By Bob Harner

The January 2, 1895, edition of the Arizona Weekly Journal-Miner featured this notice: “If you fail to attend Putnam’s lectures, you will always regret it. Such treats of reasoning of eloquence of Encyclopedic knowledge, don’t come our way every day.”

The lecturer was Samuel Porter Putnam, a leading advocate for the Freethought movement. A former Unitarian minister, Putnam founded the Freethought Federation of America (which later merged with the American Secular Union) in 1892. Freethought philosophy held that people should rely on their own human reasoning rather than on religious doctrines and beliefs. Putnam frequently traveled the country, delivering lectures and promoting the creation of local Freethought Federation chapters.

By Barbara Patton

This week’s article continues a look back at some of the early women settlers in Prescott. One of them was Mary Catherine Leib Brooks.
 

Mary Catherine, a small, refined lady, arrived with her husband, Dr. Charles Leib, in Central Arizona in late 1863. Dr. Leib was attached to the first military party at Fort Whipple. Mary was a devoted wife to accompany her husband to such a remote outpost, especially since she was likely the only woman in a group of military men.
 

By Barbara Patton

Women settlers started arriving in Prescott in early 1864. Mary Ramos was perhaps the earliest. Her name is associated with this region's first log cabin, “Ft. Misery,” which rests today at the Sharlot Hall Museum.

Originally from Austin, TX, she came to Arizona in 1861 and moved to Prescott in 1864, where she went by the name Mary Brown. She soon purchased the log cabin store built by Manuel Yrissari and turned it into a small boarding house. For $25 a week, she provided meals, including goat's milk for coffee. The building also became a gathering place for early miners, was sometimes used as a church and, when needed, a court room.

By Jenny Pederson

The Bradshaw Mountains of Central Arizona contain many treasures. Among them is an oasis which features outstretched saguaros, an array of desert flowers, palms, a creek, and geothermal spring waters.

Used by the Yavapai for millenia, the area with the geothermal springs was part of a homestead claim filed by Civil War veteran George Monroe in 1873. Making the claim with three partners, he and his partners subsequently set up a tent camp and established a stagecoach stop. By 1877, the medicinal and health benefits of “taking the waters” were already known.

By Shellane Dannatt
 

Native American baskets are woven with more than willow and sumac- they are also woven with the tribal beliefs of the weaver. 
 

Baskets were used by most early inhabitants of North America, with the oldest basket found in the Southwest dating to about 8,000 years ago. Ancestral Puebloan sites (forerunners of today’s Pueblo Indians) contained ancient woven baskets.
 

By Parker Anderson

Historians generally accept (albeit hesitantly) that Raymond Hatfield Gardner was an Army scout during the Indian Wars. Beyond that, nothing about his life has been conclusively verified.  His genealogy has never been successfully traced, and his flamboyant stories have never been verified. It’s not even established that Raymond Gardner was his real name. Even the birthdate on his tombstone came from his own statements.
 

By Worcester P. Bong

Driving on Interstate 17 and State Route 69 between Phoenix and Prescott routinely takes less than two hours. Today’s travelers don’t realize the backbone of these two highways was a stagecoach route known as Black Canyon Highway, which officially became a state highway in 1936, designated as Arizona State Route 69 (SR 69).

By Nancy Burgess

The primary purposes of the Homestead Act of 1862 were twofold: to make government owned land available to citizens and to open up the western United States to settlement. This act paved the way for United States citizens of any means to obtain land at no cost other than the fee to file the paperwork. 

Homesteading in Arizona Territory was slow to develop as much of the territory was completely undeveloped, and therefore inaccessible – a “wilderness.” Even the territorial capitol of Prescott was established in a wilderness in 1864.

By Marjory J. Sente

An early proprietor, H. (Henry) C. Vincent, and his family experienced the full circle of life at the hotel. Moving back to Prescott from Williams, he took over the Congress House on October 10, 1901.
 

Early ads boasted “Everything Strictly First-Class.” However, the January 29, 1902 Arizona Weekly Journal-Miner announced the hotel would soon be remodeled, adding ten rooms and other improvements. During the renovation, Vincent changed the name from Congress House to Hotel Congress.
 

By Marjory J. Sente

When the Congress Hotel burned down on July 12, 1923, a Prescott landmark was gone, but its history and the memories of the people who lived and visited there were not extinguished.

Built in 1878 by Fred W. Williams, the hotel was called the Williams House and then the Congress House until it was renamed the Hotel Congress in 1902. Located at 124 - 126 E. Gurley Street (present site of the Hassayampa Inn), it was close to the Plaza and downtown. It became a popular place for women traveling alone, Phoenicians looking for cool summers and travelers from around the US seeking mild winters.