The Place Name, Eloy, Arizona

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• The Place Name, Eloy, Arizona
• Harry J. Winters Jr. (bio)

To the best of my knowledge, up to today the meaning and origin of the name Eloy has not been discovered. Barnes (1935, 144) wrote, "In the year 1902 the Southern Pacific (Railroad) built a switch here, naming it Eloi, a word taken from the Syrian language, meaning 'My God.' It was soon called Eloy after the Spanish pronunciation." Barnes took this information from a letter from "Mrs. M. M. Fordham, President Woman's Club, Eloy." Barnes' "switch" was a siding and section house. I worked for the Southern Pacific Railroad from 1958 to 1961 and had frequent contact with section gangs and train crews. I heard a fair amount of cussing but never in Syrian or Aramaic.

I know that Barnes was uncertain about the origin of this name since I have seen correspondence between him and Fr. Bonaventure Oblasser, O.F.M, in which he asked Fr. Bonaventure if Eloy was a Papago (Tohono 'O'odham) word and if he knew the meaning. Bonaventure responded that he did not know but would try to find out. I have no information that he ever did. He was widely regarded as a leading authority on Papago history and the Papaguería in general, a reputation he definitely deserved. He was fluent in the 'O'odham language. If anyone could, he would have been able to find out if Eloy was an 'O'odham word. In over 60 years of learning and speaking the 'O'odham language, I have never heard a word pronounced like Eloy.

Granger (1960, 294) rejected Fordham's explanation of the origin of the name. She wrote, "Eloy does not appear on GLO (General Land Office) maps until 1921. As late as 1918 there was no town or settlement of any kind in the vicinity of the present Eloy, but merely a section of land belonging to the railroad and bearing the name Eloy." She went on, "Why the railroad named a section Eloy has not been ascertained. Locally a tall tale has come into existence." The tall tale, as she related it, is an embellished version of Fordham's explanation. Granger concludes, [End Page 282] "There is apparently no basis for this story." In my opinion, Granger was correct.

What might the real explanation be? There are really two questions. First, does Eloy mean anything, and if so, what? Second, if it does mean something how did the railroad siding and later the town come to have the name? The answer to the first question is, yes! Eleuterio is a Spanish proper first name. It is not a common name, but like so many Spanish first names it has a hypocoristic (Spanish hipocorístico) form, and that form is "Eloy." Eloy is to Eleuterio what Pepe is to José, Nacho is to Ignacio, or what Pancho is to Francisco. It is possible that there was a Mexican in the area, perhaps a farmer or someone who was of service to the railroad in 1902, whose proper name was Eleuterio and who was called Eloy. For example, Russell (1908, 20–21) wrote about the site of a "village ('Ak Chiñ) of Pimas and Kwahadk's ('Akimeli 'O'odham and Koahad people, the latter a branch of the Tohono 'O'odham) which was situated west of Picacho (Peak) on the border of the sink of the Santa Cruz river.…" This village had not been occupied by the 'O'odham since sometime in the nineteenth century. Russell further wrote, "The site of this settlement was visited by the writer in April, 1902……A few Mexican families have lived in the vicinity for many years, pumping water from a depth of a hundred feet and depending upon crops of corn and beans raised in the summer when a few showers fall upon their fields."

I do not know the specific location of the 'O'odham village site or of the Mexican fields mentioned by Russell, but they were not far south from the railroad tracks at Eloy; they were probably less than ten miles away. The Santa Cruz passes less than ten miles to the west of Picacho Peak and...