06/11/2026
Old Tubac Has So Many Stories
For the Research Team at the Tubac Historical Society, it’s all about people. Yes, it’s also about the old buildings and our desire to save them, but it’s the people of the area, and their stories, that keeps us researching. It is actually better for us when it isn’t a Wyatt Earp type person, but a normal, everyday person who gave their all to life and their community. This lovely picture reinforces our love of our local history.
Lucila Gomez Bejarano, pictured here, posed in front of this elaborate background at age 17. It was 1937 and this photo captures the time period. She married that same year. One has to wonder how World War II, only a few years away, impacted her life, her family, and even her friends. How did it change the dreams she had?
She was born in 1919 in the Santa Rita Hotel in Calabazas right at the end of the town’s existence. She died in 2024, having made it to 105 years of age. Her obituary notes that she was a “patient, kind, independent woman.” How much she must have witnessed. She ended up in Tumacácori, and we can bet she spent a lot of time in Tubac, watching it change from a sleepy burg in 1937, to an artist colony starting after the war in 1946.
Lucila’s photograph is magical. It gives us a peak into old Tubac, but close enough to our own existence to makes us wish we could have spoken to her. Her image drives us to hasten to discover more stories, to capture more oral histories (we recorded hers), and to learn about our very interesting and very real citizens. We invite you, even urge you, to join us in this fun “detective work,” scraping away the past in Tubac one layer at a time.
(Click the image to see her entire dress)
