By Michael Wurtz

Only two and a half weeks have passed since the Indian Creek Fire rolled into our backyards and caused about 3 million dollars in damage. It seems too fresh to be considered "history," but it is fast becoming a piece of Prescott history. It will probably be just a matter of time before legends of Virgil Earp and gargoyles on the Hotel St. Michael are attached to it.

By William "Bill" Peck

Once upon a time Hillside had a store-two if you counted Darnall's. So did Congress, Skull Valley, Kirkland and Yarnell. But, all that Bagdad had was a commissary. These were real honest to goodness general stores that stocked meat, fruits, vegetables, Blazo, kerosene, rabbit feed, Levi's, gas and an assortment of veterinarian supplies. Bag Balm was used most likely as hand lotion even though the label didn't specify it for people.

By Carolyn Bradshaw

(This is the second part of a two-part article regarding Jerome Union Stage War.) 

The real fireworks would not start until the Jerome Union Stage Line was awarded a contract for postal service between Jerome and Prescott in 1923. In the mail contract, the government asked the bidders to take into account the revenues that might accrue from carrying passengers. Elijah Flummerfelt's Jerome Union bid of $6,700 vs. the Arizona Bus Company's bid of $21,000 was clearly designed to get Flumerfelt the contract.

By Carolyn Bradshaw

(This is the first part in a two-part article regarding the Jerome Union Stage Wars) 

On a February afternoon in 1923, Sheriff George Ruffner left Prescott to do the job his deputies had refused to do, arrest the driver of a mail-carrying automobile, a man in charge of the United States mail.

By Dr. Kathryn Reisdorfer

When we think about the Old West, we often conjure up images from movies about gun-slinging desperadoes and barroom brawls. Though Hollywood tends to exaggerate and romanticize these events, it is true that violence was widespread, and murders, especially in the early days of prospecting and mining, were frequent.

Suicides were also common in those days of wild dreams and dashed hopes. 

By Mona Lange McCroskey

In 1967, drawn by the immense, open country of Australia, Prescott cowboy Lyman Tenney entered into a contract to manage the Wollogorang station, in the Northern Territory on the Gulf of Carpenteria. Although the Tenney family had always lived on Arizona ranches, the distances in Australia were daunting and they were isolated for four months every year by monsoon rains. It was 500 miles to the grocery store at Mount Isa! A few groceries were available at Burketown, 187 miles down the coast (population 76-"and 70 of those were Aboriginals,") by two tracks down through the timber. The Tenneys soon connected with the mail plane that came in every two weeks.

By Pat Atchison

The words Memorial Day bring forth thoughts of loved ones, friends, patriotism, wars, cemeteries, long weekends, families, ceremonies. . . . The list goes on and on. 

Memorial Day, or as it was originally known, "Decoration Day," was formally proclaimed by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic (an organization of Union veterans of the Civil War) in 1868. His order proclaimed that, "The 30th of May, 1868 is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet in the land.

By Sylvia Neely and Terry Munderloh

Many happy birthdays occurred at 128 South Mt. Vernon Street when maternity facilities were virtually nonexistent in Prescott after the Sisters of Mercy Hospital was destroyed by fire in 1940.

When Father Alfred Quetu Came to Prescott in 1889 he appealed to the Sisters of Mercy in Phoenix to open a hospital in Prescott. The Sisters came in 1893 using a small house near the church for a hospital and in 1896 Frank Murphy sold to the Mercy Hospital Corporation five lots on Grove Avenue for $750.00.

By Ken Edwards

(This is the second art of a two-part article regarding the history of early automobiles in Yavapai County)

By April 1904, just a year after the first cars arrived in Yavapai County, many of the wealthier residents had made purchases of these new vehicles. On Friday, April 22 of that year, four cars set out from Prescott on a journey to Tucson, which they expected to reach in three days. An automobile tournament was to be held there the following week.

By Parker Anderson

For a number of decades scores of western movies, pulp magazine writers, and even some respected historians have expounded the idea of "frontier justice," intimating that law and order in the old Southwest was swift, sure and often unfair. We have been historically fed this so often that nearly everyone accepts it as fact.

I beg to differ. I don't pretend to speak for other areas of the West, but pioneer Arizonans were a high-toned people who fashioned a set of high-toned laws to live by.