By Parker Anderson

The solemnity of honoring our deceased military veterans on Memorial Day has been weakened a bit in recent years by weekend parties to mark the beginning of summer. However, there was indeed a time when entire communities banded together to pay tribute to our brave soldiers. Prescott was one of them.

By Carol Powell

When the Spanish flu began to cut its deadly path across the country in 1918 it did it with such efficiency that some believed sinister forces to be at work. In March of 1918 an Army private at Fort Riley, Kansas reported to the camp hospital complaining of a sore throat, fever and a headache. As the day advanced more soldiers became sick. The U.S. was at war, which provided a convenient target upon which to heap suspicion. Had the Germans used germ warfare?

By Zach Hirsch

(Ed. Note: Rotary International is an organization of service clubs located world wide. The first club was formed in Chicago by attorney Paul P. Harris on February 23, 1905, meeting with three business friends and choosing the name Rotary because they rotated club meetings to each member’s office. By 1910, the clubs were nationwide and, in 1922, because branches had been formed in six continents, the name was changed to Rotary International. By 1925, Rotary had grown to 200 clubs with more than 20,000 members. Today, there are more than 32,000 clubs and over 1.2 million members world-wide.)

By Parker Anderson

Jody Drake originally organized a theater troupe by the name of "Cold Turkey" and performed western plays and skits at the Riata Pass Steakhouse in Dewey. The name of the theater was changed when she picked up a rose-shaped pine cone that had dropped into a bucket of blue paint. Blue Rose Theater, under her direction, formed a partnership with the Sharlot Hall Museum in 1994.

By Nancy Burgess

On March 19, 2007, the house at 309 East Goodwin Street in Prescott was severely damaged in a fire. This was the home of George E. and Elsie Briggeman from 1949 until 1964. This small, classical bungalow has an interesting history.

By Edna Ballew Patton

In Skull Valley, people used to get together and help each other. Thirty or more people gathered at Bill and Martha Overton's one Sunday and built a room onto their house. We built a tennis court at the school, shoveling sand by hand. It took several Sundays and a lot of beer! We got together and poured the cement for Barney and Annie's house (where Charlie and Diana Taylor live now).

By Edna Ballew Patton

(Edna Mae Ballew Patton lived in Skull Valley for over 60 years. In the late 1990s, she committed many of her memories to paper. Her first published memoirs appeared in the Days Past issue of November 20, 2008 and can be read there. Mrs. Patton died on July 31, 2008, five days after giving Sharlot Hall Museum permission for her memoirs to be published.)

By James F. Vivian

Captain John G. Chandler, according to the Arizona Journal-Miner on June 26, 1915, was presented as the “first man known to suggest that the first capital of Arizona be christened Prescott.”

By James F. Vivian

In 1864, the town of Prescott was named in honor of Massachusetts-based historian William Hickling Prescott, who was already deceased at the time and had never set foot in the west. Even in the 19th century it was unusual for towns to bear the names of people who were not involved with their founding, and thus the question has been raised as to which of our earliest territorial pioneers suggested the honor for Mr. Prescott.

By Bob Cornett

The western half of the North American continent contained a million square miles in 1800, all unknown to the U.S. citizens in the eastern half. For expansion westward, maps and handbooks were needed. We know there were more than 40 major surveys and mapping reports from the time of Lewis and Clark (1804-1806) up to the General Land Office surveys of the late 1850s. Americans believed that it was their God-given right to settle the West (Manifest Destiny), and the path had to be cleared.