By Mick Woodcock

The aim of President Woodrow Wilson and most American citizens in 1916 was to avoid getting involved in what was perceived as another European war. There was no planning or preparation for America to go to war. When war was declared, however, there was an immediate flurry of activity in Washington, DC, to put the country on a wartime footing.
 

By Dr. Ted Finkelston and Edited by Kathy Krause

(Originally written by Dr. Ted Finkelston and published in two parts on November 12 & 19, 2005.  The following article was condensed and edited by Kathy Krause.)

World War I was raging in Europe when the Selective Service Act of 1917 required all men 21-30 years of age to register for the "Draft." In 1918, it was expanded to all men 18-45. Local draft boards were appointed throughout the U. S. and the eligible men registered at their voting precincts and received numbered draft cards. A lottery conducted in Washington D.C. periodically determined the men chosen from each locality for induction into the U. S. Army.

By Bob Harner

The new Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Arizona, Charles Silent, arrived in Prescott from California in February, 1878. The new Territorial Governor, John C. Frémont, arrived from New York in October the same year. Precisely when these two unlikely business partners began to collaborate isn’t clear, but according to the published diary of Lily Frémont (the unmarried adult daughter of John and his wife, Jesse), they were actively engaged in a variety of ventures by 1879.
 

By Bob Harner

Unless you have researched the life of Arizona’s fifth Territorial Governor, John C. Frémont, it’s unlikely that you’ve heard of Judge Charles Silent. Yet Charles Silent was not only a prominent judge and lawyer in the Arizona Territory in the late 1870’s and early 1880’s  but also a more successful businessman than his better-known partner, Frémont, making him worthy of a closer look today.
 

Effie Iola (Anderson) Spencer Smith, daughter of Adolphus and Martha Adelia (Coulter) Anderson, was born in Sevier County, Arkansas, on September 29, 1869, and grew up in the nearby city of Hope.  Effie had one brother, George, and a sister, Carrie. She attended Mrs. King’s School and Hope Female College in Hope, Arkansas. As a teenager, she developed an interest in drawing, and took up painting landscapes by her fifteenth birthday. Her artistic talents would fully blossom years later in Arizona, bringing her national renown.

Sedona Arabella (Miller) Schnebly was born in Gorin, Scotland County, Missouri, on February 24, 1877, one of 12 children of Phillip and Amanda Scheafer (Mohr) Miller.  Her father was of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry.  The Millers, devout Methodists, gave their daughter a fine education and even sent her to a finishing school.

Mildred “Millie” Elizabeth (Slaybach) Ogg was born January 14, 1902, in Blackwell, Kay County, Oklahoma, to Sarah Elizabeth (Nail) and William Anderson Slaybach. The Slaybachs were of German descent and made their living as farmers.

Marie (Seidler) Kuhne was born on June 26, 1862, in Halle (Saale), a city in the southern part of the German state Saxony-Anhalt.  Her parents were Ferdinand and Auguste Seidler.  Nothing is known of her life in Halle.  In September 1891, the Miner newspaper reported a letter from Frank A. Kuhne saying that he was recently married to a very handsome and worthy young lady in Saxony, Germany.  (This issue of the Miner is evidently not extant, or else Marie Kuhne, who wrote the original biographical sketch of her mother, was mistaken about the date.)

Elsie Muriel (Love) Johnson, daughter of Rosa (Baker) and William Henderson Love, was born May 20, 1896, in Prescott, Arizona Territory. Her parents came to Prescott in 1888. She attended St. Joseph’s Academy her first two years of school.  However, her parents moved to an eighty-acre ranch outside of Humboldt in 1908, and she attended Humboldt Elementary School and graduated from Prescott High School. She rode on horseback to Humboldt school, tied the horse outside the school, and took biscuits and jelly for lunch.

Olive Valora Haisley was born in Prescott, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory, on January 15, 1895, the daughter of Albert and Margaretta (Harvey) Haisley. She graduated from Prescott High School in 1914, where she had been the captain of the Women’s Basketball Team. Under her graduation picture in the 1914 Prescott High School yearbook, The Hassayamper, was written, "For she was just the quiet kind whose natures never vary."