THE STORY OF EARLY ARIZONA

Sharlot M. Hill

(Extracted from Arizona Magazine, v.2, no.4, Dec.1906) THE STORY OF EARLY ARIZONA

SHARLOT M. HALL

There are a few states, like Massa- temperately ; for we were destined to be chusetts with her Puritan pilgrims, and the .battle ground of missionaries and Virginia with her cavaliers, and Cali- politicians and treasure seekers who fornia with her romance of gold and came and saw and were not infrequently ' conquest, and Texas who brought to our conquered; and went on to mingle the flag a star that she had won bravely bitterness of defeat with unvaried tales and worn with honor as an independent, of heat and sand and dronth and deso- state, that have a history which sets them lation. apart from all others; but for the most To go back still farther it is said part the history of one state is so in- that even the Creator did hot- refer to woven with that of its neighbors that Arizona when he saw his work and pro- \ taken alone it is a thing of shreds and claimed it good. Tradition asserts that patches. being particularly hurried the last even- This is particularly true of us here ing ho cleaned up the work-shop and in Arizona; our story is made up of the clumped all the rubbish, and left-overs crumbs that fall from richer tables. We and misfits in the universe down here

have never had anything just -for our- without one smoothing touch. selves. Nobody discovered us because Early poets_ have sung that Lucifer be was looking for us; nobody cared himself was god-father at our christen- whether we were ever discovered or not, ing, and that being permitted to add, . and our beginning in history was punc- whatever he deemed lacking- to climate tuated with flowing Castillian oaths be- and scenery he ever after -fOrsook his cause we presented more miles of blis- own king- dom and took up his permanent tering .desert than golden cities of the abode in Arizona. Bull. In truth Nature seems to have Worked 19 the early day we had but one here in her uncertain moods, to have H eulogist, good Padre de Niza, the first tried her prentiee hand on peak and white corner to our borders; and his plain, and to have left it at last a .sOrt of glowing reports so .glowed in and ont of experiment station, full of things ''she season that only for his priestly frock nover cared to repeat elsewhere. Ge0- he would have been branded of all men logically Arizona is one of the most-,, as a liar. And not a few of the -unlucky wonderful spots on earth, with a history ones whom he beguiled into following laid bare in her rocky pages that reaches him northward to his new found para- from the first gray shoulder of stone . dise said so despite the frock and laid that swallowed up above the universal their despairing bones face down_ in the sea to parching deserts rimmed with sand, While their . souls went on to a shell-strewn beaches that might have braver quest than Cibola. been wet yesterday. But it is something to know that our But to return to Father de Niza—the ' discoverer praised us, even though in- good .old man was not looking -for us SHARLOT NI HALL 3 that day in 1539 when after send- of the great river valley, which in 1630 jug his negro servant ahead to clear out first appeared under its present naine of possible difficulties he crossed our south- the saine friendly, peaceful, agri- ern border. His eyes were bent north- cultural people we know them today, A ward to the fabled golden cities which mission to the Papagos was the first at- minor said lay beyond the desert. The tempt at settlement in Arizona; and same lure of heathen souls to be saved without the aid of this tribe and the and heathen gold to be won that had led Finns and ..1Taricopas there would never him through Peru with Pizzaro now have been that brief, romantic, always fired bis enthusiasm for another quest precarious era of Spanish colonization fated to end in something less than Incas along the southern border. and ingots. Over the earliest pages of our history But the padre was a dreamer ; how- lie large the names of two priests. Padre ever often he was disappointed, the wait- de Niza, the dreamer, and Kino, the mis- ing heathen gold and perishing heathen sion builder. Niza first made us 1:110W11 souls always lay just over the next hill, to the civilized world Kino shot through and though his followers refused to go the plain warp of our story with such farther at last and compelled him to re- golden threads of n)mance as shall never turn to Mexico footsore and empty fade. T le was a great traveler, from handed his enthusiasm still served to fire 1687 he spent twenty years going up the ardor of a dozen explorers. Coronado clown over northern Sonora and that and Alarcon, Espejo and others, always vague land of 'Pinieria Alta which was to seeking gold and wonders, and, as tradi- be Ariama. Sometimes he traveled with tion grew in that ready soil, a great in- a few Spanish soldiers for guard, but land sea to the north, crossed and re- often alone with only an Indian guide. crossed Arizi: -ina: cursing the land under On one long journey he walked and led their feet and looking for riches and a mule laden with the altar service so pleasure beyond. that he might say mass ill every Indian Ouite the nyist wonderful thing of all rancheria. Ile did no permanent build- is how thoroughly those first Spaniards ing; the number of missions in Arizona penetrated the secrets of the grim land has always been irver estimated, because in which they wandered without map or kinn and his followers nail a way of guide. The Colorado river with its mar- ,i.4iying every little Indian village a Span- velous. canyon, the great triple peaks of ish saint's naine; but we have left as the San Francisco, the deserts, the few fer- i - mtcome of his work the most f ui tile valleys, were all known and then for- relic of all that old religious Fervor, San gotten, as the dream of a new Xavier del [lac. Not one of the Pncitic faded and grew dim, ast missions is as rich in (ICCOrati011 It was a quest of souls pure and simple or as gracefully beautiful in architectnre; that made our history for the next cen- nul li lt ()lie of them win: reared under tury. 'We were a lost and forgotten land conditions half so savage and dangerous. except as some zealous padre more dar- With San Xavier, or indeed before ing than his fellows crosso:1 to the Alogni her, were 'l'ubac and Tumacacori at villages in the north, or eastward to first mere presidios, tiny adobe forts with Zuni and the scattered pueblos ah mg the a handful of soldier, and a Imilill e 111.o Grande. They found the Indians Indian converts, and a visitinig priest THE STORY OF EARLY ARIZONA who came and went from tribe to tribe. weather smoothed adobe mounds where Then very slowly the fields were en- the old buildings can scarcely be traced. larged, a few Spanish settlers and And Tumacacori is a deserted- ruin traders came, a truce was made with the though still so beautiful that in any other Apaches, as fierce then as now, and land than ours it would be guarded., as a gradually a quaint little colony grew up treasured heritage in the desert half-a-year's journey from After irrafir years soldiers were again anywhere, stationed at San Xavier and another set- The broad valley of the Santa Clara tlement struggled for footing: but the was thick with cattle; there were first American travelers found little haciendas not unlike old Mexico: and more than a mud fort and a few adobe grain fields and vineyards; and many huts. sheep for wool, and horses to ride. The These first American corners were records of San Xavier show that great trappers, traders, adventurers, and late herds of cattle were driven down to So- soldiers and explorers; but though froi noran ports and sold to pay for that rich them at last was to be born a new state cathedral in the desert. In the country it was still an accident nobody cared the stirroundhqr; Tucson are still to be seen toss of a coin for the soil that is now the ruins of ranches of large size; some Arizona. It became part of the United of them now miles distant from all living States because with the end of the Mex- water. And there are in the old Mexi- ican war California and New Mexico can families most interesting stories pre- were held spoils to the winner. An served of the old days. these Siamese twins of conquest wer ( /rice a year pack trains went out to united by a strip of unknown desert an Sonora, conveyed by the bravest men of mountains that could not well be severed the little colony and bearing hides, wool, It was the tail that went with the hide, rich ores, buckskins and such things to and as little valued. There had neve exchange for gay cloth, sugar, imported been a Spanish settlement north of wines. jew els, and silver coin. Often the Gila, the southern boundary of the Ile\ Apaches laying in wait swooped down possession, and since Espejo tto one ha on them on their return and reaped rich explored it, it was a land forgotten. itlunder. Though somewhat later she brough It was the most picturesque era in our to the territory its first civilized inhabit history; but it could not last ; the colon- ants southern Arizona has no boast ove ists were always like mice in the clutch the north. The Gadsden purchase meal of a cat; and when internal wrangles a road cleared to the gold of the Pacific cn impelled the recall of the troops to —and no more. It was tacked on to ti exico most of the settlers went along big territory of New Mexico, which ir and the rest were killed by the Indians. eluded all of Arizona previously acquir

°ale miss- ions were abandoned: beautiful ed. as carelessly as a bow to a slipper San Xavier stood silent and alone with In spite of the promise of rich mines tl

barred doors and shut windows- for people of the East and the authorities many years, The Papagos still tilled Washington mouthed long at the prit bits of the old fields but they forgot the and called it boldly a waste of goi. faith of the padres. Tubac was never money. reclaimed and is today a cluster of As in the days of Coronado the peop who crossed Arizona did so because they All the while this stream of a wanted to get somewhere else and she turers fought and wrangled and sta ved happened to be in the way. The war their way across her southern verge Ari- with Mexico made her a highway for zona was just a huge, desert-scarred no- troops marching to and from Sonora where, tacked on to Dona Ana county, and California; and the way they opened New MeXico, What, goverment it got was followed by government surveying came at long range from Santa Fe and parties and soon by a horde of gold mostly miscarried on the journey. IThere seekers. was in fact nothing to govern except The road from Santa Fe to Tucson Tucson and a few Indian rancherias was made by Lieut. Col. Cooke and his near. The whole northern part was still famous Mormon batallion in 1846 and practically unknown and in the hands over it passed argonauts and 49ers by of the Apaches. Only one American— thousands—cursing the land as they old Pauline Weaver, the trapper, had crossed it and leaving a trail of bones to penetrated the mountain plateau Black mark their way. In 1851 the govern- Range and destined within the coming ment got up curiosity enough to send twenty years to yield gold enough to Lieut. Sitgreaves across from Zuni to pay almost twice over the purchase price the Little Colorado, and by way of the of the settled lands below the Gila. 'Big Colorado down to Yuma. Whipple Yet it was a silver knight who was to and Ives and similar expeditions came wake the sleeping state, hedged as se- from time to time after him; and soon curely behind her legions of cactus as the gold of California drew westward the fabled princess of old with her briar such an army as was never seen before rose. As the mining fever grew the old or since. Mexican pack trains and tales of La Planchas de Plata, the great American caravans poured out along the placer where nuggets of pure silver were trail from Santa Fe to Tucson and from found scattered in the sand ; and the Tucson to Yuma, re-enforced by an ex- silver mines of fabulous richness known odus of Mexicans from Sonora by way to the padres and lost through half a cen- of Altar. It has been guessed, though tury of Apache warfare, begun to stil probably with too generous an estimate, again. that by the end of 1851 60,000 people had T w o men, Lieutenant Sylvester crossed the Colorado river at Yuma, and Mowry and Charles D. Poston, prob- for years thereafter the travel continued. ably did more at this period to pave the A little homely romance is connected N ray for the new state than all the others with this period—for sonic of these within her borders. They had followed travelers were old pioneers of the East the old tales to earth and found ore and and tried to escape the worst piece of even in of earlier prospecting. desert by floating on flat boats down the Both were men of sonie influence and Gila to Yuma. In November, 1849, such neither scrupled to use it. Mowry's a boat came down bearing a Mr. How- mine, the Patagonia, fairly lifted the ard and his party, among which was his hitherto neglected land into general no- Wife and little new born son, named tice and his books, lectures, and persist- Gila, from the river on which he first ent lobbying gained the ear of the gov- saw light. He was the first American ernment for larger measures. child born in Arizona. These early milling interests were 6 THE STOR3 - OF EARL) - ARIZONA largely in the Santa Rita mountains not pamphlet is the first book published in far from Tubac and south of Tucson. the territory. The first government military post in the Sylvester Mowry had a map made of territory, a little adobe barracks named the proposed territory and it is one of Ft. Buchanan, was located with a view to the most interesting Arizona relics that protecting the miners and for several I have ever seen. The northern bound- years activity centered at Tubac and ary was far south of Prescott, not much Tucson renewed something of her old above Wickenburg, and on the east the importance. In 1856 the motley popu- territory extended into the Staked Plains lation of the secti(in gatherecl at Tucson of Texas. It was divided by north and ami held a cenvention which resolved to south lines into four huge counties, the send a memorial to congress urging the most western being Castle Dome with establishment of a new territory of Ari- the Colorado river between it and Cali- zona. There were 260 names on the fornia. This county was named for txtition but the five thousand inhabit- Castle Dome mountain and silver mine; ants claimed to be painfully waiting a one of the very famous mines of the fuller government were more than four- early (lays. fifths Indians and Mexicans and the Castle Dome county was marked on report at Washington was unfavorable. the Mowry map as "unexplored" except Other similar bills were presented with a small corner around the mine and the systematic persistency from year to year vicinity of Ft. Yuma. and as regularly ignored or defeated. The next county was Ewell, named for It is amusing in connection with these General Ewell; the third, Mesilla, ex- tended to and not particularly soothing to oui- the Rio Grande river, and the vanity to know what unwillingness and last, Dona Ana county, embraced the even anxiety our foster mother New section between that river and the east- Mexico showed to be rid of us. Nor did ern half of the Staked Plain, taking in a good coiner of western Texas. she puri .rose sending us out empty handed into the world to seek our for- There was a battle of names for the

tune like a dove less (laughter. She territory and . , \rizuma, Arizonia, Gad- very generously proposed to give us all soMa, and Pimeria contended with Ari- the Indians within her border; insisting zona. Personally, I wish the choice in fact that we should take them as a might have fallen upon Pimeria, with its parting gift. They NA'CIT to be moved rich human and historical associations: into northern Arizona to fill up our un- but Charles D. Poston decided for Ari-

mapped s. paces and set a good example zona; taking the name from the Ari- to immigration. sonac mountains near the great Planchas In 1860 a convention met at Tucson to de Plate, it being considered suitable frame a provisional constitution, and that the state which was to be built on organize a territory, subject to the later silver should bear a name taken from the action of the general government. It most wonderful silver region of the world. was done in fact. with a governor and all And yet with her name settled and her officers Dr. I,. S. Owings governor) boundaries a good deal less so the terri- a code of laws was framed and the gov- tory to be, had still three years to wait for ernor's address printed at Tucson in her legal birth. There were complications CHARLES D. POSTON S ORY OF EARLY ARIZONA

ng from the great civil strife then ernor narch to seek his capitol in an un- wogress which made it impolitic for a tracked wilderness; the site to be chosen new member to enter the Linion too pre- at his own will. In no other territory of cipitately. In 1862 a new bill completely the United States has it happened so. rearranged the territorial boundaries, But Tucson, the natural claimant of the tking them approximately the same as honor, indeed the only town in the new those of today, and in February, 1863, domain ; had leaned far southward in her the enabling act was passed and a new sympathies and it was not certain, or star set in the western sky. rather it was only too certain, how she (larks D. Poston was particularly would welcome a government of the op- active in this last effort to secure legal position. So she was left to dream in recognition of the new section ; when her enchanted valley, bewitched by old victory seemed near he sent to Arizona 'memories, and the official party made four hundred ounces of virgin silver straight for the new found gold fields of from his own mines and had it made into the north, where in the midst of a pri- a magnificent ink stand for President meval forest, on the site of old Indian Lincoln, intending that it should be used encampments they set up a state house of in signing the bill creating the territory. rough hewn logs and named their capitol It was finished just too late for this pur- Prescott, in honor of the great historian pose hut it W3S accepted and is still pre- then at the zenith of his fame. Richard served by Robert Lincoln as an object McCormick, then secretary and after- much prized by hi ,. great father. It was wards governor, is said to be responsible a massive piece, of simple yet most ar- for the name. tistic and effective design. The ink well To go back just a little, one of the was hidden in the graceful dome of a most picturesque incidents in Arizona capitol the broad base represented the histoiy is the formal organization of her typical scenery of the desert, and at one government as soon as the official party end a crouching figure of Poston in had crossed her borders. At Navajo frontier dress with a rifle across his Springs, in what is now Apache county, knees kept guard. while at the other a two days march from the eastern line of beautiful Indian figure represented the the territory the governor and his party ii iendly tribes. President Lincoln did halted, and on December 29th, the flag not debt) in filling the chief offices of the was raised and cheered, a prayer was ',Kw territory. A governor and subor- said, and the oath of office taken. The dinate office is were appointed in March governor read his proclamation by which and in the latter part Of July the entire the seat of government was located in party set out, conveyed by an escort of the vicinity of Ft. Whipple, which post In sups, to practically create the state, had been established about a month which they were to govern. previously by Major Willis and his Cal- There was one change in the officiai ifornia cohmteers. list. John .\ Giirlev, the first governor If I were an artist I should like to lied in July, and John N. Goodwin was Paint that scene; the rugged hills dark appointed to fill his place. with their ranks of cedars, the ground In so.nne ways the march of the guber- snow covered, the soldier escort, and the natorial party was a romantic and un- waiting officials; all eyes bent upon that usual progress ; not often does a goy- rising flag as its bright folds shook out SHARLOT lif. HALL and fluttered over a new commonwealth. formed from time to time and Coconino The Chino valley post was soon is the latest.comer. abandoned for the present site on Gran- There has never been anything o ite creek and the capital locatet as large interest in Arizona's political his- have already stated The doings and un- tory; her Indian Wars and the varied de- doings of the early legislatures would be velopment of her mineral resources have interesting reading, but I shall not speak made up her story of them; nor of the game of shuttlecock From the first she faced an Indian by which the capital was tossed back and problem such as few states have had to forth between Tucson and Prescott, till• meet, and though it was a matter in the it landed at last in the lap of a younger hands of the national government every sister who has held it ever since. T. have phase of it was reflected in the pros- been a good deal interested in tracing the perity of the territory. The southern name of Phoenix ; it was undoubtedly and southeastern counties were the suggested by the rising of a modern city greatest sufferers, and scarcely a mile of on the site of extensive pre-historic ruins, their soil but has been sometime stained —like the fabled phoenix from his ashes. with blood. Victorio and Geronimo, The name was chosen by Darrel Duppa, Chato and Cochise and Deltchay will live an Englishman of education and high as long as our history ;—but these In- family connection, who was the first set- dian wars are for a larger canvass than tler in the vicinity of the present town. mine today. The story of the early One act of the first legislature was to mines of Arizona is a romance, a fairy adopt a territorial seal with the design tale like the search of the Rhine gold of mountain peak, pines, and deer, now Every peak of the south is haunted with familiar to all; but it is rather curious old stories of Jesuit mines worked by In- that for twenty years this seal was dis- dian converts for the enriching of the carded for another of unknown origin, missions. There is scarcely one nail of which showed a miner with pick and truth on which to hang these fantastic shovel and sharp mountain peaks in the garments of fancy ; for the Jesuits background—a design , suggesting strik- worked no mines, and their Franciscan ingly the pioneer baking powder label successors few, if any. But in the golden \Vhich some of us remember. age of Spanish colonization the silver of As on 'Mowry's old map the territory the Santa Ritas and the wonderful La was at first divided into four huge coun- Planchas de Plata in the region now known ties. named this time from Indian tribes. as La Cananea drew thousands of brief adventurers who left little perma- Pima, Yuma, Mojave and Yavapai. nent mark. Later Pah-Ute was set off from the There was never a northern end of Mojave Spanish gold fever and included all in Arizona; the silver of Peru the corner of and Mex- Arizona beyond the Colo- ico had turned popular interest to that rado river, which afterward was at- metal and its prominence in the ores of tached to Nevada. When this was done the southern border directed the course Pall-Ute county was abandoned and the of mining to it alone. remnant restored to Mojave. have spoken of how Mowry and - Later Maricopa, Phial, Apache, Co- Poston and other early prospectors were chise, Graham, and Gila counties were advocates of the white metal and

In T/IE STORY OF EARLY ARIZONA

prophesied Arizona's future greatness on one million two hundred thousand dol- that basis. lars, with ore that went as high as The placer gold excitement begun z17,000.00 a ton. along t h e Gil a w here a mushroom town Peace and prosperity have no history. of Arizona City sprung up while the it is sai(l; the steady development of Cllifornia rush was at its height ; and Arizona for the past twenty years has though the city soon shrunk to one house left deeper impress on her hills and val-

a - 10. the thousands who had winnowed leys than on the pages of her history. Cie sands of the desert for gi)ld dust From a land whose two chief highways Fasse.! on new thousands gathered soon were once known as "The Trail of after along the Colorado river and made 1)eatli. - and the "Day's Journey of the

1.a Paz and Ehrenburg names of note Dead \Ian. - she has come to two great in their day. transcontinental railways and a connect- The discovery of placer gold drew a ing system spreading yearly and already large floating population into northern outlined for extension that will reach the .Arizona. and the subsequent discoveries very deserts and mountain peaks. of rich quartz gave a stability to its later Where once the peaceful indians of development. The placers counted mil- the Gila valley represented her agricul- lions of dollars in their harvest, and be- tural popnlat:on she has a net work of fore they were fairly on the decline the irrigated valleys that command national silver era dawned. It was not as great attention. as Nevada; but it lived long enough to Her mines are known in all the mar- make fortunes in a day and to tinge the kets of the world and her general de- politics of the whole territory long after velopment is a thing any state might be the great mines were almost a tradition. proud of. She has gone forward with a For a quarter of a century thé fame of dignity and stability that promises much Arizona rested on such names as Tomb- for the future she has had a romantic stone. Tip Top. Humbug, and the Peck. yesterday, het tomorrow will make true The Peck mine, the nearest of these to nrmy of the golden dreams of her dis- Prescott. produced in three years over covei ors.