Oracle

History

The name "Oracle" comes from early prospectors. Albert Weldon came to the area looking for gold and silver. He and some other companions named their first mine The Oracle after the ship Weldon had traveled on. The community was later named after its first mine, and thus, indirectly, after a ship. The community began to grow in the late 1870s, as gold and silver were discovered, and the Christmas and New Year mines opened. By 1880, a post office had been established. The community also became a retreat for people suffering from tuberculosis. The Acadia Ranch – built in Oracle in 1882 by Edwin S. and Lillian Dodge – was, during this time, a sanitorium. On January 1, 2017, in the Arizona Daily Star newspaper, historian David Leighton challenged the accepted history of the town of Oracle: He wrote that Albert Weldon, who was born about 1840 in New Brunswick, Canada, traveled on his uncle Capt. A.D. Wood's ship Oracle around Cape Horn at the tip of South America and arrived in California between 1857 and 1860. Weldon enlisted as a private in Company E, 5th California Infantry, of the Union Army in 1861. This unit was attached to the California Column and soon marched to Tucson where Weldon was posted at a nearby stage station before moving east and eventually being honorably discharged in Mesilla, New Mexico in 1864. After his military service he returned to California and was involved in mining and also lumber. In 1876 he returned to Arizona. Within a couple of years he found a partner in Irishman Jimmie Lee and both men traveled northeast of Tucson into the Santa Catalina Mountains in search of precious metal. Soon he found a mining claim and named it Oracle in honor of his uncle's ship. The ship Oracle was built under the supervision of Captain Charles E.…

Geography

Oracle is located at (32.616030, -110.781854). According to the United States Census Bureau, the CDP has a total area of , all land.

Race & ethnicity

Largest nearby schools

• Mountain Vista School
  Elementary · ORACLE · 399 students · 13.8:1 ratio
• First Avenue Elementary School
  Elementary · SAN MANUEL · 231 students · 17.8:1 ratio
• San Manuel High School
  High · SAN MANUEL · 183 students · 12.2:1 ratio
• San Manuel Jr. High School
  Middle · SAN MANUEL · 120 students · 20:1 ratio
• PCJTED - San Manuel High School
  High · SAN MANUEL