By Fred Veil

The Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest award for bravery, was first authorized by the U.S. Congress in the early years of the Civil War. Initially, the Army balked at the concept of such a medal, as its commanding general thought that it smacked of “European monarchy.” He nevertheless reconsidered when the Navy adopted it in 1861 “to be bestowed upon such petty officers, seamen, landsmen, and Marines as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry and other seamanlike qualities during the present war.” The authorization for an Army Medal of Honor was enacted into law in July, 1862.

By Barbara Patton

In last week’s “Days Past” article, we followed Martha and her husband Lt. Jack Summerhayes on part of an arduous two-month trip.  The year was 1874 and they were relocating from Wyoming to Fort Apache in the wilds of Arizona Territory.  As we begin this week’s story, their ambulance wagon has brought them to Fort Whipple for a short recuperation before continuing on their way.

By Barbara Patton

This is the first installment of a two-part article on Martha Dunham, who married Army Lt. Jack Summerhayes in 1874.  Part Two will appear next Sunday.

Jack’s career brought them to Arizona Territory shortly after they married.  Some of Martha’s travels and experiences must have been frustrating, frightening and dangerous at the time, but in 1908, with memories softened by the years, Martha compiled her reminiscences into a delightful book:  Vanished Arizona — Recollections of the Army Life of a New England Woman.  These articles are based on her book.

By Dave Lewis

When Lewis and Clark made their epic 1804 – 1806 journey across the country, they did not have an artist with them.  They encountered Native people, plants and animals, breathtaking scenery and fantastic geologic features beyond anything they could have imagined.  They did a decent job of sketching some of what they found, but still struggled to convey the uniqueness of the American West.  Subsequent explorers beginning around 1830 made sure to include an artist.  And artists – from the Eastern United States and Europe — were eager to take up the challenge.

By Gretchen Hough Eastman

Amateur theater was a popular and important pastime at remote Army camps in the late 1800s.  Ft. Whipple, founded in Prescott in 1864, did not have a theater troupe in its first several years, a void lamented by the editor of the local newspaper, the Arizona Miner:  Theater, he suggested, would be “. . . much better than the sort of amusement indulged in by a great many of the Fort Whipple boys, i.e., getting drunk and shooting one another. . . “

By Amy Hale Auker

So history’s mostly a horseback song

And set to the thud of the hoofs.

~~~from Horseback Men, by Charles Badger Clark

The horseback man has long been revered worldwide. From Genghis Khan who kept showing up where he wasn’t expected to the Argentinian gaucho to the Guardians in the South of France, the romantic figure of a man on a horse has become part of the folklore of many cultures. The cowboy, relatively new on the scene, has become the most recognized symbol of our once-wild American West. He is our shiniest hero. And here in Yavapai County, he is a huge piece of our present as well as our past.

By Dave Lewis

Clarence Dutton, protégé of John Wesley Powell, was the most poetic and eloquent scientist ever to study the Grand Canyon and its surrounding deserts and plateaus.  He saw the area for the first time in 1880 and was struck by the contrast to the green fields, forested mountainsides and softly eroded geology he had always known in the eastern United States.

By Allan Englekirk and Cathie Englekirk

Historians, in chronicling Arizona’s eventful past, have tended to overlook the significant contributions of Mexican-heritage citizens of Prescott in the early 20th century.  A review of local newspapers of the period reveals that Mexican-Americans served their community and their country with greater devotion than most people know.  The pages of the Prescott Evening Courier of the 1930s and 1940s demonstrate convincingly that those citizens participated fully in the entire spectrum of community life, and in World War II numerous soldiers of Mexican heritage put their lives on the line as part of our national legacy of sacrifice.

By Jay W. Eby

By 1900 the Prescott Free Academy (Days Past, 29 Aug 1999) had proven to be too small for Prescott’s growing population, and the Board of the School District enlisted David Kilpatrick to design a larger and more modern building which came to be known as the Washington School.  (Kilpatrick also designed Prescott National Bank and the Hotel St. Michael.)

By Ray Carlson

In March 1871, the Weekly Arizona Miner noted: “Rev. Mr. (Alexander) Gilmore, Chaplain at Fort Whipple, is about to commence instructing the youth of Prescott, some encouragement having already been given him for the carrying out of the laudable object.”  During Prescott’s first five years, at least eight people opened private schools in homes, but none of these schools lasted more than six months.  Sam Rogers built a school and taught for eighteen months, but Rogers, as a father of six, could not survive financially on the fees parents paid. Gilmore in contrast had no family and had housing and financial support from the Army.