Alfalfa

Chandler’s early economy was based on agriculture. Cattle and sheep were the main livestock, and alfalfa and cotton were the main crops.

In 1887, Dr. Alexander John Chandler came to Arizona from Canada as the territory’s first veterinarian surgeon. He visited California, and there, he found the deserts being turned into irrigated farmlands; he decided the same thing could be done with Arizona.

In 1892, Dr. Chandler resigned for good as a veterinarian surgeon and devoted all his time to the development of an irrigation project in what is now Chandler. In the next 20 years, he would purchase, clear, irrigate, and resell 20,000 acres of land back to farmers, ranchers, and settlers looking for work.

The land, when irrigated, is fertile and the climate allows as many as 12 cuttings every year. For this reason, Chandler became a major grower and exporter of alfalfa. Alfalfa farming peaked in the 1940’s and the 1950’s when it led the country in alfalfa productions. Now, it is grown on farms across the southern portions of the city, providing not the faintest clue that this land once did not have the characteristics of a raw frontier settlement; a testament to the unique state Arizona is and has been from the very beginning.