OVER NEW YEAR’S DAY weekend 1960, more than 100,000 people drove from across Arizona and Southern California to a remote intersection twelve miles northwest of Phoenix, a site that had been cotton fields just a year earlier. The advertisements that had lured them there promised a new housing development offering “country-club living,” priced with “unbelievable modesty.” Now, a stone sign with cheerful atomic lettering welcomed them to Sun City.
Golf greens extended toward the desert horizon, surrounded by graded lots waiting for homes to be built atop them. A Safeway that appeared plunked in the middle of nowhere was open for business. In the recreation center, hired actors did arts and crafts and swam in the pool, showcasing the “Way-of-Life” visitors could purchase along with the five model homes on offer, each customizable with a selection of fifteen different exterior surfaces. There was the Kentworth, a compact, rectangular two-bed, one-bath; the Bridgeford, with an expanded living and dining room; the Brookside, with a “king-size lanai”; the Coronado, with an a…