The O’Connor House

I did not post yesterday because I was away the entire day setting up and then attending an event I’ve been working on. The event revolved around a house, but not just any house…

my friend and guest, Tammy Fannin, walking up to the house

In 1981 Sandra Day O’Connor became the first woman to serve as a justice on The United States Supreme Court in its 191-year history. The house mentioned above belonged to Justice O’Connor and her late husband, John. When Sandra and John O’Connor began to build their adobe home in Paradise Valley back in 1957, they hired George Ellis to form adobe bricks with the mud from the Salt River banks. The mud was shoveled into brick-shaped forms which baked in the Arizona summer sun. The bricks were then stacked to the architect’s specifications and mortared with more adobe mud. Then the walls were “painted” with skim milk. The protein in the milk acts as a sealant. (somehow food had to be involved somewhere in this story!)

John and Sandra O’Connor in the kitchen of their Paradise Valley home

John and Sandra, then a young married couple with their first-born son, Scott, in tow, scraped every one of the indentations in the adobe. They named the entire process “Mudslinging”.  The O’Connors sold the home when they moved to Washington, DC in 1981. The house sold again a few years ago and the new owners intended to raze it to build new. Because of the historical significance of the home, friends of the O’Connors rallied and raised money to save it.  The house has been taken down, brick by brick, and rebuilt next to the Arizona Historical Society Museum located in Papago Park in Tempe, Arizona.  Amazingly, Janie Ellis, daughter of adobe-brick-maker, George Ellis, was the construction administrator orchestrating the move.

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor speaking about the house at The Mudslinging

Justice O’Connor promised, “When the house is moved, I will help to paint the walls once again with skim milk, just like John and I did years ago.” Now The O’Connor House and Center of Civic Discourse will be available for people and organizations to come together and resolve conflicts or disagreements, peacefully.

Thank you for coming, Sloane, Rob, Scott, Amy, Mike, and Ronnie!

The event and the reason for missing a post yesterday was The Mudslinging for The O’Connor House. After the ceremony, where Justice O’Connor spoke and Janie Ellis instructed in the painting of the walls, honorees and guests headed up a path to The Arizona Historical Museum Courtyard for an evening of western music and BBQ complete with flowering plants placed in cowboy boots as the centerpieces.

Click this LINK if you would like to learn more about the O’Connor House or watch a video of the house being moved.