Save Our Museum!

The Ajo Museum is located in the historic St. Catherine's Mission. The building, built of rock, is solid but the flat roof, which has patches on top of patches, springs fresh leaks every rainy season and endangers the exhibits. It needs a new roof and some other repairs. Please help the Ajo Historical Society raise the funds to save Ajo history!

St. Catherine of Sienna was the original name of the building. There was an earlier wooden Catholic Indian Mission that was given to the Franciscan order located near the site but it burned down in the late 1920s. The Franciscans and Native Americans built St. Catherine’s in 1942 and rebuilt it after a fire in 1946. The last mass was celebrated there in 1974 and the church was deconsecrated.

It is now the Ajo Museum, run by the Ajo Historical Society, a non-profit group organized in 1975. Displays include a vast collection of Ajo High School yearbooks, an obituary collection, equipment from Dr. Pease's old dental office and from the Ajo Copper News, vintage clothing & household goods, mining equipment, some strange typewriters, and tons of information about Ajo's past.