Thirty days after starting the job, Chandler resigned from his post as the territories veterinarian.

[3] In 1891, Chandler bought eighty acres of land from the federal government located in the Salt River Valley south of Mesa.

He was instrumental in building an early system of canals in the dry and arid Arizona desert, which proved vital for agriculture in the area.

The Salt River Project Charter only granted each landowner enough water to irrigate only about 160 acres.

Trains on the newly completed Arizona Eastern Railroad brought three hundred speculators who spent $50,000 for land.

By 1913 businesses had been built along the west and south side of the park, including the Bank of Chandler and the Eastern Railroad depot.

[8] But agriculture was the main economic driver in Chandler's early days with cotton, grains, and alfalfa as primary crops.

Farmers also raised cattle, sheep, and ostriches whose feathers were used to adorn popular women's fashions.

He then attempted to drive the ostriches like cattle from the company in Avondale to his land in what is now Chandler, a journey of about 27 miles.

In 1899, David Fairchild, with the United States Department of Agriculture, sent Chandler several bushels of long-staple cotton seeds from Egypt.