Sonora: Wool, Mohair, and the Cooperative

Charles Adams founded this town in eighteen eighty-five and named it for a helper from Sonora, Mexico, which is a slightly roundabout way to name a county seat. Sonora became the seat of Sutton County when the county organized in eighteen ninety, and what made it thrive was wool and mohair. Sheep herding took over after mechanical shearing arrived in nineteen oh-one, and Angora goat ranching followed, turning Sutton County into one of the most productive fiber-producing regions in the country.

When the Great Depression crashed wool prices by more than half, local ranchers did something notable: they formed the Wool and Mohair Cooperative Marketing Association and sold nearly three million pounds of wool in their first year. The cooperative kept Sonora alive through hard times and stands as a footnote to the broader history of American agricultural self-organization.