Shops, galleries and restaurants line Main Street and provide the backdrop for this quaint and colorful historic district. The unique Cottonwood Jail stands guard at the top of Main Street.
Cottonwood is surrounded by jagged mountains on the south and west, and to the north and east by mesas and buttes. Named for the beautiful Cottonwood trees that grow along the Verde River, the town grew from a small farming community to the Verde Valley 's population center, called “the biggest little town in Arizona ” by the late 1920s. At that time Old Town businesses supported residents and workers of the many mines that operated in nearby communities.
