About the City of Chandler
Chandler is a city in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States, and is a prominent suburb of the Phoenix, Arizona, Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). It is bordered to the north and west by Tempe, to the north by Mesa, to the west by Phoenix, to the south by the Gila River Indian Community, and to the east by Gilbert. As of July 2012, the population was 240,101 according to the United States Census Bureau, however, according to the city’s official website, Chandler’s Planning Division estimated the population as of September 2012 being 239,610. It also has satellite locations for many technology companies, including Intel and Orbital Sciences Corporation.
History
In 1891, Dr. Alexander John Chandler, the first veterinary surgeon in Arizona Territory, settled on a ranch south of Mesa, studying irrigation engineering. By 1900, he had acquired 18,000 acres of land, and began drawing up plans for a town-site on what was then known as the Chandler Ranch. The town-site office opened on May 17, 1912, the same year that Chandler High School was established. By 1913, a town center had become established, featuring the Hotel San Marcos, the first golf resort in the state.
By 1980, it had grown to 30,000, and it has since paced the Phoenix metropolitan area’s high rate of growth, with vast suburban residential areas swallowing former agricultural plots. Some of this growth was fueled by the establishment of manufacturing plants for communications and computing firms such as Microchip, Motorola and Intel.
Since the early 1990s, the City of Chandler has experienced exponential growth, ranking among the fastest-growing municipalities in the country. Indeed, nearly 100,000 homes dot the landscape today and the population has surged to more than 238,000 residents. The heart of Chandler remains its revitalized historic downtown, which includes the award-winning Chandler City Hall and a Center for the Arts. In 2010, Chandler was named as an All-America City, bestowed by the National Civic League
Cultural Attractions
Chandler is noted for its annual Ostrich Festival. Initially, agriculture was the primary business in Chandler, based on cotton, corn, and alfalfa. During the 1910s, there were ostrich farms in the area, catering to the demand for plumes used in women’s hats of the era. This demand ebbed with the increasing popularity of the automobile, but the legacy of the ostrich farms would be commemorated by the Ostrich Festival. The Chandler Center for the Arts, a 1,500-seat regional performing arts venue, is located downtown, and the Arizona Railway Museum is at Tumbleweed Park. A 70,000-square-foot (6,500 m2) Holocaust and Tolerance Museum has been slated for construction in Chandler.
There are numerous properties in the town of Chandler which are considered to be historical and have been included either in the National Register of Historic Places or listed as such by the Chandler Historical Society. The Historic McCullough-Price House, a 1938 Pueblo Revival-style home, was donated to the city by the Price-Propstra family in 2001. The city renovated and opened it to the public in 2007. On June 12, 2009, the McCullough-Price House was added to the National Register of Historic Places, the official listing of America’s historic and cultural resources worthy of preservation. The city of Chandler operates the facility, which is located southwest of Chandler Fashion Center at 300 S. Chandler Village Dr.
All information about Chandler courtesy of Wikipedia
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