We have been notified that the Schilling Ranch Historic District, also known as Winchester Ranch, was entered into the National Register of Historic Places on August 7, 2009. The process of nomination took over three years. I started by sending information about the Rock House to the State Historic Preservation Office. They recommended that we prepare documentation for an Historic District, as the Rock House, Bunk House, Tack Room, Hay Barn, and Corral are all intact and essentially in the same condition as when they were built, between the late 1920's and early 1950's. There are very few historic ranch headquarters still intact in Arizona.
Winchester Ranch was part of the Muleshoe Ranch, controlled by cattle baron Henry Clay Hooker from 1886-1906. It later became known as “Schillings.” Ernest Schilling homesteaded the ranch around 1906 and his purchase from the United States of America was recorded in 1927. Ernest Schilling is locally known for taking a bull to the Chicago World’s Fair in 1933 and winning the top prize. He put the bull on the train and brought him back to the ranch.
There are no definite records of when the Rock House was built, but believed in the late 1920’s or early 1930’s. The rock veneer on the Rock House appears to have been gathered within sight of the house. A local family, the Brownings, purchased the ranch in 1948, and with a crew of cowboys
built the Bunk House, Hay Barn, and Tack Room.
built the Bunk House, Hay Barn, and Tack Room.
After we purchased Winchester Ranch in 2003, we began immediately restoring the historic headquarters. I lived in the Rock House while I was building our main house compound. We now use the Rock House as our guesthouse.
