Time is running out for Mesa history buffs to see the community's early artifacts firsthand, as the Mesa Historical Museum is preparing to drastically scale back when it's open to the public.

The Mesa Historical Museum will shutter its doors to the public early next year, leaving its building a warehouse for a vast collection of artifacts.

Mesa Historical Museum Teen Volunteer Training and Orientation will be 10 a.m. Saturday at 2345 N. Horne. Information: (480) 835-7358 or

A Mesa museum is getting national recognition. The Mesa Historical Museum is being commended with a national award for general excellence in exhibits, resource management, and public programming by the American Association for State and Local History, a Nashville-based nonprofit.

Jim Ripley: The Mesa Historical Museum would close its Lehi facility by October, and its popular spring baseball exhibit would move to the downtown Mesa area and housed at what is now the Arizona Museum for Youth, under a plan presented Thursday to the City Council. 

A weathered gray lectern from the old Mezona dance hall sits in the Mesa Historical Museum’s basement under several layers of dust and atop cinder blocks that barely saved it from 4 inches of water left by Tuesday’s storm.

A weathered gray lectern from the old Mezona dance hall sits in the Mesa Historical Museum’s basement under several layers of dust and atop cinder blocks that barely saved it from 4 inches of water left by Tuesday’s storm.

The 11th Annual Historic Home Tour in Mesa has been scheduled for Jan. 29, which will consist mostly of houses that have not been included in any of the prior tours.

Nancy and Christopher Gilbert used to walk up and down the streets of downtown Mesa many evenings when their two children were still toddlers, pushing them in strollers and admiring the many old houses in their neighborhood.

A historic but trouble-plagued motel just east of the Arizona Mormon Temple in Mesa has bit the dust. In its place will rise a $2.5 million, 45-room Comfort Inn and Suites. Dust is about all that’s left of the Copper State Motel and Trailer Park, which has stood at 651 E. Main St. for almost 70 years.

A historic but trouble-plagued motel just east of the Arizona Mormon Temple in Mesa has bit the dust. In its place will rise a $2.5 million, 45-room Comfort Inn and Suites. Dust is about all that’s left of the Copper State Motel and Trailer Park, which has stood at 651 E. Main St. for almost 70 years.