Jessie Ann (Benton) Fremont was born May 31, 1824, in Cherry Grove, Virginia, the daughter of Thomas Hart and Elizabeth (McDowell) Benton. By the time she was five years old, Jessie was living in the nation's capital. She absorbed her early education from her father, a senator from Missouri who was renowned as the Great Expansionist.

Ora (Townsend) Coleman French was born April 19, 1870, on Ash Creek, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory, near Orme Ranch School, the daughter of John B. and Elizabeth (Vickers) Townsend.  Her father, the “Peace Commissioner,” was killed by Apaches at Dripping Springs, east of Mayer, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory, when she was three years old.  Her mother then married Merideth Aldridge.

Emilie Sidney “Sydney” (Tomkinson) Fritsche was born on June 22, 1888, in Philadelphia, the daughter of Joseph and Emilie (Surgison) Tomkinson. She attended school in Philadelphia and graduated from Swarthmore College. She came to the Arizona Territory with her parents in 1908.

On May 30, 1909, she married Harrie (Harry) Walter Fritsche in Phoenix, and they homesteaded at the HW Ranch in Big Chino Valley, Yavapai County, in 1911. She had two daughters: Christine (Mrs. Atkins B.) Hensal (1910), and Barbara B. (1916). A post office for Big Chino was in the ranch house, and Sydney went by buggy to get the mail at Simmons Station in Williamson Valley.

Annie Elizabeth (Randall) Fuller was born to Alfred Jason and Ruth (Campkin) Randall on August 21, 1868, in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. From 1870 to 1880 the family resided in Harrisburg, Washington County, Utah, where Mr. Randall farmed for a living. By the year 1881 the family had moved to Pine (Pine Creek), Gila County, Arizona Territory, where Annie spent her adolescent years. The Randalls were of the Mormon faith.

Anna “Duke” (Lewis) Gentry was born January 7, 1887, in Gunnison, Colorado, the daughter of Agnes Ann (Brown) and Dr. Wilbur Wright Lewis. She came to Prescott in 1889 when she was two years old. Duke's family lived with Judge Brooks until their home was built. On September 2, 1903, the Weekly Arizona Journal Miner reported: “Dr. W. W. Lewis left this morning with his daughter, Miss Duke Lewis, for New York, where the latter will remain for a couple of years attending school.”

Ida Elizabeth Hester (Smith) Genung was born on October 7, 1848 in Council Bluffs, Iowa and is the  daughter of Emily Laverne (Wright) and Dr. William Isaac Smith. She accompanied her father over the old Mormon Trail to California in a wagon train.

Ida went to school in California in the cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco and had private tutoring at the Smith Ranch. She lived on the old stage route in Banning, California, where notables crossed back and forth between the territories.

Mabel attended school in Prescott, residing with Captain and Mrs. Bucky O’Neill during her high school days.  Mabel was teaching school in Santa Maria, California, during the winter of 1898 but returned to Peeples Valley to nurse her sister, Louise, who was seriously ill with pneumonia.

Cassie Ethel (Walker) George was born at Klondyke, Graham County, Arizona Territory, on January 3, 1910, the daughter of Albert Gallatin and Jessie (Wootan) Walker. Albert was a freighter in the Aravaipa Canyon area.  Jessie died October 14, 1918 from the Spanish flu, one day after giving birth to a baby girl, who lived only a short time.   Albert moved his family to Safford, Graham County, Arizona. His brother, Ira Walker, bought a ranch on the Hassayampa River near Wagoner and urged Albert to join him.

Mary Etta (Jones) Gibson, daughter of Levi Cashes and Lida Ann (Turner) Jones, was born in Skull Valley, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory, on August 16, 1894. Her father was a teamster who hauled sand and gravel by wagon to help build the Yavapai County courthouse, in addition to doing some farming and ranching. When the 1900 census was enumerated the family had moved and was living on S. Granite St. in Prescott.

Margherita “Nonna” (Mariani) Gilardi was born in Bre, Lugano, Switzerland, on July 21, 1885, to Giovanni and Apollonia Mariani. In 1903, Margherita met and married Eliseo Gilardi, who  had returned to his native Switzerland after becoming discouraged as a prospector in the Arizona Territory.  Eliseo returned there in 1905 and went to work at the Senator Mine in Yavapai County, leaving Margherita with a baby daughter. Within a few years, he had saved enough money to pay for the passage of Margherita and two-year-old Leonita, as well as the $200 required by the Immigration Department at Ellis Island.