By Parker Anderson

Prescott’s longest-operating community theater, Suze’s Prescott Center for the Arts, closed at the end of September of 2024 after 55 years of operation and of bringing the joy of live theater to Prescott area communities. The organization was founded as the Prescott Fine Arts Association (PFAA) but underwent two name changes in later years. Since the Center is now gone, it seems fitting to recall how this cornerstone of the arts community began.

In 1968 long-term resident Reathel Gammill Jackson decided that it was time for Prescott to have a centralized arts center, and she persuaded T. Frank Stewart, then publisher of the Prescott Evening Courier, to join her in this quest. They persuaded other prominent Prescott residents of the worthiness of this project, and on July 10, 1968, the Prescott Fine Arts Association was organized, and Articles of Incorporation were filed.

Reathel Gammill Jackson herself became the first President of the PFAA Board of Directors. The focus of the new organization would be to support graphic artists (painters, sculptors, etc.), with the possibility of adding a “Little Theatre” later for dramatic performances.

Money needed to be raised to purchase or lease a building as a permanent place for the PFFA, so a Finance Drive Committee was formed with Bob Kieckhefer as Chairman. Their goal was to raise $50,000 by October 1968, a significant sum in those days. Then small-town Prescott was so excited over their new arts organization that prominent citizens like Norman Fain, Dr. Taylor Hicks, Roxie Webb Sr., and Barry Goldwater joined the Finance Drive Committee. However,

Goldwater did not stay long, as he was preoccupied—he was running that election year to regain the U.S. Senate seat he had given up in 1964 to run for President.

The Courier regularly reported the ongoing progress of the PFAA. $13,500 was raised during just the first five days of fundraising, and by January 1969, over $25,000 had been raised. The organization had entered into negotiations to lease the second floor of the Santa Fe train depot on Sheldon Street as home to the Prescott Fine Arts Association. It seemed like a sure thing, and it was publicly announced that this would be the PFAA’s home. But for reasons that are not entirely clear, negotiations with the railroad fell through, and the arts organization had to start looking elsewhere for space to lease.

To show their support, bronze sculptors Robert Mikulewicz of Prescott and Walter Emory of Camp Verde each donated one of their works of art for permanent display wherever PFAA ended up. Emory’s sculpture was a bust entitled “The Laughing Eskimo.” Today, the whereabouts of these sculptures are unknown.

Meanwhile, Sacred Heart Church, the Roman Catholic parish of Prescott, had outgrown their 1894-constructed church at the corner of Willis and Marina Streets and were building a new structure on the site of the old St. Joseph’s Academy. The final mass in the old church building was reportedly on June 13, 1969, after which they formally decommissioned it as a church. The old Sacred Heart Church and Rectory, recognized as among Prescott's most historic buildings, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978. Its listing in the National Register Information system states that it is “one of the best examples of nineteenth century religious architecture.” Aware of the legends that a priest who died in 1902, Father Edmond Claessen, had been buried underneath, Sacred Heart filed paperwork to have him exhumed, but after much digging, could not locate his remains. Decades later, solid research by historian Betty Bourgault determined that Father Claessen had been buried in Citizens Cemetery in an unmarked grave.

Next week, the PFAA moves into the old Sacred Heart Church.

“Days Past” is a collaborative project of the Sharlot Hall Museum and the Prescott Corral of Westerners International (www.prescottcorral.org). This and other Days Past articles are also available at www.archives.sharlothallmuseum.org/articles/days-past-articles/1 The public is encouraged to submit proposed articles and inquiries to dayspast@sharlothallmuseum.org Please contact SHM Research Center reference desk at 928-277-2003, or via email at archivesrequest@sharlothallmuseum.org for information or assistance with photo requests.