by Tom Brodersen

(It was in 1928, seventy-five years ago this coming June 11, that the first guest signed the Governor’s Mansion register and the Sharlot Hall Museum began. We are running a series of articles over the coming months that will explore the people and events that have shaped the museum’s long journey. This Sunday we will look at the museum’s beginnings up until 1928.)

Today the Old Governor’s Mansion, which Sharlot Mabridth Hall called the "Arizona’s Mount Vernon," is the heart of the Sharlot Hall Museum. For Sharlot, this big log cabin was always "the most romantic house in Arizona — rich in stories of the state’s first official and social life, tales of Indian wars mingled with convivial jokes and merriment — with haunting love stories and tragedy of death and misfortune."

Samuel Blair, W. P. Blair, Daniel Hatz, Philip Sheerer, and John Raible built it in the summer of 1864, soon after the territorial governor’s party arrived. Sharlot wrote, "With axe and adze the logs were hastily shaped, dragged in by oxen and mules, and laid into the walls" of the rough ‘mansion’ which we can still enter today, after over 138 years.

The log house served as both home and office for Territorial Governor John Goodwin and Secretary Richard McCormick. In September 1865, when Goodwin was elected Territorial Delegate to Congress and returned to the east, McCormick brought his new wife Margaret out from New Jersey, and he soon became our second territorial governor. Sadly, Margaret McCormick died in childbirth and was, as Sharlot wrote, "laid with her babe in her arms under the pines." In 1867, the Territorial Capital was transferred to Tucson, and Governor McCormick went with it. His wife’s remains were sent back east.

Governor and Mrs. McCormick had shared the house with Henry Fleury, who served as personal secretary for both governors. Judge Fleury later acquired the building from the federal government and lived there until his death in 1895.

Sharlot Hall was born in Kansas on October 27, 1870, just six years after Prescott was founded. In 1881, her family set out by covered wagon and headed for Arizona. Sharlot described how, along the way, she "counted the graves lost in the grass and more than once climbed off my pony to set some rotting head board straight." As her family "threaded the rugged canyons and crossed the mountains" of central Arizona, Sharlot saw prehistoric ruins, which awakened her lifelong interest in Native American cultures and artifacts.

"In mid-February of 1882," Sharlot wrote, "I rode into Prescott on a long-legged dapple gray mare who had just left her footprints the full length of the Santa Fe Trail." On that day she saw the Old Governor’s Mansion for the first time. Rustic as it was, Sharlot said it seemed "grand enough to me who remembered the sod houses and dug outs."

Soon she was "a schoolgirl in Prescott and there was a gray-bearded man," Judge Fleury, still living in the old log house. Sharlot listened to the tales he told of earlier days, which "lighted a fire that was never to die in my heart." Sharlot wrote that, "after the gray old man was carried out the door never to return," she began to collect relics of the disappearing frontier and as her collection grew so did her "desire to own the old log house and put all these things of story and romance into it."

The death of Charles Poston on June 24, 1902, was another spur to Sharlot’s desire to create a museum. The Territorial Legislature had called Poston the "Father of Arizona" and voted him a tiny pension. In the museum’s archives, one of Sharlot’s letters contain her penciled entry lamenting how "Charles D. Poston, pioneer, traveler, poet, author, diplomat, breathed his last upon the earthen floor of an adobe hovel in squalor and alone."

The passing of Arizona’s pioneers — their stories unrecorded, their possessions scattered and lost, their graves unmarked and forgotten — moved Sharlot to seek out the living "old-timers" all over the state, documenting their lives and collecting artifacts "that root people deeply into the life of their own locality."

In 1907, with the help of the women of Prescott’s Monday Club, Sharlot organized an event to raise money to build a clubhouse with a museum. A "Hassayamper’s Evening" was held at the Prescott Opera House on Gurley Street. Sharlot opened the program, which included dances and musical entertainment, with tales of Arizona history and a plea to preserve the old Governor’s home. She read poetry from her soon to be published book, ‘Cactus and Pine’, which would later be reviewed by the New York Times as "a significant volume of Western verse." Sharlot declared from the stage that the "Hassayamper’s Evening begins a fund which ought to grow and blossom."

However, apparently private funding was not adequate. It would be another twenty years before her efforts of create a museum in Prescott would bear fruit.

Sharlot continued to write poetry and historical articles, which were published in periodicals from coast to coast. From 1901 to 1908, she was associated with Charles Lummis’s magazines, ‘Land of Sunshine’ and ‘Out West.’ The Southwestern Museum in Los Angeles, which Lummis founded, was yet another inspiration for her dream. When the last territorial governor, Richard E. Sloan, of Prescott, appointed her territorial historian in 1909, Sharlot became the first woman to hold public office in Arizona.

In 1917, the State of Arizona bought the old Governor’s mansion from Joseph Dougherty, who had modernized the historic log building by covering it with wood siding. The City of Prescott agreed to maintain the historic structure, but no money was allocated, so for another decade not much was done.

Calvin Coolidge was running for a second term in 1924, and Sharlot’s name was placed on the ballot as a presidential elector. She had the honor of delivering Arizona’s electoral vote to Washington. On the trip east she visited the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, and toured museums and art galleries in New York and Boston, which strengthened her desire to create a museum in Prescott.

In May of 1927, Sharlot wrote a formal letter to the City of Prescott, asking for a lifetime lease on the Governor’s Mansion and freedom to develop it as a museum in exchange for donating her historical collection. The City of Prescott accepted her plan on June 20, 1927. The dream she had carried since she was a girl was finally becoming reality.

Before she actually moved into the old Governor’s Mansion, Sharlot made another trip back east to see a doctor. She visited small museums, historic homes, "the woods Thoreau walked among," and the old Wayside Inn that Longfellow had written about. The Inn had been restored with money from Henry Ford. Sharlot said it was "exactly what I have dreamed for thirty years of doing with the old house in Prescott without the Ford capital without any capital but my own hands and brain and my historical collection."

Sharlot soon moved her collections into the Governor’s Mansion and began the work of turning the old log building into a "House of Memories." She opened the Museum’s guest register for her first official guest, Arizona State Historian George Kelly, on June 11, 1928, 75 years ago this coming June.

(Tom Brodersen edits the ‘New Directions’, the Sharlot Hall Museum newsletter.)

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(bug534pi)
Reuse only by permission.

In 1907, Sharlot M. Hall organized an event to raise money to build a clubhouse with a museum. A "Hassayamper’s Evening" was held at the Prescott Opera House. She opened the program with tales of Arizona history and a plea to preserve the old Governor’s Mansion, shown here in about 1900.

by William Peck

The school at Hillside in 1940 was located at Yava, a distance of 4 miles toward Prescott from Hillside, and consisted of a one room, clapboard shack, propped up on some granite rocks that was its sole foundation. The wind howled beneath its board floor that had half-inch cracks between the shrunken planks. When sweeping the floor, it was unnecessary to employ a dustpan, because everything but large scraps of paper filtered through the cracks and blew away. When it was cold and the wind was coming up through the boards, the kids with the highest test scores got to sit closest to the oil-burning stove — which was great incentive to excel.

The school board was duly ashamed of the facility and wished for a newer building. This was cause for an annual election that was foredoomed since the issue of funding was always accompanied by the proposal to move the school to Hillside. Unfortunately, there were exactly 21 qualified voters in Hillside and 21 in Yava. When the votes were counted, a tie resulted and the issue was shelved for another year, much to the board’s frustration.

One August morning, a couple of days before school was to resume, a fire sprang up beneath the school’s porch and quickly consumed the structure. The cause was never explained. I was the popular suspect, but actually the idea never occurred to me. Perhaps the school board itself was motivated enough.

Too bad it went, since so many fond memories went with it. In its final year, our class was composed of 11 boys and 1 lonesome girl, 2 if you counted Amy Randal, who was taking a high school correspondence course, supervised by our teacher, Ada Fishburn.

Baseball was the leading subject taught. At recess we chose up sides, Amy as the captain of one team, Mrs. Fishburn, of the other. Both were sluggers, and we boys had to step out to the end of the lot when they were up to bat. Mrs. Fishburn’s team always had the advantage. If they were behind, recess might last a few minutes longer. We older boys never understood why the younger kids were always chosen first. Female guile escaped us.

There was a lean-to attached to the schoolhouse’s rear with a dirt floor and a huge wood range that provided extra heat in the winter. Orange crates were stacked for cupboards and flour sacks provided the doors. These were stocked with "commodities," flour, sugar, baking powder, beans, bacon and lard, to mention a few. This was supplemented with fresh milk, butter and eggs supplied by the Yava kids and maybe a turnip or two in the spring.

At 10:00 a.m., an older child and a younger one were selected from the roster and they escaped classes for the forenoon to cook lunch. This could consist of fresh-baked bread or maybe corn bread, beans or stew and usually some desert such as chocolate cake or apple pie, all made from scratch. There was a great deal of competition as to who could cook the best lunch but we all ate well. Learning to cook was probably the most valuable asset acquired in school, possibly preventing starvation among the forthcoming bachelors and newlyweds.

We had our ups and downs. Our sanitary facilities were boys’ and girls’ outhouses. A bird had chosen to build its nest in one of the buildings and was being observed by the entire school. One day it was brought to the teacher’s attention that the nest was on the ground and that the eggs were broken, the birds nowhere to be seen. Summary court by the teacher pronounced one young man guilty. For penance, he was commanded to dig a new outhouse hole for the boys; it being much more used than the girls’, and was nearly full. It seems unlikely that he was guilty, but he sulked off with the shovel over his six foot two frame to commence the task. In twenty minutes he was back in his seat.

"You haven’t had time to dig another hole! Get back to work," commanded the judge.

"Twarn’t necessary, teacher," he defended, "I just swapped signs around." That boy had never before demonstrated such genius.

Ada Fishburn was a true Annie Oakley. She had a 410 shotgun and would pick up the gun and one shell and pursue her supper. Quail were very abundant and was her favorite food. She was a true sportswoman and shot only wing shots, of which I never knew her to miss. She had an inch deep cleft in her forearm that she obtained by pulling the gun through the fence, barrel-first, catching the hammer on the wire, snapping it, and blowing a hand-sized chunk of meat from her arm. This salty old gal took a piece of wire from the fence, fashioned a tourniquet and drove herself to the doctor.

She was also a student of Barney Oldfield, the race driver. One ride to Hillside with her was enough for me. She was scolding me for some misdemeanor, gesticulating in the air with both hands, when she overran a curve, running off into the brush. Undeterred, she made a U-turn and off we went again without a break in the conversation, spewing sand and rocks, onward, ever onward, at 40 miles an hour, an ungodly speed, toward Hillside.

The ride to and from school was in the back of Clay’s dad’s pickup, equipped with what was my first encounter with a camper shell. There was no back door on the shell and the seats were mere plank benches along the side. It was frosty and dusty in the morning. I can remember us boys sneaking our morning cigarette in the back of the pickup after positioning our bodies to screen the rearview mirror. The road was dirt and boulders and we jolted along for 20 minutes to make the 4-mile trip.

The old schoolhouse stood where Clayton Satathite’s corrals are today, just east of the road at Yava, south of the Kirkland Creek bridge. The remains of Ada’s teacherage still exist a hundred yards beyond. My, how small it looks today, but of course it was a smaller world in those days, one made larger than life by the interesting times that it embraced.

(William Peck is a long time resident of Hillside.)

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(pb059f10i4)
Reuse only by permission.

The old teacherage in Yava looked little different in 1980, when this photo was made, than in its heyday. The author remembers going to school in the Hillside/Yava area and reminiscences about the people and atmosphere.

by Doris Theriault

Let me warn you before you begin reading, this is yet another Prescott love story.

I grew up in Montreal, Canada, and spent my working years in the harbor area of Los Angeles. I’m a city gal through and through. While in Los Angeles, I commuted for an hour to work each way. I’m used to fast freeways, fast cars and even more relevant to this story, fast-talking car salesmen.

Six years ago, my husband and I became captivated with all the charms of Prescott and made this our retirement home. In the spirit of enjoying our free time, we toyed with the idea of purchasing a convertible car. It’s crazy and impractical, but it would be our second car, and we could have fun with it almost year round in this great climate.

I was doing some plein air painting at Sharlot Hall Museum a few weeks ago, when I happened to look up and across the street to the McIlvain Motor dealership. Sitting next to the showroom was a sweet little turquoise convertible with a sign that read "Extra Clean" on it. It might as well have said, "Buy me" as it begged for my attention.,

No sooner had I gotten home, I called the dealership to get details on this cutie. I was in luck, I was told, because the price has just been reduced that very day. The city girl in me heard warning bells ringing loud and clear. I’ve heard all these great sales lines many times before. It turns out that the price reduction was true. My husband had seen this car a few weeks prior, but had disregarded it for some reason or another.

The man who gave me this information, the owner and only salesman, Mr. Joe McIlvain, invited us to take the car for a test drive whenever convenient. We showed up bright and early on a Saturday morning. I asked him if he wanted our names, the car keys for the car we were leaving behind, or a signature on anything before we left. I’m used to city ways and know for a fact that you just don’t get in a car that you don’t own and drive away. Mr. McIlvain said, no, that he trusted us with his car and that was all there was to it. Actually, it’s not all there was to it – there was about an hour’s worth of conversation, wherein we learned more about this native Precottonian and his way of doing business.

During this conversation, I asked him why he thought this great little car hadn’t sold yet, and he answered, with a sheepish grin and a gleam in his eye, that he had grown very fond of the convertible and might have priced it accordingly. As is often the case in his business, this was the second time he was selling the car, having sold it to the previous owner as a program car, serviced it over the years and then took it in trade when the former owner wanted a truck instead. It seems that customer loyalty is a big part of McIlvain’s success.

His office is a living museum of mementos of times past and present. As he relates a story that happened 50 years ago, he pulls out a newspaper article or a picture to document it. There are piles of papers, plaques, photos and memorabilia everywhere, and each piece has a story to tell. With any luck, you get to hear a dozen or more of those stories on each visit.

We took the little convertible on a test drive up to Jerome, where we had breakfast before returning to town via Interstate 17. This allowed us to test the car in a variety of situations. When we got back to the dealership, we had a few things that were of concern, which Mr. McIlvain duly noted in the course of an hour or so, with many more colorful stories.

In three or four days, we received a call from the shop manager, telling us that the items in question had been fixed and the car was ready to check out again. When we called later to make an appointment to pick up the car, we couldn’t reach Mr. McIlvain. He had gone to the high school in order to give some money to their swim team, one of his favorite causes.

He must have helped many a cause over the years because his office walls are full of thank you notes, messages from graduating classes, Christmas cards and more thank you cards. He has obviously been an active part of this community. How refreshing to see someone giving back to the community that supports him!

Eventually we reached him and made arrangements to take the car out again. We could take it for the weekend, if we wanted. No questions asked and no papers to sign!

By now, we knew to allow plenty of time when visiting the dealership. At first, the city gal in me wanted to move on with the test drive, the details of the purchase, etc. but this 82-year-old gentleman dispels any need to rush. In a big city, I would have taken a test drive with the salesman sitting next to me and breathing down my neck about a decision. Not in good old Prescott… things here are leisurely, friendly and very trusting. What a breath of fresh air!

Our test drive proved very satisfactory and we decided to purchase the car. This meant spending an hour and a half giving Mr. McIlvain our legal names for the sales documents. During that time, we found out more about his father, Mac McIlvain, who began his career by running a taxi service with a Model T Ford. It was located across from the courthouse square and was often used to drive the miners up to the Bradshaw Mountains. Mac then opened up a garage, and eventually the car dealership in 1919. We admired a picture of young Joe, all decked out in his cowboy finery, to attend the Prescott Frontier Days with his buddies, Budge Ruffner, Bob Boy Barrett and Joe’s brother, Pat. Mr. McIlvain served in the Fifth Air Force during World War II. We found out that he has a special place in his heart for any customer who has also served his country.

We heard stories about former customers, among them a recent one who also bought a convertible. Mr. McIlvain had tears in his eyes when he told us that soon after purchasing the car, the man had a stroke and has been unable to drive or enjoy his new car.

We were told about the scrapes he got into as a kid, the chow mein his family used to eat on Friday nights at the local Chinese restaurant, how his family lost everything during the depression. We got to see pictures of the famous snake dance done by the Smoki in their heyday. In a short time, we were family, and finding out about the trials and tribulations of early Prescott. We were interrupted once by a phone call from his wife. It turns out that she was just checking up on him.

He told us, in confidence, that when he and his father heard about the crooked dealings of Phoenix car dealers in the early 1940s, they shook hands and vowed to always be honest with their customers. I’m told that there are generations of people in Prescott who always buy their cars from Mr. McIlvain because when they were young and broke with no credit record, Mr. McIlvain agreed to sell them their first car with simple interest. Those cars and the payments are gone long ago, but the loyalty that such trust engenders lingers on.

To pick up the car, pay for it and sign the tons of papers took two and half hours. I looked at my watch with a smile – this could have driven any time-conscious person crazy, but instead it was pure joy at seeing a way of life, a way of doing business that is hardly ever seen anymore. We had talked so long that by the time we were ready to leave, most of his staff had gone home. At 82, he insisted on taking the old screwdriver off his desk and removing the license plate himself.

Finally, the car was pulled up in front of the dealership by Mr McIlvain himself, and we accepted the extra set of keys. After shaking our hands and thanking us for the purchase, he slipped a ten-dollar bill in my husband’s hand, telling him to top off the tank with gas, much as a concerned parent would do to a child taking his first car out for a spin. We waved as we left, promising to send pictures….

(Doris Theriault now considers herself a "former city gal.")

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(pb126f1i5)
Reuse only by permission.

Across from Sharlot Hall Museum is a museum, of sorts, in the McIlvain Motor Dealership. Along with newspaper clippings of donations to organizations, you will find more than one copy of this photograph of Pat McIlvain, "Budge" Ruffner, Bob Boy Barrett, and Joe McIlvain at the 1928 Rodeo.

by Anita Nordbrock, Mike Ruddell, Norm Tessman, and Michael Wurtz

Red Light District to Prescott’s quietest downtown lot:

From the late 1860s until the 1900 fire, this site was home to two populations that were segregated from Prescott’s other citizens – the Chinese community and the "red light district." Although both groups are well-known stock characters in the "old west" past, little is known of their day to day lives. There is a general study summarizing Prescott’s Chinese community in the Journal of the Southwest Spring 1989 issue. However nothing similar has been written about South Granite Street’s prostitutes. We hope this archaeological excavation will contribute more information about both groups, and spark interest and research into Prescott’s lost denizens of South Granite Street.

On July 14, 1900, the entire block bordered by Montezuma, Gurley, Granite and Goodwin Streets was consumed by Prescott’s greatest fire that destroyed most of the downtown area. Unlike Montezuma Street’s "Whiskey Row" which quickly rebuilt in fireproof brick and block, the middle of the east side of the 100 block of Granite Street has seen only three small buildings in over 100 years. Recently, only known as a parking lot, this land held almost 18 buildings in 1895. Little redevelopment assures no deep excavations have intruded into the pre-1900 cellars and trash pits of Granite Street businesses, thus indicating a wealth of artifacts.

Chinese:

The first Chinese arrived in Prescott in the late 1860s. The transcontinental railroad, which employed many Chinese laborers, was completed on May 10, 1869. Some of these laid-off laborers may have been among the first Chinese to arrive in Prescott in 1869. The newspaper showed that negative attitudes toward the Chinese already existed. The Arizona Weekly Miner on May 29, 1869, noted, "We have heretofore neglected to inform our readers that a veritable young Celestial arrived at Fort Whipple, a short time ago. Should he live long enough to become a man, Yavapai County will contain one Chinaman." In Prescott, they were produce farmers, miners, cooks in saloons and restaurants, domestic servants, laundry owners and even a faro dealer. In 1900, the Chinese population peaked at 229. Because these men had every intention of returning home to China, they came as sojourners (temporary residents) who intended to return to China once they had accumulated enough money.

Various factors contributed to the departure of the Chinese from Prescott. In 1886, Stephen B. Marcou started a campaign against the Chinese and established an Anti-Chinese League. In 1891, Granite Creek overran its banks and flooded Chinatown. In 1892, opposition to immigration and residence of Chinese in the United States peaked with congressional passage of the Geary Act, which extended for ten years the Exclusion Act of 1882, banned new immigration from China, and for the re-entry of former residents required a certificate of residence, which included a photograph and details about the person. The 1900 fire consumed the red light district with its restaurants, hotels, saloons, stores, sporting parlors and other businesses which were owned by or employed Chinese. Further erosion of employment opportunities occurred in 1907, when gambling was declared illegal in Arizona Territory. Then in 1914, Prohibition closed the saloons and their restaurants and many Chinese cooks lost their jobs. Lastly, the Great Depression of 1929 saw the demise of the four remaining laundries, the Yee Hang Yon Restaurant, and the Dong Wah and Quong Hing groceries.

Historical Archaeology:

The key phrase of Cultural Resource Management (CRM) is "resource management," where investigation of an area to be impacted by construction projects results in a survey to determine what archaeological remains are present and how to minimize their destruction. The excavation component of CRM is concerned with the recovery and interpretation of both prehistoric and historic sites endangered by modern progress.

Historical archaeology looks at material remains from past societies that also left written evidence about themselves, and are thus "historical." The Prescott City Centre dig is an excellent example of modern multidisciplinary historical archaeology. It will combine the expertise of archivists, architectural historians, and cultural material specialists as well as archaeologists. Archival documents, photographs, and maps indicate where to dig, and suggest which former structure relates to each trash pit and artifact. The food bone will be analyzed for butchering techniques, and patent medicines will hint at diseases of the red light zone. Asian Studies scholars will be consulted to identify such esoteric items as Chinese gambling pieces.

The excavation is collaboration between the City of Prescott, the M3 Corporation, and Sharlot Hall Museum. It is being carried out by SWCA Environmental Consultants.

For more information on old Prescott, visit the Sharlot Hall Museum Archives (Tuesday – Friday, Noon to 4 and Saturday, 10-2). Call 928.445.3122 or visit www.sharlot.org.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(bub8069pc)
Reuse only by permission.

A cross section of Prescottonians at the Union Saloon in 1892 show miners, cowboys, restaurant workers, a Chinese man and a prostitute. We know plenty about the miners, etc, but we have little or no record about prostitution from early Prescott. The dig will shed light on these other populations.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(map 819.1) Reuse only by permission.

This lithograph, looking NE toward Fort Whipple, created in about 1886, shows many buildings on Granite Street, which runs along Granite Creek in the foreground. The properties on Granite Street all show large backyards, connecting with the alley between Granite Street and Montezuma Street. After the 1900 fire, the area of the Prescott City Centre dig has only had three small structures, leaving much of the historic material from before the fire intact.