Municipal boundaries are with Nácori Chico in the north, Yécora and Onavas in the south, Soyopa in the southwest, Bacanora in the west, San Pedro de la Cueva in the northwest, and the state of Chihuahua in the east.
Based on descriptions there is historical speculation that Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca may have passed through the Sahuaripa Valley in 1536.
Records show the following missionary priests were stationed at Sahuaripa: 1767 marked the end of the Jesuit Period in Sonora.
Don Jose Cañizares who was the first to enter the San Francisco Bay by sea aboard the San Carlos on July 27, 1775; Pedro Pablo Cañizares and his wife Ana Gertrudis Rudecinda Arguello Moraga, (daughter of Alta and Baja California Governor, Don Jose Dario Arguello), arrived in Sahuaripa to administer the Spanish Royal Mine of La Trinidad in Ostimuri.
After several years at Sahuaripa he went on to take charge of the Port and Custom house at San Blas in the territory of Tepic, present-day Nayarit.
A diplomatic row between the United States and Mexico was initiated on September 13, 1887, by the Ambassador of the United States in Mexico, Thomas Courtland Manning, when the prefect of Sahuaripa, Don Loreto Trujillo, imprisoned U.S. Citizen and California native, Jose Q. Garcia, for failing to vote in an election.
Sonora governor Luis E. Torres opened an inquest into the affair to which the following persons testified: Ruperto Galvan, Narciso Torrecillas, Geronimo Cordova, Manuel Maria Esparza, Severiano Guerrero, Jesus Cordova, Maxamiliano Sagariboy, Rafael Macen, Jesus Hurtado, Manuel Hurtado, Miguel Garcia, A.T. Willem, Eleazar Torres, Juan Francisco Torres, Theodore Wendlandt,[Note 2] Macedonio Sanes, Ignacio Romero, Jhon Willem, Henry W. Walter, Leonardo Monje and Jacobo T.
A militia of National troops was gathered under the command of neighboring Moctezuma's Prefect, Francisco Chapa to march on Sahuaripa and capture the rebels.
[7] In October 1935 during the governorship of Rodolfo Elias Calles, a military force of "Cardenistas," officially the 20 Regimiento under the command of General Agustin Mustieles and Captains Sandoval, Camacho, and Basurto and Lt. Ojeda, flying red and black flags stormed into the town in search of Bishop Juan Navarrete y Guerrero and made the church their barracks.
Porfirio Cornidez, was in exile in Pomona, CA and later Los Angeles due to the 3rd persecution of the Catholic Church in Mexico of 1932–1937 that was underway.
There exists an oral tradition in Sahuaripa that has not been corroborated from the Cristero time period, that a priest hiding in the Zetasora Sierra was turned into the authorities by a rancher.
Native son, Carlos Armando Biébrich Torres, barely 33 years old and an undersecretary of the Federal Interior Secretariat (Gobernacion), was appointed gubernatorial candidate.
His initials and an arrow tilted upward, CAB↑, were painted on the southern end of the Cordon of the Tasajera mountain range above the Campeña creek facing west so that it was visible upon entrance into the valley through El Puerto Pass and throughout the town.
Two years into his governorship, in 1975, the imperial presidency forced his resignation as scapegoat measure when troops fired on a Yaqui Valley demonstration over land rights that resulted in ten deaths.
The neighborhoods that comprise the present Municipal Seat are the following: Northern end between the cemetery and the Del Oro Creek is Colonia Ricardo Duran.
The Streets closest to the east side of the town, nearest the Sahuaripa River are called "La Orilla Del Rio."
Local indigenous red pepper production could provide a better alternative than cattle feed for the limited arable land in the narrow valleys along creeks and rivers.
[citation needed] Ristras of red pepper chilies are as common here as in northern New Mexico as well as dehydrated sweetcorn known as "chicos".
The Mexican national Secretariat of Economy first granted the concession to Placer Dome of Vancouver, BC, CA, but the project was transferred.