By Conrad Jackson

While most of us are acquainted with the image of olden day firefighters using a bucket brigade to douse the flames of a burning building, fewer have seen the image of a hose cart racing down a street.  A hose cart is little more than a handle attached to an axle mounted to two wheels.  Spooled onto the axle are several hundred feet of hose that terminates with a nozzle.  Firefighters would pull the hose cart to the scene of the fire where they would leave one man holding the nozzle.  The remaining firefighters would then pull the cart to the nearest hydrant, unspooling hose as they went.  The hose would then be connected to the hydrant and the water would flow.

By Mick Woodcock

What do a cast iron flatiron, a brass bucket and a gold watch all have in common?  In this case they were all owned by Catharine Scott Alexander, Yavapai County pioneer, ranch woman, wife, mother and mine owner.  These are the tokens of a life lived on the frontier in the days when Arizona was a territory and Prescott was founded.  They tell of life on the ranch and of a different life in town.

By Al Bates

Judging from time they spent away from Arizona during their terms of office many of our early territorial officials would rather have been somewhere else.  But who could blame them?

By Mick Woodcock

Efforts by the Yavapai Chamber of Commerce and others to have the Whipple hospital permanently transferred to the United States Public Health Service were successful.  On February 15, 1920, the hospital was formally transferred to the United States Public Health Service, to be operated under a permit from the War Department.

By Mick Woodcock

On February 25, 1913, Whipple was deactivated and the buildings were given over to a caretaker detachment.  The Army General Staff planned to concentrate the mobile army at eight large posts and abandon 31 small ones such as Whipple, which was deemed as having an “obsolete situation.”

By Mick Woodcock

After thirty-four years of active service, Fort Whipple was to be shut down on April 25, 1898, the same day Congress declared war on Cuba.  The officer on hand to close down the post instead became the mustering officer for the Arizona men who volunteered for the First U. S. Volunteer Cavalry, the Rough Riders.

By Fred Veil

The notion that Civil War general Abner Doubleday invented the game of base ball is a myth, promulgated and perpetuated by a group of Americans who, in the early-1900s were bound and determined to establish an American origin for a game that had become a truly American sport.  In fact, the origin of the sport can be traced to 17^th century England and a school children’s game known as “Rounders.”

By Miller Valley Historical Team

As with all things, there is a beginning and an end.  There is a birth, a lifetime to be celebrated and a legacy to be remembered and cherished.  So it is with Prescott’s Miller Valley School.  Preliminary preparations for a centennial celebration have become instead a 99^th anniversary celebration and/or eulogy.

By Christy Hastings

The visitor to Sharlot Hall Museum who reads the exhibit posted in the small log cabin known as “Fort Misery” will be introduced to “Virgin Mary” Ramos, a most intriguing early Prescott pioneer.  When she died in 1876 at the age of 57, her obituary stated:  “A well written history of her eventful life would constitute a volume of thrilling interest.”  If only she had written down the story of her life!  Instead, it is left to archivists and historians to struggle with the few facts we know about her.

By Betty Bourgault

My desire to adopt a grave at the Citizen’s Cemetery in Prescott and to become its caretaker led to the solution of a century-old mystery and to my learning of a most remarkable young man who served our community as an Assistant Pastor at Sacred Heart Church before his untimely death.