Broadway, McDowell, McClintock. These are just a few street and road names that Valley city officials thought were important to honor. Many other roadways have unique backstories.

Hayden Road is not named after Tempe founding member Charles Hayden. It is after the Wilfred Hayden family, which lived at Hayden and McDowell roads, according to JoAnn Handley, an employee of the Scottsdale Historical Museum. She’s also a lifelong Scottsdale resident with family roots going back several generations.

Wilfred Hayden was a farmer. "He had alfalfa and grains and things. And mostly what he did was he sold his to the dairy farmers who had dairy cows,” Handley said.

The Wilferd Hayden farm was among just a few in the area in the late 1890s. The family helped create a working community where everyone pitched in with each other’s farm to pick crops. During the depression, many of the farmers lost their property. The Haydens didn’t and lived in the area until the 1960s. Hayden Road starts near the Loop 101 in north Scottsdale and ends, intentionally, on the south end in Tempe.

Charles Hayden, the founder of Tempe, does have a street named after him, though its association may be less apparent.

Near McClintock Drive, just south of University Drive, is Don Carlos - the street named after Charles Hayden, Tempe preservationist John Southard said.

Don Carlos is what the Spanish-speaking residents called him, he said. The street is located between University Drive and Apache Boulevard.

“Hayden in 1890 moved from what we know today as Monte’s La Casa Vieja, at the corner of Mill and Rio Salado in the heart of the bustling 1890 Tempe, out to the country what is now University and McClintock,” Southard said.

Like the Scottsdale Hayden farm, the Tempe Hayden Ranch is gone today. Businesses, apartment buildings, stores and restaurants have replaced them. Historians say road names are often created by communities, others were landmarks that were eventually adopted as official street names.