By Parker Anderson

Every once in a while, someone will strike up a conversation with me regarding Prescott's various reputed "haunted" sites.  I enjoy the subject, but in reality, Prescott is probably one of the least haunted cities in America.  Whether you believe in ghosts or not, there are not that many purported hauntings in the Prescott area, so the same stories are told over and over again.

By Mick Woodcock

Victorians celebrated the coming of the New Year in a number of ways over the time that Victoria was queen of England, 1837 to 1901. It would seem that she was the reason that people in England and the United States gave the day any importance. The Queen was taken with the Scottish tradition of celebrating Hogmanay, which was the last day of the year. In Scotland it was celebrated by the giving of small gifts and the tradition of “First-foot” which meant that one received visitors on New Year’s Day.

(Condensed from an article written by Sharlot M. Hall, founder of Sharlot Hall Museum, that first appeared in the Prescott Courier on December 24, 1930.)

Counting miners, soldiers, pack-train owners and all, there might have been two or three hundred men in reach of Prescott that Christmas season -- that late December of 1864.  There were half a dozen families, mostly with several children; most of them arrived in October on a California-bound train and decided to try their fortune in Arizona instead of going on further west.

By Judy Stoycheff

John Stemmer had, by 1875, established a way station on what would later be known as the General Crook Trail at a location just east of Dewey along Ash Creek. He maintained a fully supplied inn, stables and corrals built of stone, a bar, store and dining room

In December of 1882, John paid the sum of $8 for Homestead Application #197 for the 160 acres where his station was located, made easier by dint of his being a military veteran. deed.

By Mick Woodcock

The war put a crimp in the Holiday celebrations in 1917.  Not only were some families missing members who were gone in direct support of the war effort, but also a number of other factors conspired to dampen yuletide spirits.

Originally written by Morris Goldwater and edited by Parker Anderson

Editor's note: On June 23, 1891, at the celebration of the 25th anniversary of Aztlan Lodge in Prescott, Morris Goldwater (1852-1939) delivered a lengthy address on the history of Freemasonry in Arizona. While he spoke of many of the lodges in the Arizona Territory, the following extracts from his speech deal with the Prescott Lodge, the first in the territory.

"The first mention I can find of an effort to start a lodge is in a letter written by our lately deceased brother, Alexander G. Abell, very worshipful grand secretary of the Grand Lodge of California. It is dated July 29, 1864, and is in reply to a letter written by Brother John Howard, now mayor of our city. In order to insure its delivery, it was addressed to Fort Whipple.

By Al Bates

History is not just about dates or events, it is the story of people and how they affected events and how events affected them.  This, then, is an attempt to tell of Fort Whipple's colorful past by combining dates and events with stories of people who passed through its gates.  This is a salute to the people of Fort Whipple.  Some of them left their names as city streets or county roads, or creeks or other landmarks.  Some of them are still quite famous and others are almost entirely forgotten.  Some of them spent years at Whipple and others were just passing through. 

By Al Bates

This article is one of a series appearing in this space during this year and the next on historic events relating to the Arizona Territory's Sesquicentennial.

As Arizona Territory's first governor and his official party were slowly crossing northern New Mexico Territory (see Days Past, Dec. 15), they were following in the wake of another combined military and civilian expedition headed to the central Arizona "diggings."

By Al Bates

Charles DeBrille Poston was not the only early Arizona pioneer to be pushed aside by newcomers and changing circumstances, but he certainly was the best known-shoved aside unceremoniously and unexpectedly by others who had arrived to fill appointed territorial offices.

By Al Bates

The building known as the Governor's Mansion started as and remains the centerpiece of the Sharlot Hall Museum campus. It also is the subject of a classic piece of Prescott lore.It was long held that the request for proposals for the mansion's construction was published in the Arizona Miner in June 1864.