Norma Jackson Helm (1863-1891) - Southern Belle

 

PCA Archives

Norma Jackson was born December 1863 in Madison, Morgan County, Georgia, to newlyweds Jesse Wade Jackson and his wife, Julia Tunnell.  Although Madison is near Atlanta, it escaped destruction during General Sherman’s March to the Sea in 1864 because it was home to a pro-Union congressman, Joshua Hill. 

Surprisingly for a white Southerner, Norma’s father was a Republican.  As a matter of fact, he became a personal friend of Ulysses S. Grant, who arranged an appointment in the U. S. Revenue Department for him in 1881.  The Jacksons resided in Washington, D. C. until March 1887, when Jesse passed away.  His body was returned for burial in the family plot at Buckhead, Georgia.

As her parents’ only child, the move to Washington had benefitted Norma.  Raised in the genteel traditions of the Old South, she was expected to act as a gracious hostess at the tea parties and social events befitting her station in society.  When she came down with consumption, she travelled to Los Angeles to visit an aunt.  While there, she met Dr. Scott Helm and became engaged to him.

In February 1890, a Los Angeles newspaper reported, “Miss Norma Jackson, of Capitol Hill, the only child of the late Jesse W. Jackson, was married on the 12th instant, at Phoenix, the capital of Arizona, to Dr. Scott Helm, a native of Kentucky, a graduate of Princeton College and Rush Medical College, [and] of Heidelberg, Germany.  Miss Norma is well-known in Washington, where her grace, beauty and accomplishments won her many admirers.  She was on the Pacific Slope visiting her aunt, where she was wooed, won and wed by the fortunate doctor.”

As the wife of Dr. Helm, the foremost surgeon in the Arizona Territory, Norma entertained frequently and became known for her charm and hospitality.  Her circle of acquaintances included her half-aunt, the much-married Mary Taylor Woolsey Sullivan Fry Baxter.

Norma’s health took a turn for the worse late in 1890.  In February 1891, the Helms celebrated their first—and last--wedding anniversary with an excursion to the Hole in the Rock near Scottsdale, where the party was serenaded by a local singer known as “Monsieur Mumm”.

Despite Dr. Helm’s expert ministrations, Norma died on April 30, 1891, at the age of 28, and was buried in Porter Cemetery.

Dr. Helm did not remain a widower for long.  In November, 1892, he married Miss Jane Beeler of Kentucky.

 

- by Donna L. Carr

 

Nicholas A. Connick (1838-1898) - Merchant and Accountant

 

Bing AI Generated

Nicholas A. Connick is believed to have been of Irish descent, but he was born about 1837 in Pennsylvania.  However, he didn’t remain there.  Unlike the majority of immigrant Irish who settled in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and the industrial northwest, Connick was living in Texas at the outbreak of the Civil War. 

He seems to have had a fairly good education since, on August 26, 1861, he enlisted as a sergeant in Capt. Charles Mason’s Company D, Cook’s Battalion, 1st Texas Heavy Artillery.  By October, 1861, he was with the Pelican Battery at Galveston, defending the Texas coast from ships of the Union Navy. 

Connick’s military service was short, however, as he was discharged on November 22, 1861, after being promoted to the rank of major.  Thereafter, he served the Confederate cause as chief clerk in a Houston commissary.  A Confederate coupon from 1864, worth two dollars in groceries, bears his signature, written in a fair hand.

On April 27, 1862, Connick married Nathalia F. Gaye in Christ Church, Houston, Texas. The 1880 federal census found Nicholas Connick living in the newly-formed county of Somervell, Texas, and working as a bookkeeper.  By this time, he was a widower.

Sometime before 1891, Connick arrived in Phoenix, Arizona, where he opened a saloon near the train depot.  The Great Flood of 1891 forced the relocation of the establishment to higher ground.

Early in January, 1891, Connick joined a newly formed group of ex-Confederates.  Twenty-three local men attended its first meeting.  Ivy Cox was elected president and Connick became the secretary.  Thomas Greenhaw and Dr. Oscar Mahoney formed a committee to look into permanent organization.  The group’s goal was to promote good fellowship and assist old comrades in distress.

Perhaps competition drove Connick out of the saloon business, as the 1892 city directory of Phoenix listed him as an accountant.  In addition to being proficient with figures, he was regarded as being a sociable, cultured man and a brilliant conversationalist, with vivid memories of the Civil War.

On November 18, 1898, Connick died of typhoid at the county hospital in Phoenix.  Although his death certificate suggests that he was to be buried in the county cemetery, his old comrades arranged to have him interred as a veteran in Porter Cemetery.  No grave marker survives.

- Donna L. Carr

 

 

Anna Mary Fisher Dameron (1839-1894) - From Missouri to Arizona

 

Porter Cemetery - PCA Archives

Anna Mary Fisher was born March 27, 1839, in Lewis County, Missouri.  She was one of five children of James Fisher and Lucinda Doke, who were fairly well-to-do farmers.

On Valentine’s Day 1866, Anna married Willis Monroe Dameron in Adams County, Illinois.   Willis had been married previously to Sarah Dysart, the daughter of a clergyman. She had died in 1860, presumably from complications following childbirth.   Dameron, who was supporting his widowed mother and his little son Everett, seems not to have served on either side during the Civil War.

After their marriage, Willis and Anna farmed in La Belle, Lewis County, Missouri.  They had two sons of their own:  Logan Douglas, born in 1867, and Richard Monroe, born in 1872. Logan was named after his paternal uncle, a successful dry goods merchant.

The Damerons’ son Logan attended La Belle Academy and taught for five years before enrolling in Hospital Medical College in Louisville, Kentucky.  After graduating in 1891, he moved to Phoenix where he went into practice with Dr. H. A. Hughes.

By then, Anna was in poor health.  When Logan returned to Missouri for a Christmas visit in December, 1892, he persuaded Anna and Willis to accompany him back to Phoenix.

Anna lived for two more years before dying of pneumonia on December 31, 1894.  After a Methodist Episcopal service conducted by Rev. W. A. Harris, she was buried in Porter Cemetery.  Her husband joined her in January, 1907.

Shortly after Anna’s death, her son Logan married Bettie Hughes, the daughter of his partner.  Having helped to start the Arizona chapter of the American Medical Association, he became its president in 1903.

 - by Donna L. Carr

 

 

DeForest Porter (1839-1889) - Territorial Justice and Mayor of Phoenix

Donna Carr

 

The man who would one day be the mayor of Phoenix, Arizona, was born on February 2, 1839, in western New York state.  He was the youngest of nine children belonging to George A. Porter and his wife, Anna Gillett.

Young DeForest grew up in Albion, Orleans County, New York.  He enrolled in St. Lawrence University with the intention of becoming a Unitarian minister.  However, while campaigning for Lincoln in 1860, his imagination was fired by politics.  Upon graduation, he was ordained but decided to go into law instead, as had his older brother George, Jr.

According to sources, Porter enlisted in the Union Army and received a severe wound at the Battle of Gettysburg.  After the war, he married Julia Sophia Trowbridge and they settled in Brownville, Nemaha County, Nebraska, where Porter opened his law office and began his political career.

In 1872, Ulysses S. Grant nominated Porter to the Arizona Territorial Supreme Court. He moved to Arizona City (now Yuma) in April to become an associate justice.  Because the summers were so hot, Porter’s wife Julia was staying in California when their son, DeForest Jr., was born in 1875.  In 1876, Maricopa County was added to Porter’s judicial district and he moved to Phoenix, an agricultural area where it was marginally cooler.

After Julia’s death in 1878, Porter married Lois "Lulu" Gertrude Cotton on December 29, 1880.  They had one daughter, Marian.  Porter acquired considerable land in Phoenix, and he also had mining interests.

Porter resigned from the Arizona Territorial Supreme Court in 1882, hoping to be elected to some legislative office.  Although initially unsuccessful in that, he was elected mayor of Phoenix in 1883.  Among the achievements of his first term was the establishment of the fraternal cemeteries that occupy Block 32 [Neahr's Addition] of the Phoenix townsite. They are now part of the PMMP. 

Porter served briefly in the territorial legislature in 1885-1886 before being elected to a another term as Phoenix mayor.  During his second term, the Normal school in Tempe (now ASU) was established as well as the Territorial Insane Asylum, and Porter lobbied the heads of the Southern Pacific Railroad to lay rails to Tempe from Maricopa.

Porter's health was adversely affected by Arizona's hot climate.  On Feb. 17, 1889, he  died following a severe bout of erysipelas.   Although originally buried in the Knights of Pythias Cemetery, he was moved to Porter Cemetery in March 1890, after his widow had had the new Porter cemetery laid out.  His remains, and those of his first wife, were moved to Greenwood in 1916, where the Porter and Cotten families share an impressive monument.

- 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

Edward O. Schwartz (1842-1904) - Civil War Veteran and Adjutant General of Arizona

 

PCA Archives

Edward O. Schwartz was born in New York on February 19, 1842, to Louis Schwartz and Catherine Boese.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Schwartz enlisted in the 8th New York Militia in April 1861 and mustered out in August of that year. He then enlisted in the 4th New York Cavalry in January 1862.  Although he fell ill with typhoid fever later that year, he recovered sufficiently to achieve the rank of lieutenant.  A year later, he was promoted to captain and, in March 1864, he became a major. 

Schwartz fought in several major battles which included the battle of Cross Keys, Virginia; Second Bull Run (Manassas); Chancellorsville; and Gettysburg.  In 1864, he participated  in General Philip Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley campaign and was present at the June 11-12 battle of Trevilian Station.  He was honorably discharged at the end of the war.

After the war, Schwartz went West. He was part of a military detachment that escorted engineer and geologist Clarence King through northern Arizona and other parts of the West in the Fortieth Parallel Survey of 1867-1873. Schwartz later relocated to New Mexico where he left service and married Angeline Flint in Santa Fe in 1880.  Their union produced one daughter.

A few years later, the family moved to Phoenix, where Schwartz engaged in various business enterprises.  An engraver by trade, he was elected recorder of the City of Phoenix in 1890, a post he held for six years.  In 1891, he joined the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR), becoming commander of the Arizona GAR that same year.  In April 1893, the new territorial governor, Louis Cameron Hughes, appointed Schwartz Adjutant General of Arizona. He served for six years and was regarded as an able commander.

The Schwartzes left Phoenix in 1897 and moved to Seattle. From there, they went to San Francisco before returning to Phoenix in 1899.  In a newspaper article, Schwartz declared, “Not until one leaves Phoenix does he appreciate the business advantages it presents.”

One of the last services Schwartz performed for his community was organizing the Decoration Day service for the GAR which took place on May 29, 1903, at the city cemetery.  There was no march, as it was deemed too much of a strain for the old soldiers, but Major Schwartz did invite veterans of the Confederacy to participate in the ceremonies too.

Major Edward Schwartz died at home on March 1, 1904.  On March 3rd, he was interred in the Porter Cemetery with full military honors.

 - by Mark Lamm

Theodore Buck (1824-1896) - A Union Artilleryman at Vicksburg

 

PCA Archives

Theodore Buck claimed to have been born in 1824 in Prussia.

Buck was older than the average recruit when he enlisted in the Union Army on November 23, 1862, in Clinton, Illinois.   While serving as a private in Battery F, 2nd Illinois Light Artillery, he suffered deafness in both ears, likely caused by the incessant cannonading during the Siege of Vicksburg in 1863.  He was discharged July 27, 1865 with the rank of private. 

By 1878, Buck was in Phoenix, where he registered to vote.  The 1880 federal census of Phoenix, Arizona, shows a Theodor Buck, born Prussia 1825, unmarried, living in the household of Miguel Peralta, a general store proprietor.  Buck was working as a porter in the store.

Theodore Buck was a founding member of the John Wren Owen GAR post.  In 1887 and again in 1892, he visited the hospital at the Old Soldiers Home in Leavenworth, Kansas, for medical attention.  He applied for and received invalid pension #771,427.

When he died on October 24, 1896, Buck was living at the Star Lodging House and working as a janitor at the Five Points School.  He was buried in Porter Cemetery, Block 33, Grave C.  His grave has a military marker. 

- by Donna L. Carr

 

George Washington Sanders (1839-1904) - Union Veteran and Mining Superintendent

 

PCA Archives

George Washington Sanders was born September 6, 1839, in Fort Covington, New York.  He was the oldest of eleven children born to Eliphalet Pike Sanders and his first wife, Melissa Henry.   In 1846, the Sanders family moved to Ashtabula, Ohio.

On September 9, 1861, George Sanders enlisted in the Union Army at Trumbull, Ohio, and was assigned to Battery C of the 1st Regiment Ohio Light Artillery. However, he did not see much action as he was often sick and in hospital.  On September 26, 1862, he was discharged for disability at Camp Chase, Columbus, Ohio.  Despite his relatively short service, he became a devoted member of the Grand Army of the Republic, being elected commander of the Arizona Department in April 1903 at the San Francisco Grand Encampment.

Sanders moved to Polk, Iowa, in 1863.  In 1866, he married Mary Beebe, and they soon had two children, Albert and Ethel.   After Ethel’s birth, Sanders moved the family to Salt Lake City.  He and Mary had two more children in Utah; Ida and George.   

After Mary’s death in childbirth in 1877, Sanders took his family back to Iowa.  By 1880 he was remarried to a woman named Lizzie.

It wasn’t long before Sanders set his sights on the West again.  This time he travelled to Arizona.  By 1881, he and nine other men had created the Sanders Arizona Mining company which aimed to produce copper, silver, gold and other metals from mines in Pima County.

It was right at the turn of the century and near the end of his life that Sanders experienced his greatest achievements and his greatest losses. By 1899, he had divorced his second wife Lizzie and lost his daughter Ethel and grandson Sanders in what was believed to be a murder-suicide. But it was also that same year when he became superintendent of the Vulture Mine near Wickenburg and began work to get the mine back into production.

When Sanders first took charge, the Vulture Mine didn’t have enough water. By cyaniding the tailings, he recovered enough gold to finance drilling the mine deeper to locate an existing water source.  In 1901, the mine struck a new vein of gold ore.  As one of the financiers, Sanders received much of the initial profits.  

It was also during 1901 that Sanders was married for the third time--to Clara Glenn.

On March 20, 1902, Sanders sustained serious injuries when he was thrown from a streetcar of the Phoenix Railway Company.  He died on February 6, 1904, of heart complications attributed to his 1902 accident.  He was buried in Porter Cemetery under the auspices of the local GAR post.

 - by Tricia Alexander

 

Did You Know? Phoenix 1800s Veterans' Cemetery Owner: Lulu Porter

 

PCA Archives

Did you know one of Phoenix’s oldest veterans' cemeteries was owned by a woman in the 1800s?

Lulu Porter, wife of Mayor DeForest Porter, owned the southern half of Block 22 in Neahr’s Addition. This land would become Porter Cemetery.

The land was purchased by the Porters in 1887, although it was not denoted which of the Porter's owned it. DeForest Porter died in 1889, and Lulu moved his body from the Knights of Pythias Cemetery in 1890. She also reinterred her father there, James M. Cotten, a Phoenix pioneer. These burials marked the beginning of what would grow into a community cemetery.

Later, early city plat maps from 1891 labeled it “Mrs. Porter Cemetery,” recognizing Lulu as the owner.

Today, Porter Cemetery is one of the most historically significant parts of Pioneer & Military Memorial Park, not just for its founders, but for its veterans.

It holds nearly one-third of all military burials in PMMP.

To find out more, read "Histories of Pioneer Cemeteries in Phoenix, Arizona" by Ed Dobbins at the Internet Archive. 

Anne Morrison Perley (1865-1932) - A Teacher in Puerto Rico

Pinterest Post Card - 1907

Anne Morrison Perley was born January 28, 1865, in Henry County, Illinois, to Peleg Stone Perley and Nancy Eliza Morrison.  Anne had three siblings:  Bruce, Grace and Harriet (known as Polly).  

Anne came from a family of teachers.  Her grandfather, Nathanial Perley, had been an educator for over 30 years, and her father Peleg was a teacher prior to becoming a lawyer and practicing law in Henry, Illinois.

  Peleg Perley was the postmaster of Henry, Illinois, in the early 1880s.  In 1883, he employed Anne as a postal clerk.   She was attending Washington University’s College of Fine Arts in St. Louis in 1887.

 The Perley family moved to Arizona where Peleg continued his legal career in a milder climate.  Anne travelled to Tombstone to fill the position of assistant principal at Tombstone High School in January, 1892. It was a temporary appointment, and she returned to Phoenix at the end of the school year in June.  Having acquired some administrative experience, she was then hired as the assistant principal for the old Central School at 201 North Central Avenue in Phoenix. 

Anne remained in Phoenix, teaching, until after the death of her parents--her father in 1898 and her mother in 1900.  Thereafter, she went to teach in Bisbee, returning to Phoenix in 1903.  A few years later, Anne departed Arizona for New York and accepted an offer to teach in Puerto Rico.  She arrived there in September 1909 aboard the Steamship Coamo.   The 1910 federal census recorded her as a schoolteacher living in Pueblo Norte, Aibonito. 

Anne may have learned to speak Spanish during her years of teaching in Tombstone, Bisbee and Phoenix.  Acquired by the United States from Spain in 1898, Puerto Rico had a need for bilingual teachers, especially after the Foraker Act of 1901 mandated that English should be the language of instruction in Puerto Rican high schools.

It is not known how long Anne remained in Puerto Rico teaching.  However, by 1920 she was back in Brooklyn, New York, and working as a translator for an export business.  Presumably, she was by then fluent in Spanish. 

Anne was still living in Brooklyn in 1930 when she fell ill and was sent to a private sanitarium in Stamford, Connecticut.  She died there on May 23, 1932.[i]  Her sister Grace arranged for her cremains to be returned to Arizona where she was buried in her parents’ cemetery plot in Porter Cemetery.

 - by Patricia 

Robert John “Robin” Icke (1858-1905) - Ostrich Wrangler

Microsoft Stock Image

Robert John “Robin” Icke was born April 1858 in Attleborough, Warwickshire, England. He married Fannie Townsend in England.  However, their first child, John Henry Townsend Icke, was born April 1888 in Bathurst, Eastern Cape, South Africa, where Mr. Icke had gone to engage in ostrich farming.  Ostrich feathers were in great demand for Victorian ladies’ millinery, and the huge birds were also raised for their meat.

The couple’s second child, Edith Winifred Icke, was born in July 1890 in Wellington, Shropshire, England.  The 1891 census of England and Wales also recorded the Ickes in Wellington, where Mr. Icke was working as a commissions agent.

By about 1893, the Ickes were in Minneapolis, Minnesota, when Mr. Icke was hired by Josiah T. Harbert to manage his ostrich farm in south Phoenix.  Perhaps the desert climate reminded the Ickes of South Africa, for they came to Arizona at once…and stayed.  The United States federal census of 1900 records them living about three miles northwest of Phoenix.

Around this time, newspaper accounts suggest that Robin Icke was of unsound mind.  He was committed to the insane asylum for a brief period in September of 1900. In April 1901, Fannie Icke contracted typhoid fever.  She died on April 13th.   Because Mrs. Icke’s doctor had been sanguine about her chances of recovery, and because of her husband’s previous mental illness, an autopsy was ordered.  It proved, however, that Mrs. Icke had indeed died of typhoid fever.

Fannie Icke was buried in Porter Cemetery, Block 17.  Shortly thereafter, the two Icke children--John, 13, and Edith, 10—were sent back to England to be raised by Fannie’s married sister.

While the exact nature of Robert Icke’s mental illness is not known, the death of his wife and the loss of his children may well have pushed him over the edge.  On March 2, 1905, he died of alcoholism in his room at the Commercial Hotel in Phoenix.  He was buried next to his deceased wife in Porter Cemetery, B17.

- by Donna Carr

 

 

Grace Curns (1877-1894) - Beloved by All

 

AI Bing

Grace was born in 1877 in Winfield, Cowley County, Kansas.   She was the second child of John Wesley Curns and his wife, Frances Virginia Hulse.  In 1880, John Wesley was a real estate agent. Grace’s older brother, John Frank, had been born in 1871, and a younger brother, Edison Speed Curns, was born in 1879.  Edison died at the age of seven and was buried in Winfield, Kansas. 

The Curns family moved to Phoenix sometime between 1887 and April 1893.  Though newcomers, they evidently moved in the best circles and were considered relatively cultured.   The Curnses were members of the Presbyterian Church whose pastor, Rev. Preston McKinney, they had previously known in Kansas. 

As a member of the Phoenix high school class of 1895, Grace belonged to the Ionian Literary Society and Philomathean (musical) Society.  Both societies often performed at community events.   In August 1894, she joined several others in a trip to Mogollons to escape the summer heat.

Grace fell ill early in November and died on November 21, 1894, of cerebritis or a swelling of the brain resulting in severe headaches and seizures.  It is often found in persons with lupus although it may also have been caused by a bacterial infection. 

Her obituary describes her as a dutiful daughter, kind sister, affectionate friend and a young lady of high intellect and industry.  Schoolmates draped her desk in black and covered it with flowers.  At the Presbyterian church, a thirty-six string harp with one broken string symbolized the loss of a favorite Sunday School student.   Rev. Preston McKinney conducted the funeral service, after which the remains were borne to Porter Cemetery.  Grace’s coffin was deposited upon a carpet of flowers that lined the grave in the east half of Block 18.

A few years after Grace’s death, Mr. and Mrs. Curns moved to Willow Creek in Yavapai County. The federal census of 1900 records Mr. Curns as a farmer.  Grace’s surviving brother was a bookkeeper.

- by Donna Carr

 

Dr. Alfred H. Graham (1824-1895) - Physician and Civil War Veteran

 

PCA Archives

Alfred Hamilton Graham was born about 1824 in Beattie’s Ford, Lincoln County, North Carolina, to John Davidson Graham and his first wife, Ann Elizabeth Connor. 

Ann Elizabeth died in 1836 after bearing fourteen children. John Davidson Graham remarried but died in 1847. The federal census of 1850 shows Alfred living with his step-mother, Jane Elizabeth Johnston Graham, and three half-siblings. 

In 1853, Graham enrolled in the University of Pennsylvania. Two years later, he received his medical degree. From 1856 to 1857, he was an assistant surgeon at Blockley Hospital, Philadelphia.

It is not known exactly when or why Graham came to be in Texas. However, by 1860 he was accompanying George Wythe Baylor’s Rangers as a field surgeon while the Rangers patrolled the western frontier of Texas to protect settlers from the Comanches.  

Graham was in Georgetown, Williamson County, Texas, when he married Mary Louise Mason on March 20, 1861. Their first son, Charles, was born in February of the following year.

On March 15, 1862, Graham joined the Confederate Army, enlisting in Company F, 18th Texas Cavalry (Darnell’s Regiment) as ‘acting surgeon’.  His unit was already fighting in the eastern United States as part of the Army of Tennessee when Vicksburg fell in July, 1863.

As the war ground on, recordkeeping in the Confederate Army became rather spotty.  No discharge papers for Graham have been found; however, owing to the fact that Graham’s wife gave birth to a daughter, Mary, on May 31, 1864, it seems likely that Graham was back home in Texas by September, 1863. The Grahams had two more sons in 1865 and 1868.

After the War, Graham resumed his medical practice and also purchased land in Williamson County.  An amateur archaeologist, he excavated and identified some cretaceous-period fossils and sent them to his alma mater in 1874.  He is also said to have written and published a number of accounts and articles about his Civil War experiences.

By 1880, Graham and his wife had also added three more children—Maggie, Mary Louise and James—to the family.  Graham continued to practice medicine in Bagdad and Lampasas, Texas, until about 1890.

Graham was in Phoenix when he died pneumonia on May 3, 1895.  He may have gone there in 1894 for his health.  There is some disagreement over whether he died of consumption, pneumonia, heart failure--or all three.  He was buried in Porter Cemetery under the auspices of the Odd Fellows, the Masons and the Ex-Confederate Association.

Graham’s widow Mary was still living in Houston, Texas in 1919.  She died in Williamson County in September, 1923.

A Graham family photo from 1881 is in the archives of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association, Inc.

- by Donna L. Carr

 

William Lindsey George (1832-1897) - Farmer and Contractor

 

PCA Archive

William Lindsey George was born April 29, 1832, in Shelby County, Kentucky, to James Whitefield George and Frances Booker, farmers.  The Georges had a total of eleven children.

Shelby County was not far from Louisville—and the Ohio River.  Many of Kentucky’s agricultural products were floated down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers on flatboats to New Orleans.  So, after faraway Texas became a state, the Georges moved there, settling in Guadalupe around 1854.

William married Eliza LeGette in about 1858 and they soon had an infant son, James.  The federal census of 1860 records the family farming in New Braunfels, Comal County, Texas.  William’s parents and younger siblings lived on a ranch not far away.

After the outbreak of the Civil War, William waited until March 26, 1862, when he enlisted in Seguin, Texas.  He was assigned to Company K, 8th Texas Infantry, CSA, later under the command of Colonel Ireland.  The 8th Texas Infantry served in East Texas throughout the war, so William was able to visit his family occasionally.  His wife Eliza gave birth to son Henry in September, 1862, and to William Jr. in March 1864.  At the end of the war, William was discharged with the rank of captain.

Big events were taking place on the Great Plains, as the Transcontinental Railroad pushed westward.  By 1870, the entire George family had moved to Kansas City, where they worked as cattle traders.  William even became (briefly) the president of a Kansas City bank.

In 1886, the Georges moved to Arizona, where William ran a freighting business and became involved in building railroads, canals and reservoirs.  He was one of the contractors who built the Gila Bend canal and the Agua Fria reservoir.

As a prominent businessman, William maintained a keen interest in local politics and was several times asked to run for office.  In 1888, he yielded to voters’ entreaties but bowed out rather than stoop to the kind of unethical behavior needed to get elected.  Thereafter, he was elected to the County Board of Supervisors strictly on his merits.

In August 1897, William experienced a couple of angina attacks.  Although the attacks passed, his doctor advised him to send for his wife, who was in California.  She arrived in Phoenix just five hours before William died early in the morning of August 20th. 

The funeral sermon was preached by Rev. W. E. Vaughan of the Methodist Episcopal church.  A modest man, William had previously requested that there be no empty eulogies, but his friends and business associates attested to his honesty and moral uprightness.   He was buried near his brother James Benjamin in Porter Cemetery, Block 41, space B. 

by Donna L. Carr 

Frederick J. O’Hara (1875 - 1901) - Member of the Fraternal Order of Eagles

 

PCA Archives

Fred J. O’Hara was born on July 3, 1875, in Kent County, Michigan.  He was the son of Sarah J. Lamoreaux and her second husband, Bryan O’Hara.  Bryan O’Hara was from Ireland  

From at least 1874 to 1887, the O’Haras lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Bryan worked as a cabinet-maker.  Sarah divorced Bryan in 1885, claiming that he was a drunkard and failed to support her and the children.  On December 7, 1887, Bryan O'Hara died as a result of injuries received during a saloon fight in Evansville, Indiana.

Sarah and her two children moved west to Tacoma, Washington, after Bryan’s death.   Fred may have become a touring musician, as his comings and goings from Tacoma were occasionally noted in the newspapers.  Apparently, his banjo was briefly stolen—but recovered—in 1895.

He soon joined the Eagles, a fraternal organization formed in 1898 in Seattle which drew its membership from among those in the performing arts. 

Suffering from an unspecified illness, Fred had moved to Phoenix, Arizona, by 1901.  He died of peritonitis at Sisters’ Hospital on November 1, 1901, and was buried in Porter Cemetery by the local chapter of the Eagles, Aeyrie 178.  The Eagles also provided his grave marker.

- by Donna Carr

 

 

#10 Tallman Jacob "T.J" Trask (1852-1894) - Pioneer Grocer

 

PCA Archives

Tallman Jacob Trask was born 1852 in Vassalboro, Maine, one of eleven children born to William Chase Trask and his second wife, Sophia Winslow.  By 1860, the Trask family had moved to Concord, Illinois.

When he was 17, Tallman, or T. J. as he was known, went to work for Abel Gum as a clerk in Gum’s dry goods store.  T.J. roomed with the Gum family while he learned the ins-and-outs of the mercantile trade. 

Around 1876, young Trask traveled west to Pueblo, Colorado, where he became the head clerk in the grocery store of John D. Miller..  It was there that he met Laura E. Cooper, whom he married in July of 1877.   The couple had two children born between 1878 and 1879, but both died in infancy and were buried in the Odd Fellows section of the Pueblo Pioneer Cemetery.

In 1879, T. J and Laura moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to start a new store with Lyman Putney, a business man from Lawrence, Kansas.  The store, which specialized in wholesale groceries and exotic fruits from California, was located in downtown Albuquerque on Railroad Avenue, opposite the train depot. 

T.J. and Laura had a tumultuous relationship, with Laura spending much of her time with her family in Pueblo and Kansas.  In the spring of 1884, T. J. filed for divorce on the grounds of desertion.  It was granted in October of 1884.  In December of 1884, he married Lizzie Strother of Ohio, thought by some to have been “an adventuress”.  T. J. dissolved his business interests with his partner Lyman Putney and moved to Phoenix, Arizona, where he opened a store with his new brother-in-law, Emory Kays. 

Still later, in 1892, T.J. opened another store with Charles Kessler and T.J’s brother Alonzo. Located on Washington between modern-day Central Ave and 1st Avenue in Phoenix, the Trask-Kessler wholesale grocery soon became one of the largest grocery stores in town.

As he prospered, T.J. took on many civic duties, becoming president of the Arizona Industrial Exposition Association and territorial fair.  His most notable exhibits were a pagoda made from grains grown on his farm, and a display of hanging tea cups and saucers from his wholesale grocery store that spelled “Trask-Kessler”.  He also served as president of the Immigration Union, vice president of the Business Chamber of Commerce in Phoenix, and was on the board of the Phoenix and Prescott Toll Road Company. 

T. J. died on December 8, 1894, from an intestinal ailment which he had fought for eight months. He was laid to rest in Porter cemetery. His headstone is of an unusual Moorish design and describes him as an “upright businessman”.

-by Val Wilson

 

Dr. Scott Helm (1862-1897) - Surgeon-General of Arizona

 

Arizona Memory Project

We are running bios this month on physicians.  This is a repost of Dr. Helm, who is still a notable Phoenix figure even today!

A native of Kentucky, Dr. Helm was a graduate of Princeton College, Rush Medical College in Chicago and Heidelberg University in Germany. He was undoubtedly one of the best educated and respected physicians in Arizona. In 1891, he joined the National Guard of Arizona.  

He was appointed surgeon-general, serving in that post for six years. During that time, he tirelessly promoted Arizona in medical journals as an ideal destination for sufferers of tuberculosis, arthritis and other ailments. He was also an active member of several fraternal organizations.

In 1889, he met Miss Norma Jackson, a Southern belle who had come to Arizona for her health. They were married 12 February 1890. Unfortunately, even his expert ministrations could not cure Norma, for she died on 30 April 1891 at the age of 28.

In July 1891, Dr. Helm was accused by two other physicians of having performed an abortion on Alice White, granddaughter of Ira Stroud of Phoenix. The case went to trial and, in March 1892, Dr. Helm was acquitted of any wrongdoing. Later in 1892, Dr. Helm married Miss Jane Beeler.

Helm loved horses, but he told friends that he would probably meet his death in a horse-related accident. His premonition came true on 8 October 1897. He was at the train station in downtown Phoenix when his fractious horse, Montrose, reared and fell, throwing Dr. Helm to the pavement. Dr. Helm died two hours later of intracranial bleeding. An impressive obelisk of polished red granite marks his grave, which is on the walking tour of Porter Cemetery. 

By Donna Carr

PCA Archives

Forgotten Grave of a Little One - The Shadow Archives

Bing AI/Val Wilson Prompt

As I delve into various histories and family stories, I often uncover articles, photographs, and fragments of history that are both unusual and forgotten. During my research on a pioneer in Rosedale Cemetery, I stumbled upon a hidden tale in Porter Cemetery. An old newspaper article revealed the existence of an unknown infant buried there. According to the article, the infant, a child of Mr. and Mrs. White, passed away in January of 1899 from a mysterious illness. Further investigation by Patty revealed that Mr. and Mrs. Fred White were the brother-in-law and sister of James McNeil, a merchant in Tempe. This discovery adds a new layer to the rich tapestry of our history. Welcome to our cemeteries, where the past continuously unveils its secrets.  You can read the article below.  

 Arizona Republic, Phoenix, Arizona, Tue, Jan 31, 1899

Albert S. Wray (1865-1900) - Dairy Proprietor and Murdered by Horse

 

Courtesy of the Wray Family

Albert S. Wray was born 21 September 1865 in Belle Prairie Township, Morrison County, Minnesota.  His father is believed to have been William S. Wray, born 1833 in Henderson, Pennsylvania.   Albert’s mother, Sarah Ellen Reid, was born 1843 in Kentucky.  Albert was the fifth of her ten children. 

By 1875, the Wray family was farming in Lake Mary, Douglas County, Minnesota.  However, by 1880, the family had broken up.  Albert’s father William was still married but living in the household of his parents, Robert and Mary Wray.  Albert’s mother Sarah was committed to an insane asylum in 1883.

Left to make his own way in the world, Albert S. Wray enlisted in the U. S. Army at St. Paul, Minnesota, on 4 February 1890.  At that time, he was described as having blue eyes, blonde hair and a fair complexion.  He gave his occupation as ‘clerk’.  Albert was assigned to the 8th Cavalry at Fort Yates, North Dakota.  On 15 December 1890, the great chief Sitting Bull was killed on the nearby Standing Rock Reservation.  Family stories say that Wray helped carry Sitting Bull’s coffin, made by the post carpenter, to his grave.  Wray was discharged in April 1891 with a disability for which he later received an invalid pension.

On 10 August 1898, Wray married Isabelle Grantham in Phoenix, Arizona Territory.  Isabelle had been born in Canada to Irish immigrant parents.  A photograph of Wray taken around this time shows a bespectacled young man with wavy hair and a luxuriant mustache. The couple eventually had a daughter, Myrtle, born May 1899.  By 1900, Wray was the proprietor of the West End Dairy.  Paradoxically, it was located east of town. 

Wray was killed 26 June 1900 in a runaway accident .  Around 4 PM, Mr. Wray was driving east on Washington Street in a one-horse open buggy.  With him was a friend, Thomas Treadwell .  As they passed in front of the Gazette newspaper office, the horse began to kick and plunge.  Although Wray endeavored to quiet the animal, the breeching strap broke and the buggy pushed against the horse, spooking him into running north on First Avenue.  Seeing the buggy about to collide with another, Treadwell jumped out.  The ensuing collision threw Wray partway out of the buggy, although he held onto the lines and tried to crawl back in over the dashboard.  The horse meanwhile was kicking furiously.  Another jerk threw Wray completely out of the buggy, and he landed on his head so hard that bystanders heard the thud. 

Dr. Wylie, the first medical man on the scene,  assisted Wray into Mr. Melezer’s store.  Although Wray had not suffered any obvious injuries and was able to speak, albeit in a somewhat incoherent manner, he was taken around 5 PM to the office of his family physician Dr. Hawley on West Washington for further observation.  His condition deteriorated, and his wife was called.  She and little Myrtle arrived shortly before Wray expired at 8:45 PM, presumably from a concussion or subdural hematoma caused by the accident.

Wray, being an Army veteran, was buried in Porter Cemetery, Lot 10, Grave C. 

Less than a month after his death, a posthumous son, Albert Steven, was born to Isabella.

-By Debe Branning

 

John McCasey (1819-1895) - Civil War Vet and Mining Engineer

PCA Archives

John McCasey was born between 1819 and 1825 in Ireland.  At some point, he immigrated to the United States and settled in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.  He seems to have had a rather good education, enabling him to work as a machinist, mining engineer and metallurgist throughout his life.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, McCasey enlisted as a private in Company E, 8th Pennsylvania Infantry, on April 18, 1861.  He and Cornelia Connolly were married before a priest on June 4, 1861, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. 

McCasey was soon promoted to the rank of captain in Company K, 110th Pennsylvania Infantry.  However, he resigned his commission on July 29, 1861, stating that ill health made him unfit to perform his duties.  He returned home to recuperate, where his and Cornelia’s first child, William Francis, was born on August 12 of the following year.

McCasey reenlisted briefly on July 1, 1863, in Company B, 41st Pennsylvania Emergency Militia, an ad hoc unit raised to defend the state from the Confederate advance toward Gettysburg.  He was discharged on August 3, 1863.

Following the Civil War, McCasey found work as a machinist.  He and Cornelia, or Lillie as she was called, had eight children, although only four lived to adulthood.

The 1880 federal census of Jersey City, New Jersey, lists McCasey as a ‘silver miner’.  Shortly after his oldest son turned 21, McCasey moved to Arizona, while his wife Cornelia remained in Pennsylvania to raise the rest of their children.

McCasey found work as a mining engineer in the vicinity of the Harqua Hala Mine near Yuma.  In 1889, he wrote a detailed description of the ores and other minerals to be found there.  In 1891, he discovered a significant onyx deposit north of Cave Creek, Arizona.

John McCasey moved to Mesa, Arizona, and set up an assay office there in 1893.  After transferring his GAR membership to the John Wren Owen GAR Post, he filed for and received Invalid Pension #865,681. He seems to have lost touch with his friends back East, as his whereabouts were not known until one of his old Army companions tracked him down through the GAR.

McCasey died February 23, 1895, having been hospitalized for about three months with pulmonary tuberculosis.  He was buried in Porter Cemetery.

His widow Cornelia filed for and received a Civil War Widow’s pension, # 471,053.  She was living in the Bronx, New York City, when she died on June 29, 1919.

-Donna Carr