NARRATIVE
OF MRS. MARY A. GRAY
FIRST WHITE WOMAN IN
VALLEY
Columbus
H. Gray and Mary
A. Gray, his wife, were the first permanent
settlers on the north side of
the Salt River Valley. C. H. Gray, or "Lum" Gray, as he was known, was
a very
active citizen during his
life. At one time he was a
member of the legislature, and he was always, more or less, a miner and
prospector. Careless in money
matters ; a man of strong passions, true to his friends and vindictive
to his enemies, naturally he had close friends
and bitter enemies. His widow
is a typical pioneer woman,
and has resided in one place on their ranch just south of Phoenix for
nearly
fifty years. At the time of
his death, Mr. Gray was interested
in mining properties about ten miles west of Ehrenberg, in California.
The following interview with
Mrs. Gray gives much first hand
information in regard to the settlement of Phoenix and the Salt River
Valley : "
"We came into the
valley on the 18th
of August, 1868. I was about the first white woman in the valley. The
Adams family arrived on their way to California when we came here.
Sheriff Jeff Adams was a little boy then. Another family named Rowe
came in here. We came and
settled. The others were only camping here. They went off, and then
some of them came back. I have been a constant
resident on this ranch for
forty-eight years since the 18th
of August, 1868, and am now left alone. I am seventy-one years old. "
"I have seen many
changes in this
valley. Mr. Gray helped take
out the canal which was a
part of the old Swilling Ditch. When we came in 1868, they had taken
out a little
water; it ran for two or
three miles. They had planted some corn, beans, pumpkins, and anything
they could get to plant. That was in 1868, the
first crops raised here. It
was mostly men in the valley
then. There were no families. Swilling's wife was in Tucson. I was the
first
white woman to settle in the
valley and stay here. I remember
that when I went to court to give my evidence in the water rights case,
I was
in a hurry to get away, but
the judge called me back and
asked me if I was in the same place, and when I said that I was, he
said that I was
about the only one that was. "
"The first church
established here
was the South Methodist
Church. The first minister that came into this valley to preach was
McKean. Groves came next.
When Groves came they had no
church, and he preached in different places. He preached in our house
for one
thing ; that was when we
lived in the old adobe. I think it was about 1870 or 1871— '70 I guess.
"My husband and myself came in
1868 across the plains, the
railroad didn't come until 1869. We were on our way to Northern
California,
where Mr. Gray had mined when
a boy. If we had had an idea
that the Central railroad would have been through to California in
another
year, we would have waited
until it was completed. In 1878,
when I went home over the northern route, the Southern Pacific had got
to Yuma ;
there we met the train from
here. "
"I don't remember
any of the old
settlers who remain, if any
do. They were kind of loose; there
is none of them that stayed any length of time. Irvine was about the
first, and the
Os- borns came in 1869. They
kept dropping in.
"We went broke in the dry year
of 1891-92. Mr. Gray had over
fifty head of stock die, and we couldn't get water enough to irrigate
two
acres that dry year. We had a
wind mill pump and a hand
pump in the well. We first got water about twenty-one or twenty-two
feet down, but
that year we had to keep
adding pipe until we got down
about forty feet. "
Mr. Gray started to build a building for the Masonic Hall, on Jefferson
and First
Streets, and then sold it to
the Goldwaters. Goldwater afterwards
told me that 'Fools build and wise men occupy.' He told me they should
have
stayed in Phoenix, and he would have done much better here than he did
by going to
Prescott. "
Mr. Gray was in the Confederate Army. He got back home from California
the year
before the war broke out. He
had been in California for
ten years. He went there when he was sixteen years old with his
brother, and then got back just in time to go into the war. He
served in the war and was
nine months in the prison at
Alton, Illinois. He was captured at Helena, Arkansas, and then he
escaped by jumping
out of the cars as he was
being transferred from Alton to
Fort Delaware. There were three of themgot away by jumping through the
windows of
the car. He got back home and
stayed for three or four
weeks, and then went back into the army. "
He was born in Florida in 1833. I was born in Arkansas. My people and
his people were
real pioneers. My grandparents
went to Georgia when they had
to stand guard over the fields
to keep the Indians off. I was born in the southern portion of
Arkansas, in Union
County, about twelve miles
from the Louisiana line, in 1846.
I was seventy years old May last, and never had good health until we
came here.
We were coming just for a
rest, but when we saw the
valley we made up our minds to settle here. The valley when we first
saw it was
lovely. There was grass about
a foot high, and it was fine.
I never had any trouble with the Indians. We never saw a wild Indian
all the way
across the plains; never saw
an Indian until we got here
and saw the Pimas and Maricopas. "
I don't remember just when it was the Mormons came in here at Tempe.
I don't remember
just when the Tempe Canal was started, but the Swilling Ditch
was giving us water before
the Tempe Canal was commenced.
"
I was here when they had the contest over East Phoenix and West
Phoenix, and it was
settled by the vote of the
people. The town started off
at this end of the valley, and the settlers were coming in down here.
Swilling was fighting
for East Phoenix. His place
was right over here.
"Jim Murphy, the deputy
sheriff, is a son of the
Murphy, who was of the firm of Murphy & Dennis, and whose wife was
a Mexican
woman. The little store he
established was a godsend to us,
as we had no merchants nearer than Wickenburg on the one side, and
Maricopa Wells
on the other. When we wanted
merchandise, about all the
men in the valley would have to go to Wickenburg for it, and maybe they
could get a
piece of bacon about a foot
long, and six inches wide, for
the whole settlement. I was one time without shoes, and Mr. Duppa was
going over to Maricopa, and I asked him to bring me a
pair. He brought me a pair of
sixes, and at that time I
wore twos. I told him they didn't fit me exactly, and he said that it
was all he could get, and a sight better than going bare-footed.
"
I
don't remember the time Duppa died. I think he was alive in 1887. He
was a
strange character. I asked
him once why he didn't go back
to England. His older brother had died, and they sent for him, and he
said that he
couldn't go back and have to
pull his hat off to people;
that he would have to open up the old estate and accept all the
responsibilities of a high position over there, and that he did not
want to do. Duppa would never become a
citizen of the United States
though. They sent his younger
brother over after him, but he told him : 'John, you can go back and
rest satisfied
that I will never return.' "
At times he would go off in the mountains and stay until his hair came
down to his shoulders, and sometimes when he came back
he didn't look like a human.
I was home once when he
returned from the mountains, and he was as rough a character as you
would want
to see. He looked like he
hadn't washed his face or
combed his hair for months. He went to Maricopa and brought me back
some Sonora oranges, and he had been shaved and
cleaned up, and bought a new
suit, and he came to the door and
knocked, and when I went to the door, he began by saying: 'Good
morning, Ma'am,' thinking
I wouldn 't know him, but I
knew him by his voice. Duppa
lived right over there. (Pointing west.) "
Dr. Thibodo and his wife are both dead. Duppa got his remittances
through Dr.
Thibodo. Thibodo used to come
down here sometimes, but toward
the last he hardly ever went out of his drugstore. "
I was married in 1865, August 24th, my husband's full name being
Columbus H. Gray and mine Mary A. Gray. My maiden name was Mary A.
Norris. My brother, Coleman
Norris, lives here in town.
He is not doing anything now.
He has two sons and a daughter. Bud Gray a half brother of my husband
is dead.
He was taken sick out at the mine and came in, and died in six weeks. "
My brother Mr. Norris came into the valley about thirty years ago. When
I went back home in 1878, I brought my parents back
with me. I think he came in
within five years after they
left. His wife came of a delicate family, and they didn't think she
could live two
years there, so he brought
her here."
Thomas
Thompson Hunter was born in Louisiana February 24th, 1844. He was
reared in South Carolina;
received an academic education. During the Civil War he served from the
beginning to the end in a battery of
General Longstreet's corps,
and was mustered out at Nachitoches,
Louisiana, June 26th, 1865, when he went into Western Texas and
embarked in
the cattle business. Learning
of the natural advantages of
Arizona, he drove his herd across the plains, and came into what is now
the Salt
River Valley and Phoenix with
the first herd of cattle. Upon
reaching Maricopa, a few pioneers came over from the Salt River and
told his
party about that wonderful
country where there was plenty
of grass and a fine place to recruit their cattle. They changed their
plans and on
the first of January, 1868,
entered the Salt River Valley,
and pitched their camp just west of Hayden Butte. Both the Gila and
Salt Rivers
were at high tide, and after
crossing the Gila they lived
on beef straight until the waters of the Salt subsided, when they
crossed on the 16th of
February, 1868, and found a
few pioneers on the north
side of the Salt River taking out the first canal from that river,
known afterwards as
the Swilling Canal. Mr. Hunter says: "The business men of the Territory
were assisting the enterprise, and the Government policy at
that time was to aid all
infant settlements, and Fort McDowell,
being thirty-five miles from us on the Verde River, helped the little
settlement
a great deal. "
Jack Swilling was the first settler on the canal; old man Freeman came
next,
then McWhorter next, whose
settlement was
abandoned not long
afterwards. Coming back from
a business trip to Fort
McDowell, the Indians
murdered poor old McWhorter,
as he was called.
Then came Pump Handle John,
and next
to him was Lord Duppa and
Vandermark, then
myself, Hunter, and McVey,
then the Irish
boys, Jim Lee, Fitzgerald and
Tom Conley, the
Starar brothers, Jake and
Andy, next, then
old man Adams and family,
then one-eyed Davis
and Bill Bloom. Frenchy
Sawyer was located
somewhere near the Irish
boys, and built the
first house erected in the
valley, which
consisted of four cottonwood
forks set in the
ground and covered with mud,
making a nice retreat on a
hot day. While sojourning in
Pima and
Maricopa counties, I
witnessed several
incidents which are hard for
me to forget. One that
impressed me so much I will
relate. We turned our
poor cattle loose to hunt
forage. They were
compelled to range out ten to
fifteen miles. It
was my custom to cut sign
every morning, go outside
of all cattle tracks among
the sand hills.
Occasionally the squaws would
band together and go
away out to procure mesquite
wood. The first
time I witnessed this sight I
was out some ten or
twelve miles. From the top of a sand hill, looking back toward the
river, I saw the strange
sight. I saw two hundred and
fifty Indian women in
a long line with their
three-cornered
baskets and long slick-sticks,
that at first resembled
a herd of cattle, their
sticks looking like horns. The
wood being reached, they
began filling
their baskets, and when
filled they each had a good
burro load. It was a sight to
see them when
loaded start back with their
heavy burdens in a little
trot peculiar to themselves.
I noticed, too, what
struck me so forcibly, a
picket line being
maintained along the crest of
sand hills by the Pima
warriors. They were armed
with bows and arrows,
and each sentinel stood with
his bow
slung ready to fire on the
first sight of an enemy.
Thus was the frontier being
maintained by these
naked, poverty stricken,
ignorant savages, the price
of peace, self-preservation,
the first
law of nature, even among
these savages. Just a
little negligence on the part
of this frontier army,
and the Apache might rush
upon their women
and take them off to
captivity and slavery.
From the bottom of my heart I
pitied these
poor, helpless, starved
people, fighting their battle
of life, and making their
struggle for existence
in their own peculiar way. We
call them savages
for one thing, that they make
beasts of
burden out of their women,
and we were taught in
our childhood days that no
Christian nation ever
did thai^ The first sign of
civilization was to
place our women on a level
with the men. While
we condemn the Pima and
Maricopa Indian slavery,
we find the flower of the
highest
civilization on earth
stationed upon the frontier in
order to maintain the peace, while their women are in the same
condition that we find the
savage Indian women forty
years ago. "
While -we held our cattle on the Salt
River plains, I was the
herder. On
Churchill's Addition to the
city of Phoenix was a low,
heavy soil that I designated
as the Alfileria
flats. Several hundred acres
were well set with
alfileria, and being the
first of its kind that
either the cattle or myself
had ever seen, the cattle
took kindly to the new
forage, and soon were as
fat as butter. I would always
turn the cattle loose
about daylight. They would go
no father than the
Alfileria flats. There they
would eat their
fill and lay down, and about
the noon hour I
would start them back to the
river for water. The
alfileria had begun to
mature, and it seemed to
me that in one night every
bunch of it was
covered with a large
variegated colored caterpillar,
and, as a consequence, the
cattle would not
touch it that morning, and
lit out to hunt pastures
new. I mounted my pony and
started after
them, and I had to ride hard
to turn them back,
as they, in a little while
more, would be in the
Apache country. I drove them
back, and it was
probably the middle of the
afternoon before I got
them to the Alfileria flats.
In examining the
weed, I found out for the
first time what the
trouble was, — it was the
worm. Then I saw a funny
sight. A long line of Indians
of all kinds
were coming across the flats.
On my approaching
near enough I discovered that
they were
gathering these worms and
eating them raw,
happy and innocent as
children in a huckleberry
patch. After getting their
stomachs filled,
the maidens of the tribe strung the worms through the middle with a
needle and thread. They would
then double the strands
several times, and
place the strands over their
necks, and the
live worms would wiggle upon
their naked busts.
The sun shining upon the
variegated collars
made them appear to be a
beautiful necklace. Of
course it was beautiful until
we discovered
that it was really live,
repulsive worms." (The
Indians boiled these
caterpillars with a
little salt, and then ate
them.)
The mesquite grove of which Mr.
Hunter speaks was probably
the grove which
covered what is known as the
"Balch Addition
to Phoenix." It was covered
with mesquite in 1887 when
the writer settled in this
valley.
Some time in the spring of 1868 a
little girl was born to John
Adams and wife, who
it is claimed was the first
white child
born in Phoenix. She is now
married and the mother of
a large family.
Mr. Hunter was married in Yavapai
County in 1868, to Miss Ollie
T. Gallaspy,
which was among the first
marriages solemnized
in that county. Four children
were born to
this union. In 1884 he served
in the Territorial
Legislature, and after that
time was, for several
years, justice of the peace
at Safford, where he
died about the year 1912.
Speaking of early
arrivals in the Salt River
Valley, Mr. Hunter says: "
Up to August, 1868, there were a
number of new people who came
into the valley.
Among the lot were Lum Gray
and family,
Greenhaw, Patterson, and the
Rowe Family, and
an old fellow known as Red Wilson, who formed a company with old
man John Adams, and others,
to take out what was known as
the Wilson
Canal. It came out of the
river below the Swilling Canal.
Old Red Wilson made life
miserable for me. Every time
I met him he was
telling me the future of the
Salt River —
that I was young and that I
would live to see a
city built there, etc. I
could not see it like
he did, but just twenty-eight
years afterwards I
visited the valley again, and
realized that old Red
Wilson had proven himself a
correct prophet.
Phoenix had risen from the
ashes, from nothing as
it were — it was on the
occasion of her first
midwinter carnival. She was
decorated and presented one
of the most beautiful
appearances that I
ever witnessed. I felt indeed
that I was another Rip Van
Winkle. Twenty-eight years ago
here were the same Pima and
Maricopa Indians in
evidence plentifully. These
Indians were from
the Government schools at
Phoenix. What a
change in so short a time.
They were forming
on the Churchill Addition by
platoon to take
part in the parade through
the city, my old
Alfileria Flat in the long
ago. Twenty-eight
years before their fathers
and mothers were eating
raw caterpillars on the very
same spot where their
children were forming for
parade, with Indian
youths leading the procession
with a brass
band of their own, followed
by a little boy corps
of drummers. The maidens who
had the caterpillar
necklaces then, were dressed
in uniform,
marching by platoon like the
regulars of the
army. Everything had changed
except the grand old
brown mountains — they looked
just the
same, together with the everlasting sunshine, — Arizona sun. A very few
of the old-timers remain.
The prominent rioted ones are
all gone to their
reward. King Woolsey, Andrew
Peeples, Sam
McClatchey, Tom Dodge, Jack
Swilling,
George Monroe, Jerome Vaughn,
Murphy, Dennis, Jim
Gushingberry, Bill Smith,
Bronco Billy,
Buckskin Tom, Bob Groom, Joe
Fugit, Joe Fye,
John Montgomery, and many
others who
figured prominently in
Arizona life in the
long ago, have, as far as I
know, passed away.
Andrew Peeples, Jack Swilling
and old Negro
Ben were the discoverers of
the Weaver
District. Jack dug out with
his butcher knife thirty
thousand dollars in nuggets.
Nigger Ben dug
out between six and ten
thousand. I do not recall
the amount that Andrew Peeples
got.
Old Negro Ben lost his life
by the
Indians along some time in
the seventies."
Getting married in Arizona, and
particularly in this portion
of the Territory, was
rather a difficult matter in
the early days, as the
following stories show. Mr.
Hunter gives this
account of the marriage of
one of his cowboys in
the year 1868: "
The oldest daughter of John Adams and
one of our cowboys, by name
Wm. Johnson,
were married. Difficulty No.
1, came on
the scene, which had to be
overcome. There was
no preacher in the whole of
Arizona that
we knew of, no justice of the
peace nearer
than Prescott, and how to
overcome this difficulty
was a problem. I told my
friend Johnson that Fort
McDowell was a six-company
fort, and the
Government always looked
after the spiritual
welfare of the soldiers, and there must, of necessity, be a chaplain
stationed there. On
inquiry we found this to be
the case, so on one
of the most beautiful
sunshiny days of April, the
bride and groom, with a party
of friends armed
to kill, acting as an escort
to the happy couple,
hiked to Port McDowell. Our
desires being made
known to an old white-headed
man, who was
designated by the soldiers as
being the
chaplain, we told our wants.
This appearing to the old
preacher as a most
extraordinary occasion, he
communicated with the
commander of the post, who,
in turn, agreed with the
preacher, and in a
short time the usually quiet
military camp, situated
in the far west and upon the
banks of the
beautiful Verde River, was to
witness one of the most
extraordinary scenes that had
ever taken place in
Arizona — the birth of the
first little home in
Salt River Valley. The
soldiers were
formed in a hollow square
around the grand flag
pole, on whose top floated
the Stars and
Stripes. The military band
was discoursing the
most lovely music, the old
preacher with his
white head uncovered to the
beautiful sunshine, the parade
ground was covered with the
most
beautiful wild flowers, as
well as the whole
surrounding country, the
grand old brown mountains looked solemn and happy, adding dignity to
the scene. Everybody looked
happy, and why
should they not feel that
way? It was surely a
red-letter day for Arizona,
for the first home
of Salt River Valley had been
formed in April,
1868. I fail to recall the
day of the month. The
descendants and pioneer
relatives of these first
families still live in Salt
River Valley. Old man
John Adams and his wife were my personal friends — good people they
were, true pioneers, true
friends, ever ready to
respond to the needs of
their fellows. They would
divide their last crust
with the needy prospectors
who chanced
their way. If still alive
they are very old. I
presume, however, that they
have both passed to their
reward in the great beyond."
Mr. John F. Crampton gives the
following concerning the
marriage of one of his
two sisters: "Mrs. Fitzgerald,
my sister, was
married in 1873. Her husband
was postmaster
and had a store at Yuma, and
came to Maricopa
Wells to marry her, where my
sister, with the
rest of the family, were
living at the time. Dr.
Alsap was Probate Judge in
Phoenix. They sent
for him to perform the
ceremony, and when he
got to Maricopa Wells he
found out that he
was out of his jurisdiction,
being in Pinal
County, and, consequently,
could not perform the
marriage. The girls took on a
good deal, and
when I got there, having just
ridden on
horseback from Tucson, I
asked them what was the
matter. They told me that
everything was ready for
the wedding and that Dr.
Alsap was there,
but that he was out of his
jurisdiction
and could not perform the
ceremony. My sister said:
'Henry is up here from Yuma,
and Dr. Alsap
is here from Phoenix, and we
are in another
county and cannot get
married.' I thought a
minute, and then said:
'That's easy. The line is
only six or seven miles from
here. We'll all get
in the coach and drive across
the line.' I
went to the corral and
hitched up six horses to
the stage coach, and we all
piled in and on,
twenty-seven of us, and drove out across the line into Maricopa County.
We got there about
eleven o 'clock at night, and
with some holding
candles, and standing around
in a circle, Judge
Alsap performed the ceremony,
and we drove back to Maricopa
Wells. They were married
under an ironwood tree."
The day after the wedding Mr.
Crampton drove a six-horse
Concord stage coach
to Yuma with the bride and
groom and members
of the wedding party. They
probably had a
good time both at Maricopa
Wells and at Yuma,
for marriages at that time
were few and far
between, and congratulations
on the part of
the boys to the lucky
bridegroom were extended
with great cordiality,
interspersed with
champagne, and the et
ceteras.
Mr. Crampton says further: "I
went out to see the place about
three years ago, and the old
tree is still there.
My niece says that if she can
do it, she is coming
to Arizona to take up that
tree, and plant it in
her mother's yard, and then
her mother will have
her hobby there."
Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald remained in
Yuma until 1879, when they
settled in San
Francisco, where Mr.
Fitzgerald died, and there
his widow still survives him.
This is the first record that I know
of anywhere, where pioneers
had to drive six or
seven miles and then be
married at midnight
under an ironwood tree.
Among the early pioneers in the Salt
River Valley, aside from J.
W. Swilling,
two men stand out most
prominently in the
history of Phoenix, William A. Hancock, who was born on the 17th day of
May, 1831, in Barry,
Massachusetts, and died in
Phoenix in the year 1901,
and John T. Alsap, who was
born in
Frankfort, Kentucky, February
28th, 1830, and died in
Phoenix on the 10th day of
September, 1886.
Captain
Hancock was educated in the
public schools in
Massachusetts and in
Leicester Academy, and, in
the spring of 1853, with his
brothers, John and Henry,
made the trip across
the plains and deserts to
California, where they
located upon a ranch. In 1864
Captain Hancock
enlisted in the California
Volunteers and in
the following year was sent
to Fort Yuma,
and was there mustered into
Company "C" of
the First Arizona Volunteers,
with the rank of
Second Lieutenant. He was
stationed at Fort
McDowell, and promoted to the
rank of First
Lieutenant, and was mustered
out of the service
in September, 1866. He then
became
superintendent of the
Government Farm at Fort
McDowell, and then post
trader at Camp Reno,
which latter position he held
until he came to the
Phoenix Settlement in 1870.
As has been
stated Captain Hancock
surveyed the city of Phoenix,
and held many offices of
honor and trust,
having been the first
postmaster of Phoenix, District
Attorney, Probate Judge, and
the first sheriff
of Maricopa County, having
been appointed to that
position by Governor S
afford. He also served
as Assistant Attorney of the
United States for the
District of Arizona, and was,
for some time,
County Superintendent of
Schools. He was
always an earnest friend of
irrigation
projects, and was one of the
committee of three
appointed to investigate the Colorado River project. In politics a
Republican, he loyally aided in the
establishment of the party in
Maricopa County, and served,
at one time, as a member of
the County Central Committee.
He was one of the
members of the Pioneers
Association of
Arizona, of the Territorial
Bar Association, of
the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and of Capt. Owen
Post, G. A. R., at one time
being senior vice-commander
of the Post. He was
married in 1873 to Lillie B.
Kellogg, and
leaves two children, a son,
Henry L. Hancock, and a
daughter, Mrs. Mabel Latham.
Captain Hancock
was associated, in his
lifetime, with
most of the enterprises in
Phoenix and the Salt River Valley,
and his reputation was always
that of
an enterprising, energetic
citizen, whose integrity
was never questioned.
John
T. Alsap, as before noted, was
the first Territorial
Treasurer. It was through
his influence as a member of
the Sixth Legislature
of the Territory that the
county of
Maricopa was created. As a
lawyer, Judge, town
commissioner, and, in fact,
in every capacity in
which he acted, he proved
himself a citizen
of rare enterprise, merit and
worth.
One of the honored pioneers and
esteemed citizens of Phoenix,
was Simon Novinger, who
was born in Halifax, Dauphin
County,
Pennsylvania, January 14th,
1832, a son of Isaac
and Hannah (Hawk) Novinger,
both natives
of Lykens Valley, that
county.
Mr. Novinger was reared in much the
usual manner of farmer boys
of his day,
attending school about four
months, and
devoting the remainder of the year to the labors of the field. After
attaining his majority he
worked two years at the stone
mason trade, and
then again engaged in
farming. He spent
considerable time in
travelling over the east, and
in 1863, started for Nevada.
From St. Joseph,
Mo., he started across the
plains with ox
teams, but learning of the
gold excitement at
Virginia City, Montana, he
decided to go to that
place. He
went up the North
Platte to Red
Butte, and then took the
trail north, afterward known
as the Bozeman Route. There
were 417 men in
the company with which he
travelled, and
they had with them 127
wagons. They were twice
attacked by Indians, but
finally reached their
destination in safety. On his
arrival in Virginia
City, Mr. Novinger engaged in
building for a time, and then
turned his attention
to placer mining, in which he
was quite
successful. He spent five
years in Montana, Nevada,
Idaho, Oregon and British
Columbia, and in 1868
went to Stockton, California,
where he
engaged in farming for a
time, later following the same
pursuit at Visalia, that
State.
In 1871, Mr. Novinger came to the Salt River Valley, at which time
Phoenix
contained but two buildings.
He engaged in prospecting
at Four Peaks. On one of his
expeditions he
was accompanied by two other
men. Leaving him at camp the
two others started out to
look for water, and while
they were gone he
was attacked by six Indians,
whom he put to
flight, although they
succeeded in wounding him in the
right leg. He was taken to
Fort McDowell, where
on account of his injuries he
remained for one
hundred and forty days. He then returned to Phoenix, and in 1873 bought
a claim
and filed on it, consisting
of the southeast
quarter of section 12,
township 2, Maricopa County, a
mile and a half from the
city. As the years
passed the growth of the city
touched the
boundaries of Mr. Novinger 's
ranch. In 1877 he bought
another tract of one hundred
and sixty acres
adjoining it on the north,
and in the later 80
's sold it to General Collins
and General Sherman,
who laid out on it the
"Capitol Addition to
Phoenix," which has been
quite rapidly built
up. Mr. Novinger operated his
ranch
successfully, raising grain
and hay.
In politics Mr. Novinger was a stanch Democrat, and served as a member
of the county
committee. He made frequent
trips East and
travelled extensively in both
the north and the
west. He died January 24th,
1904, in
Phoenix. The
portrait of Mr. Novinger which
accompanies this sketch was
taken with his little
grandniece, Mabel Clara
Novinger,
daughter of Mason D. and Eva
Hampton Novinger.
Source: History of Arizon By Thomas Edwin Farish Published by
The Filmer brothers electrotype company, 1918
