnson’s death at age 56, the trading post was put up for sale, but with no apparent takers for years. It’s located just southeast of the Interstate 40 and Highway 87 interchange.
(Image of the Minnetonka Trading Post near Winslow, Arizona, in 2010 via Loopnet.com)