Henry Hiram Wilky (1838-1900) - Farmer

 

PCA Archives

Henry Wilky began life as Heinrich Wilke.  He was born on January 8, 1838, in Duchy of Brunswick (Braunschweig), Germany, to a farm family.

Germany saw much political turmoil in the following years, as a revolution in 1848 failed and Prussia became the most powerful of Germany’s many duchies.  Europe was also undergoing an industrial revolution, as farms with mechanized equipment were soon outcompeting small farms that depended on hand labor.  Prussia’s imperial ambitions also led to the conscription of young men into the military.  Wilke may have left Braunschweig for any of these reasons.

He arrived in New Orleans in 1855 and made his way up the Mississippi River to Burton, Adams County, Illinois, where he found employment on the farm of Peter Rump.  The Rumps were originally from Hanover--only 40 miles from Braunschweig. 

Henry obviously intended to remain in the United States, as he filed a naturalization petition in 1860.  By 1861, he had a farm of his own and, on April 2^nd, he married Sophia Lutgerding, a neighbor.  She was the daughter of George Lutgerding and Elizabeth Rump (possibly a relative of Peter Rump) of Adams County, Illinois.

The Wilkys had six children:  George L., born 1862; William H., born 1865; Frederick Daniel, born 1867; John Adolph, born 1870; Clara Ellen, born 1877: and Lena Madelia, born 1880.  The family very likely spoke German at home.  By 1870, they had moved to Marion County, Missouri, where the census recorded them as Wilkys.

By 1882, the oldest Wilky sons were adults and needed farms of their own.  Henry and Sophia sold their property in Missouri and came by train to Maricopa in November.  From Maricopa, they traveled by wagon to Phoenix.   At first, they homesteaded in the area of 99^th Ave and Indian School but, due to lack of water, they had to move to about 67^th Ave and Indian School.

The Wilkys’ last years were marked by the loss of close relatives.  Their son John Adolph died in 1886 and son Frederick Daniel in 1900.   Henry Wilky himself died on December 22, 1900, of septicemia.  He was buried in the family plot in City Loosley Cemetery.  Sophia followed him in 1908.

The Wilkys’ descendants prospered in Arizona.   More than a century after their arrival in the Valley of the Sun, they generously donated funds for a wrought iron arch for Rosedale Cemetery.

- by Donna L. Carr

 

Amos G. Randal (1828 -1897) - Undertaker

 

PCA Photo

Amos Randal was born in Cattaraugus County, New York state, about 1828.  In 1849 he caught gold fever and journeyed overland to California.  However, he seems not to have had much luck at mining and so turned to other occupations.

In 1860, he was a single man living in Marysville, Yuba County, California, and running a stationery store with two Lassiter brothers.  While there, he met and married Clara Jane McGrew on July 14, 1862.  Their first child, Norina Katherine, was born in March, 1864.

During the Civil War, Randal supplemented his income from the stationery store by serving in the militia as a recruiting officer.  In June, 1863, he was commissioned a sergeant major in the 2nd Battalion, 4th Brigade, California Militia.  On April 22, 1865, with the war drawing to a close, Randal enlisted in Company A, 4th California Infantry at the Presidio in San Francisco.  He went in as a 2nd lieutenant and soon rose to the rank of captain.  His military career turned out to be very short, however, as his unit mustered out on November 30, 1865.

The California Great Register of 1867 recorded the Randals living in Oakland, California.  Son Ernest Grant born in 1868.  Another daughter, Margaret “Daisy”, was born 1874 in Tulare, California.  The federal census of 1880 found the Randals living in Hills Ferry, Stanislaus County, California, where Randal was working as a carpenter.

Around 1882, the family moved to Prescott, Arizona, and Randal went into the undertaking business.  In April 1886, the Randals’ last child, Theodore, was born.

Moving to Phoenix in 1892, Randal became associated with the undertaking firm of Mr. W. A. Davis.   Amos Randal then applied for an invalid pension, citing health issues, but his application was rejected because his service had not begun until after the Civil War had ended.

Around 1894, Randal contracted blood poisoning when he stabbed his finger with an embalming needle.  He had several relapses which caused him much suffering.  Due to his ongoing health problems, his application for an invalid pension was finally approved in 1896.

On December 1, 1897, Randal was in Porter Cemetery, assisting with the burial of Gustavus A. Kirtley, a Confederate veteran.  As the mourners were leaving the grave, Randal walked to his buggy, then suddenly fell to his knees, pitched forward on his face and expired.  

Dr. Wylie was summoned, but Randal was beyond help.  A coroner’s jury decided that he had died of heart trouble, brought on by his bout of blood poisoning.  Randal was interred two days later in Porter Cemetery, after services conducted by the local GAR post.  Randal’s widow Clara Jane applied for and received a widow’s pension.

-by Donna L. Carr

12 Graves of Christmas - 2025

 

Rosedale Cemetery - Janet Winnicke

The 12 Graves of Christmas Begins Friday!

This December, we’re celebrating the season by sharing 12 stories of pioneers buried in our historic cemeteries. Each day, we’ll highlight a life that helped shape our community.

The holidays are a time for reflection and gratitude, and honoring the people who came before us is one of the greatest ways we keep their legacy alive.

Follow along as we bring history to light, one grave at a time.

Photo: PCA Archives

#1 Amos J. Dye (1847-1905) - Judge and Ohio State Legislator

 

PCA Archives

Amos J. Dye was born April 2, 1847, in Marietta, Ohio.  He was the son of Amos J. Dye, Sr., and Maria Taylor.  In 1860, the Dyes owned a large and valuable tobacco farm.

On 18 January 1864, at the age of eighteen, Amos enlisted in the Union army and was assigned to Company H, 77th Ohio Volunteer Infantry.  Just a few weeks thereafter, he married Marinda Jane McCowan on February 11, 1864. 

On January 1, 1865, he transferred to Company D, 77th Ohio Volunteer Infantry.  He was discharged March 8, 1866 in Brownsville, Texas, with the rank of private.  Possibly his unit went there after the Civil War as part of the Reconstruction effort.

Amos Dye and Marinda had a son, Herbert, in 1867, and a daughter, Ida, in 1868.   He was admitted to the Ohio bar as a lawyer in 1877.  By 1880, the Dyes were living in Huntington, West Virginia, where Amos was practicing law.

Marinda died of stomach cancer in May, 1894, in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she had been active in a fraternal society called the Knights and Ladies of Honor.  Amos Dye himself was by then a Mason, and a Republican state legislator.  Soon, he became an attorney for the Ohio State Dairy and Food Department.

Dye married Ida Selma Schaetzle, a divorcee, on December 12, 1895.  A son named Amos was born in 1897 and a daughter, Selma, in 1901.   Another son, Stelman, seems to have died in infancy.

In 1896, Amos Dye was accused of accepting a $5000 bribe from a representative of the Paskola Company on condition that the state would not prosecute a case against the company.  Dye vigorously denied taking a bribe and countersued.  Apparently he did not lose his state position since he continued to handle cases.

Tiring of Ohio winters, Dye purchased the Rumney house on Grand Avenue in 1902 and thereafter, the Dyes spent their winters in Phoenix.  The Dye family was living a mile and a half north of Grand Avenue when Amos died on December 30, 1905, of cardiac insufficiency.  He was buried in the Masons Cemetery, Block 17, Lot 3, Grave 3.

Dye’s widow Ida was left to raise their two surviving children alone.  She filed for a widow’s pension on February 17, 1906, but her application was rejected on the grounds that Dye’s cause of death was not the result of his military service.  She did not remain alone for long, though.  Sometime in 1908, she married Peter William De Jong.  Ida lived until 1954.

-by Donna Carr

 

#2 Baldomedo Peralta (abt 1852-1903) - A Christmas Eve Tragedy

 

Generic AI Image

Descendants of Baldomedo Peralta believe that he was born in Rio De San Pedro, Cuevas de Batuco, Sonora, Mexico.  He may have been the son of a Pedro Peralta.  His birth year seems to have been somewhere between 1849 and 1854, but verifiable records do not begin until he arrived in Phoenix in 1880.

Apparently, Peralta and Guadalupe Baldenegro had been keeping company since at least 1879.  They were on their way by wagon train from Superior to Phoenix in August, 1880, when their first child, Rosario, was born at a wagon stop called La Poste (now Apache Junction).

Upon reaching Phoenix, the couple was married on September 19, 1880, in a civil ceremony—possibly because there was no Catholic priest available. 

Thereafter, the Peraltas had children at regular intervals.  Descendants think there were twelve, although only six lived to adulthood.   It is not known for sure where they were all born, although the Peraltas seem to have resided in Phoenix continuously and not migrated back and forth between Mexico and Arizona.  A two-year-old daughter, Louisa, died in 1900 and was buried in Rosedale Cemetery.  Her older sister Guadalupe, aged 9, died in 1902 and was also buried in Rosedale.

Despite the vagueness of his origins, Baldomedo Peralta seems to have had some education.   Apparently regarded as ‘white’, he registered to vote in 1884, 1890, 1892, 1894 and 1900.  He was active in a Latino mutual-aid society and was also a member of Phoenix’s volunteer fire brigade.

On Christmas Eve, 1903, the Peralta family was enjoying a festive meal at their home when a kerosene lamp exploded, setting fire to the room.  Although the family ran outside into the yard, Baldomedo and Guadalupe quickly realized that one of the children was missing.  Peralta reentered the burning house, located the child and passed him through an open window to the family outside.  He then attempted to save some of the family’s belongings.  When he emerged from the house, his hair and clothing were on fire.  Although he stanched the blood flowing from a vein in his neck and walked to a doctor to be bandaged, his burns turned out to be more severe than was first thought.  He was admitted to Sisters’ Hospital, where he died on December 27th.  He was buried in the Catholic section of Loosley Cemetery.

After Baldomedo’s death, the oldest Peralta son, Porfirio, became the head of the family.  He too would eventually join the fire brigade.  Porfirio and his family remained in Phoenix until 1921, when they followed some of the other Peralta siblings to California.

- by Donna Carr

 

 

#3 Angeline “Angie” Piper (1876-1899) - Schoolteacher

 

Stock Photo

Angeline Piper was born 1876 in Kansas to Ray Piper and Sarah née Fortney.  Angie’s parents had been married in Bourbon, Kansas, on October 22, 1874.  Angie had a younger brother John, who was born in 1878, but he died in 1881.  Nearly two years later, Angie’s father also died, leaving her mother to raise Angie and her sister Raye, born after Mr. Piper’s death.  Since Angie’s mother did not remarry, perhaps she had sufficient means to raise two children on her own.

In 1887, a rabid dog bit Angie, her mother and sister.  According to one news report, only a “mad stone” (a bezoar stone found in the digestive tract of some animals) would save them from contracting rabies.  One was found in Chetopa, Kansas, and all must have gone well, as they all survived.

 Angie began attending Oswego College for Young Ladies in 1893 and obtained a teaching certificate.  At some point, she joined the Royal Neighbors Society.  The Society, established in 1895, was a progressive women’s fraternal benefit association and an auxiliary to Modern Woodmen of America.  It focused on assisting women and children in need and offering life insurance for women--an option never before available to women.  Today, Royal Neighbor is the largest women-led life insurer in the country.

In April 1898, Angie became quite sick while teaching in Fort Scott, Kansas, and her mother was sent for.  Under her mother’s care, Angie recovered and, in November, her mother left for Arizona to visit relatives.  Angie remained in Fort Scott at the home of an uncle, but later joined her mother in Arizona.

Angie went to Arizona primarily to recuperate.  Unfortunately, she developed typhoid fever and died December 30, 1899.  Although she was initially buried in Rosedale Cemetery, her mother later had her remains moved to the IOOF Cemetery when Angie’s Royal Neighbors Society insurance policy paid out.

by Patricia G.

 

#12 Perlina Swetnam Osborn (1821-1912) - Arizona Pioneer

PCA Archives

Perlina Elizabeth Swetnam was born on January 21, 1821, in Lawrence County, Kentucky.  The daughter of Neri Swetnam and Mildred Cross, she was the youngest of their nine children.  As Perlina is an unusual name, she sometimes appears on the census as ‘Paulina’.

In March 25, 1841, she married John Preston Osborn, a native of Claiborne County, Tennessee.  By 1850, they were farming in Morgan County, Kentucky., and already had four children.

Around 1853, the Osborns relocated to Adams County, Iowa.  The Civil War was in full swing by 1863, when they moved to Colorado, but they had their sights set on the newly created territory of Arizona.  Early in 1864, the Osborns joined a party of emigrants traveling via Santa Fe to northern Arizona.  They arrived in Prescott on July 6, 1864, with three or four ox teams and wagons loaded with flour, ham and bacon which they sold to Prescott’s hungry miners.  With flour selling at $1 a pound and bacon at $.75 a pound, they soon had enough capital to begin their family’s new life in Arizona.

The Osborns built Osborn House, one of Prescott’s first hotels, which provided modest accommodations with a menu of pork and beans, bread and coffee.  Perlina, by now expecting her tenth child, remained in Prescott to run it while John Preston explored Del Rio and the Verde Valley and tried his hand at farming and ranching.  Unfortunately, his attempts came to naught as the local Yavapai tribesmen repeatedly raided his livestock and crops.

The Osborns’ oldest children having reached marrying age, daughter Jenettie wed Joseph Thomas Barnum in 1865, and Louisa married an up-and-coming lawyer named John Alsap on June 6, 1866. However, the alliance was short-lived as she died barely a year later.

The Osborn's son, John Jr., along with his erstwhile brother-in-law, John Alsap, moved south to the Salt River Valley in 1869, and John Sr. and Perlina joined them in January 1870, establishing a homestead at what would become McDowell and Seventh Street.

Once again, the Osborns were among the first white families to settle in a pioneer town.  John Preston, now in his sixties, became an influential citizen of the new town.  Perlina was known for her nursing skills, and the Osborns hosted many a traveling minister during Phoenix’s early years.

When John Preston Osborn died on January 19, 1900, he was buried in the A.O.U.W. Cemetery.  Around the time of Osborn's death, the street that ran along the south side of the Osborns' farm became known as Osborn Road, a tribute to this pioneer family.

Perlina passed away on December 3, 1912, at the age of 91. 

-by Donna Carr

12 Graves of Christmas: Honoring Our December Pioneers

PCA Archive

This December, we will commemorate 12 pioneers from our historic cemetery who passed away during this month. Through this countdown, we honor their contributions to our community, reflect on the challenges they faced, and remember the impact they had during their time.

While some of their stories are somber, they are an important part of our history, reminding us of the resilience and humanity of those who came before us. Join us in this journey of reflection and remembrance as we count down the 12 days, preserving their memory during this season of reflection and giving.