Ruth Sylvania “Sylvia” (Reed) Reuter was born on February 15, 1906, in Triplett, Chariton County, Missouri, the daughter of Albert Ora and Virginia “Jennie” May (Scott) Reed. (The Prescott Courier obituary on May 6, 1981, erroneously designates “Albert and Jennifer Ora” as her parents, and other sources designate Southfork (South Fork), Howell County, Missouri as her place of birth.) She was the fourth of six children.

Ada Belle (Eldred) Rigden was born August 30, 1884, in Montana to Thomas D. and Rose E. (Badger) Eldred.  Her father was a carpenter by profession.  She attended Michigan State Normal College in the summer of 1903 to obtain a degree in education, and she is listed in the 1903 and 1904 City Directories of Battle Creek, Calhoun County, Michigan, as a teacher.  She came to the Arizona Territory in either late 1904 or 1905 to teach school in Kirkland, Yavapai County.

By Brad Courtney

Prescott is the bearer of several well-known legends. One wonders why an event that happened on Whiskey Row on June 28, 1896, is not one of those widely told stories.

Minerva (Denney) Scarborough was born in Jackson City, Madison County, Tennessee, on February 4, 1837, to Charles Crockett and Mary Polly (Bryan) Denney.  Nothing is known of her childhood or teenage years.

She married William B. Scarborough (b. 1827 in North Carolina) in 1858 (no record of the marriage exists), and the couple settled in Spencer, Van Buren County, Tennessee, where William was a merchant by profession.

Esta Maria (Miller) Redden was born on February 5, 1877, in Prescott, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory.  She was the daughter of Leroy “Roll” Daniel and Rachel Catherine Maria (Wiebrecht) Miller and the great niece of Sam Miller, after whose family Miller Valley, Yavapai County, was named.

Esta was elected Secretary of the newly founded Epworth League Society (a youth group of the South Methodist Church) in Skull Valley, Yavapai County, in August 1894.  She graduated from Prescott High School in 1895, took the county examination for teachers, and taught one year in Williamson Valley, Yavapai County.

Elizabeth “Lily” Fremont was the eldest child of Jessie (Benton) and John Charles Fremont. Lily was born in Washington, D.C., on November 15, 1842, in the home of her grandfather, Thomas Hart Benton. Her father had returned only days before her birth from his first successful expedition in the West.

In 1852, facing a trip to Europe with her two children Lily and John (April 19, 1851), Mrs. Fremont admitted, "I already lean on Lily. She isn't a child; she's a protectorate."

Margaret (McCrea) Donovan Horne was born September 28, 1874, in Lyons, Clinton County, Iowa, to Patrick and Bridget McCrea, both born in Ireland.  She married William Donovan June 23, 1896, in Clinton County, Iowa, in the Catholic church and moved to Dixon, Lee County, Illinois, the following day.  They had a son Edward W., born May 16, 1897, in Dixon.  Her husband, William, died April 10, 1901, of Bright’s disease.  An item in The Dixon Evening Telegraph, dated 24 May 1901, read, “Mrs. Margaret Donovan started last evening for Prescott, Arizona, to make that place her home.”  

Harriet E. (Sedgwick) Sands was born on March 6, 1906, in Waterloo, Blackhawk County, Iowa, to James Elliott and Carrie Amanda (Cobb) Sedgwick.  She attended West Waterloo High School and was a graduate of Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Greene County, Ohio, and of Iowa State College (June 1928) in Ames, Story County, Iowa.  In the year 1926 she was initiated into Chapter Z of the P.E.O. Sisterhood, a philanthropic organization dedicated to the advancement of education for young women, in Waterloo.

Mattie Elizabeth (Durbin) Scott was born on June 30, 1894, in Prescott, Yavapai Co., Arizona to Ida Sarah (Densmore) and William Waters Durbin in the home built by her father at 136 North McCormick Street, Prescott, Arizona.

Mattie was the youngest of six girls: Jessie Grace (Durbin) Powers (1881); Florence B. (Durbin) Kennedy (1883); Iva D. (Durbin) Ranney (1884); Helen Ann (Durbin) Reynolds (1888); and Alice E. (Durbin) Stewart (1890). She had two brothers, both of whom died in infancy: Francis J. Durbin (1887); and Elmer Durbin (1893). Mattie was raised and educated in Prescott, Arizona.

Jessie Grace (Durbin) Powers was born on November 15, 1881, in Prescott, Arizona to Ida (Densmore), of Wisconsin and William W. Durbin of St. Clairsville, Ohio. Jessie came from a family of six girls and two boys. Her siblings were Florence B. Anderson Kennedy, born February 26, 1883; Iva D. Ranney, born September 28, 1884; Francis J., born February 16, 1887; Helen Ann Williams Reynolds, born March 30, 1888; Alice Elaine White Stewart, born July 2, 1890; Elmer Henry, born May 16, 1893; and Mattie Elizabeth Scott, born June 30, 1894.