Cochise County Courthouse

This Art Deco courthouse, designed by the Tucson architect Roy Place and built in 1931, became the seat of Cochise County government when it moved up from Tombstone, on land given in part by Phelps Dodge. It is still a working courthouse. Employees describe the top floor, which held the old county jail, as heavy and uneasy, and report the smell of cigar smoke drifting through the Division 2 judge's chambers — often tied to Judge John Wilson Ross, who sat there through the 1930s and '40s. Security officers opening up in the early morning report voices and slamming doors, and more than one has described a headless figure in a judge's robe crossing the second-floor lobby.