History of GVRV

1983-84:   Park was constructed.
12/30/84: Grand Opening Celebration
1986:        First Parade at Golden Vista
1993-96:   Conversion to Homeowners Park

This is a brief history of the Golden Vista Resort. It's purpose is to lay out some of the chronological events that may help explain why some things happened when they did.

The Resort was started by a person named Dunkle. Dunkle was developing both the Golden Vista RV Resort and the Desert Sun apartments adjacent to the north. During the construction he ran into financial troubles and sold the RV Resort so he could finish the apartments.

The RV Resort opened in September 1984 as a rental RV with an annual rent of $900. Keith Finkle was the manager. A Grand Opening celebration was held on Dec. 30,1984. There were 22 initial renters known as the Pioneers. In Dec. 1985 the Resort was sold to the Stapley - Garden Company who later lost it to a bank. In 1986 Connelly Wolfswinkle bought the Resort from the bank. He ran specials of $7.00 per day to new renters that might make long term leases. Wolfswinkle ran the Resort until he was forced into bankruptcy in 1988 through his association with the Charles Keating investigation. At that time a bank took over the Resort and ran it for about two years. The bank sold the Resort to Demco Car Company located in Iowa. After a short period of time Wolfswinkle repurchased the Resort at a fraction of the cost.  In 1993 Wolfswinkle subdivided the Resort and started to sell individual lots for conversion to a Homeowners Resort. Glen Hall named as sales manager and later also became Resort manager.

The first Advisory Board consisting of lot owners was appointed by the corporation on January 1995. In February 1995 the second Advisory Board was elected by the lot owners to start the transition to a Homeowners Association (HOA). The Resort was annexed by Apache Junction from Pinal County on August 17,1995. On June 12,1996 the Homeowners Association took over the Resort and the second Advisory Board became the first Board Of Directors. The Board appointed Karen Hancock as the manager. The septic tank system was abandoned and a sewer system was installed and connected to the Apache Junction system in the summer of 1996. The first annual meeting of the Homeowners Association was held January 14,1997. The managing of the Resort was changed from a Board hired manager to a contract with a managing company on December 19,1997. The first managing company was Eagle Properly Management, Inc. The Eagle Management contract was canceled 1 July 2001 and the Association returned to self management and Dell McKinney hired as the Resort Manager.

Individual Histories of some of the Originals (or "Pioneers")

Dude McIntrye
After Dude retired in July 1980 from 33 years as a truck driver and wife Alice retired after 17 years as a school bus driver they spent four winters in Florida and went to Alaska in 1984. Alice and Roberta Goulet had worked together for many years. In February1985 Norm and Roberta Goulet called that they had found Golden Vista, a new park in Apache Junction AZ. We paid the rent on #958 in the pet section. Soon after Dude had a heart attack so they didn’t come until the fall of 1985. In 1986 we moved to lot #1078 against the south wall and in 1988 put in a park model. We were busy in the park and loved it. Alice worked bingo, helped in the kitchen, was a member of the Kitchen Band, Vista Voices, and aerobics and worked in the post office. Dud worked for park security and helped in the kitchen. For many years he led the coed exercise. Dude was finally talked into calling Bingo, he’s rather shy and didn’t know if he could do a good job. The first night he got the bingo machine all set up and as is the practice he was to call on someone in the audience to check that all the bingo numbers were in play. Dude’s opening that night was, "Would anyone like to come and check my balls’. He immediately realized what he said, looked up and several women were rushing towards the stage. Dude dropped a few names of those original women and they included Irene Huxtable, Dottie Miller and Verda Nunley. Alice passed away in 2003 after a 14-year struggle with cancer. Dude still spends his winter in Golden Vista and summers in Midland Michigan.

Wally and Nancy Thomas
Golden Vista had opened in the summer and we arrived here in January. Everyone was very friendly. The lots we lived on were all rented at that time. Some of the residents said we should have been here a few days earlier as if you were here before the end of the year you were a Pioneer. They felt bad we had come 13 days too late.

Because Golden Vista was so new there were lots of empty lots. The row of lots on Jasper drive was used to store car tow trailers and boats,

Because our trailers were so small we all did our visiting on the patio. People would gather around one round table. When more came someone pulled a second table against the first. The oval of tables grew until it was 5 or 6 tables long. There was always someone on the patio. As Wally called it –there was morning gab-the afternoon gab-and the evening gab.

There was always a guard at the gateway into the park; there was no gate. Across the street was open desert, no freeway. The apartments to the north were being built at the same time as far as I know. Goldfield Road was gravel and had a sign that said "Private Road. Proceed at your own risk".

In the evenings and during the night you could hear the coyotes howl on three sides of us. Sometimes their pups sounded like a bunch of children.

For a while there were a couple of roadrunners that came into the park and everyday we watched the quail when they came in. Along the roads we would see gophers and sometimes rabbits.

While on my evening walk I stopped to say "Hi" to the guard. He told me the night before a rabbit had run into the park as fast as he could go and right behind him was a coyote looking for his dinner. As the rabbit entered the park the coyote realized where he was and did a quick stop and ran as fast as he could back to the desert.

Through the years Wally and Nancy have taken part in any activity and entertainment offered. We always know where to find Wally and that’s at a card table. Nancy spends her time in the craft room.