Henry Patrick Proctor (1895-1978)

Henry Patrick Proctor WWI

Henry Patrick Proctor WWI

Henry Patrick Proctor was born in March of 1895 in Tucson, AZ. He went to school in Helvetia, AZ in the early 1900s. The family lived on the Box Canyon Ranch and ran cattle between the Sopori Ranch. As a teenager he rode horseback to or from the Sopori /Box Canyon ranches everyday, a distance of 20 miles. Always a ranch-man and not a school-man, he left school and ran the Box Canyon ranch with his brother Charles R.

Henry talking about the land:

[My Dad] had 100 head of cattle and steers on the Box canyon, to the Batamote ranch – 8 miles West from the Sopori. The Batamote was bought as a school section. We had around 70 acres to farm and got the water from a ‘canyon river’.  We grew everything, but very much calabasas [squash] and barley. My Dad had a young man named Alejandro who helped us with his bailing apparatus. It worked with 2 horses and bailer. I used help him with the pitchfork and worked the horses while they were bailing. We had running water and canal that would irrigate the 70 acres that we planted at the house.

In 1915, he was listed to report for the National Guard encampment in Ft. Huachuca, AZ. Henry served in the U.S. Army for WWI but was sidelined with influenza (Influenza Pandemic) in a New York port. After returning from military service, he bought the Box Canyon Ranch. He wrote back and forth with Carl Hayden, “until finally he got the place for me, the deeded land. Got the government to give me a title”.

Henry married Gertrudes “Tula” Valenzuela March of 1923 in Nogales, AZ.  Tula died from complications of a ruptured ulcer in February of 1934. He built an enshrinement for her at the Amado Pioneer Cemetery in the late 1940s. He re-married in Feb of 1935 to Evangeline “Lina” Valenzuela. A daughter was born in 1936 but died after birth. They had two boys, Henry Frank and (living).

Henry P ProctorHenry and Lina had a hardworking yet happy home on the ranch. Henry could rope, brand, butcher, fix or build anything on the ranch. He poured the cement for the cattle guards you use today to cross on to the property. Next time you are on HWY 62 (Box Canyon Rd), stop to see the HP carved from the 1950s. He was also an excellent marksman, lighting match sticks from a distance with his 10-22 rifle. Also in the 1950s, he was a special deputy for Pima County Sheriffs Department for illegal cattle slaughtering going on in the area.

In 1958 HPP sold the last of the Box Canyon Ranch and bought a small farm off of Old Nogales Highway. Later he and Lina moved to Tucson, AZ.

Henry Patrick Proctor died in Tucson, AZ in January of 1978. He is buried at South Lawn Cemetery.

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