SAGUARO
Historic Resource Study
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CHAPTER 5:
A HISTORY OF MANNING CABIN
Levi Howell Manning was born in Halifax County, North
Carolina in 1864. In his youth his parents moved to Mississippi. After
graduating from the University of Mississippi he migrated to Tucson in
1884. Since he had little money at the time, Manning got a job driving
an ice wagon. Soon he became a reporter for the Star and then the
Citizen By 1885 he held the position of Chief of the Mineral
Department in the Office of the United States Surveyor General for the
Territory of Arizona. In his successful career he next entered into
partnership with Frank Oury in the real estate and mining business. When
Oury was killed, Manning took over the company. In 1893 President
Cleveland appointed him the United States Surveyor General for Arizona
Territory. By 1900 he established the L.H. Manning and Company
commission brokerage house. Beginning in 1905 he held one term as Mayor
of Tucson. By 1910 he expanded into the ranching business and raised
pure blooded cattle and horses. Among his holdings were the Canoa,
Scotch, and La Osa ranches. He died in 1935 while at his summer home in
Beverly Hills, California. [1]
In 1904 Manning filed for a 160 acre homestead in the
Rincon Mountains where he planned to build a summer cabin retreat. That
same year he had Mexican workmen construct an eleven mile wagon road to
the proposed cabin site (see base map). The following year, 1905,
Manning erected tents on his mountain land in which to house a Mexican
workforce while they built his cabin. Provisions, tools, and equipment
were taken to the area by pack horse and wagon over the newly
constructed road. Manning's ranch foreman, David Waldon, oversaw
fabrication of the structure. Trees for the cabin were felled in the
immediate area. After it was completed in mid-summer 1905, the Manning
family used this structure as a summer home to escape the heat of Tucson
and as a cool place where friends could be entertained. Manning was the
first to build such a cabin retreat in the mountains. [2]
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Figure 13. Original floor plan of Manning Cabin as
described by Howell Manning.
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As constructed Manning's cabin was a log structure.
Daubing sealed the cracks between the logs. Rolled roofing covered the
sheathing that was placed over the log trusses (Photos 1-5). On the
interior the cabin consisted of a living room with a fireplace, a
kitchen, two bedrooms, and two, small bunk rooms (Figure 13). Manning
had a piano hauled by wagon to the cabin. [3]
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Photo 1. Manning Cabin ca. 1906. Saguaro National Monument Files
This view of the structure shows its east side. The
living room is on the right. The cabin's central section is enclosed
with verticle, daubed slabs. One can see the rolled roofing. The butt
ends of the log trusses extend beyond the edge of the eaves. There are
no windows on this side of the living quarters and no door in what
became the storage shed.
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Photo 2. Manning Cabin 1906. Saguaro National Monument Files
This picture gives a close-up of the roof and the
daubing between the logs on the east side of the living room.
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Photo 3. Manning Cabin ca. 1906-07. Saguaro National Monument
Files
Another view of the east side. Again one can see the
absence of a door on what became the storage room and the vertical slabs
enclosing the central portion. The wagon arrived by way of a road
especially constructed to haul supplies to the cabin.
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Photo 4. Manning Cabin ca. 1906-07. Saguaro National Monument
Files
A close-up of the east side of the living room. Here
the bottom portion of the door can be seen.
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Photo 5. Manning Cabin ca. 1906-07. Saguaro National Monument
Files
This photograph shows the east side of the cabin at
the juncture of the living room and the central area. Here one can see
the verticle, daubed slabs which enclosed a bedroom.
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In mid-1907 Manning's homestead rights were revoked
when that area of the Rincon Mountains was attached to the Santa
Catalina Division of the Coronado National Forest. He then leased the
land from the Forest Service for several years, but the family did not
use the cabin after the summer of 1907. For the next thirteen to
fourteen years only an occasional hunter, rancher, or forest ranger
visited the structure (Photos 6 and 7). In 1922 the Forest Service
decided to move the quarters for its fire watch and trail crew from Spud
Rock Cabin to Manning Cabin even though the structure had begun to
deteriorate by 1914. [4]
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Photo 6. Manning Cabin ca. 1909-10. Saguaro National Monument
Files
A view of the east side of the living room. The cabin
appears to be in good condition although the butt ends of the wall logs
seem to have begun to crack. The two men are probably Forest Service
employees.
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Photo 7. Manning Cabin ca. 1912-14. Saguaro National Monument
Files
A picture of the east side of the living room and
part of the central area. The structure shows evidence of deterioration.
The rolled roofing has begun to peel and the daubing has disappeared
from between the vertical slabs of the walkway.
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An article in the Arizona Star of 1959 claimed
that Manning had a bedroom and storage space in a lean-to attached to
the cabin. Since this addition had not weathered well over the years,
the Forest Service removed it in 1922 and thereby reduced the living
space. If that article is correct the lean-to would have had to have
been on the back or west side of the cabin as photographs do not reveal
any such rooms on the ends or east side. A 1976 article in the same
newspaper, which is probably the correct version, indicated that the
dimensions of the cabin of Manning's day was the same as the one that
stands today. [5]
When the Forest Service decided to use the cabin in
1922, it made some repairs. The structure was reroofed. In addition the
interior wall between the kitchen and living room was undoubtedly
removed at this time. A concrete floor was poured in that area which
then became a kitchen and bedroom. The central verticle board portion,
which had decayed, was removed thus separating the structure into two
buildings. Three men stayed there. Two people served as trail crew
keeping the fire trails serviceable and the third man rode horseback on
fire guard patrol making two rounds per day on a circuit of four lookout
points. This situation prevailed at least through 1937. The firewatch
tower built on Mica Mountain in 1938 necessitated at least one
additional man for the area.
A little over two years after the Park Service
acquired the national monument, Region Three Assistant Forester Ward
Yeager inspected Manning Camp. He found two log buildings there. Because
it had decayed, the Forest Service had removed the central part in the
1920s. Both buildings, he thought, were in serviceable condition. One of
these structures was large enough to function as a kitchen/dining room
for a crew of eight and steeping space for two men. The other building,
Yeager reported, would provide sleeping quarters for four to six men.
When Yeager returned in 1940 just prior to the Park Service's first year
in charge of forest fire protection on the monument, he found Manning
cabin in an advanced state of decay. He felt it would require complete
reconstruction within two years. [7]
For the next three years, the Park Service fire guard
stayed in the Manning structures although they continued to decay. At
the close of each of those fire seasons, braces were placed under the
rafters to prevent snow from collapsing the roofs during the winter.
During the period Custodian Egermayer and Region Three Forester V.W.
Saari advocated that the Manning buildings be abandoned in favor of a
new fire guard cabin at the Mica Mountain lookout tower. Saari expected
the kitchen/dining room cabin to soon collapse. Not only had the roof
begun to sag, but the logs had rotted and the front wall had begun to
bow outward. [8]
Finally, in the summer of 1943 both structures were
repaired. The front wall of the kitchen/dining room building was
straightened and rock buttresses were built on either side of the front
door to reinforce the wall (Photo 8). The logs were redaubed. The
structures received new roofs. Doors and broken window glass were
replaced and screens installed over them. Two years later the central
portion was reconstructed as a walkway and thus Manning's cabin became
one building again (Figure 14). [9]
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Figure 14. Present-day Manning Cabin floor plan.
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In June 1946 a wall was built on the west side of the
walkway and two "more" windows were installed in the cabin.
Historically, the cabin had no windows on the east. Since the cabin
currently has two windows in front (Photo 8) and one in back (west), one
or two of these windows was probably installed by the Forest Service.
The window on the south end of the storage shed was probably placed
there by that agency as well. [10]
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Photo 8. Manning Cabin May 1986. Photograph by
Berle Clemensen
This view of the east side of the living room shows
the rock buttresses on either side of the door. Placed there in 1943 to
prevent the wall from collapsing, they originally sloped from roof to
ground. At an unknown time they were cut back to the L-shaped appearance
shown in the picture. These buttresses were removed in the summer of
1986.
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Periodic repairs and improvements continued to be
made. In 1949 a concrete floor was put in the storage room and the
interior of the cabin painted a light color. Corrugated metal roofing
was put on the cabin in 1950, but not the walkway or the storage room
(Photos 10 and 11). The storeroom received new rolled roofing in 1963
and the entire structure was re-caulked (daubed) in that year. In August
1966 the covered walkway (or "dog run" as it was now called) was
completely removed and reconstructed because heavy snow the previous
winter had caused it to partly collapse (Photos 9, 10, 11). After it was
rebuilt it was enclosed on both sides (Photos 11 and 12). The following
summer both the storage room and cabin roofs were removed to the truss
beams and rebuilt. They were then covered with green colored, asphalt
shingles. These roof sections had begun to leak badly despite the
corrugated metal roofing over composition shingles and rolled roofing.
The roof was also home to many bats about which the ranger's wife
protested. She found them more objectionable than the four footed
mammals and various reptiles which also occupied the cabin. In 1976 the
interior and exterior doors were rebuilt. In the fall of 1985 the cabin
portion was again reroofed with asphalt shingles (Photos 12 and 13). The
remainder of the roof was completed in the summer of 1986. At the same
time ten percent of the fireplace joints were repointed, the cabin
foundation was reconstructed with mortared stone and the bottom logs
were replaced on the east, north, and west sides. The stone buttresses
on either side of the east door were removed. A gutter was attached on
the east. A new bottom log was placed on the east side of the storage
room south of the door. The foundation on the south end of that
structure was repointed and new daubing was placed on that wall. In
addition ninety-five percent of the overall east wall was redaubed along
with 100 percent of the north and thirty percent of the west walls
(Photos 14 and 15). [11]
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Photo 9. Manning Cabin "Dog Run" (Walkway) August
1966. Saguaro National Monument Files
This photograph taken of the west side and shows the
roof supports before they were removed during the time the walkway was
razed and reconstructed in 1966. One can see the corrugated metal
roofing put on the living quarters in 1950 and the rolled roofing placed
on the storage shed in 1963.
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Photo 10. Manning Cabin "Dog Run" (Walkway) August
1966. Saguaro National Monument Files
A picture of the new framing of the walkway during
reconstruction in 1966 taken from the east.
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Photo 11. Manning Cabin "Dog Run" (Walkway) August
1966. Saguaro National Monument Files
A view of the nearly reconstructed walkway from the
west side. One can see the contrast in the roofing material.
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Photo 12. Manning Cabin May 1986. Photograph by
Berle Clemensen
Again, one can see the contrast in roofing material.
The living quarters asphalt shingles (right) were placed there in the
fall of 1985. The walkway asphalt shingles put on in 1966 and the
storage room (left) roofing applied in 1967. One can also see the
plywood used to enclose the east side of the walkway in 1966.
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Photo 13. Manning Cabin May 1986. Photograph by
Berle Clemensen
A contrast between the 1966 and 1985 asphalt shingles
of the walkway and living quarters. Those shingles on the walkway were
replaced in the summer of 1986.
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Photo 14. Manning Cabin May 1986. Photograph by
Berle Clemensen
The north end of the cabin showing the exterior of
the fireplace with its unhistorical metal covering.
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Photo 15. Manning Cabin May 1986. Photograph by
Berle Clemensen
This photograph reveals the typical decaying butt
ends of logs which are located on the east side of the cabin at the
south end of the "dog run."
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sagu/hrs/hrs5.htm
Last Updated: 23-Jun-2005
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