By Marshall Trimble, Arizona’s Official State Historian

The Old West was quickly fading from reality into the realm of myth by the mid-1920s. Most of the old-time gunfighters had gone on to their great reward, and Hollywood took up the chore of reinventing them. So, Tom Mix ended up making $17,000 a week performing superhuman feats from atop his famous horse, Tony. During the Roaring Twenties, the heroes of the silver screen packed two six guns, which never needed reloading, wore cowboy boots with their trouser legs tucked in them, were quick on the draw, and never lost their hats in a fistfight.

Soon, the public, especially children, began to believe these shooting stars represented the real gunfighters.

In the late 1920s, there was still one old gunfighter left. His name was Jim Roberts. He was nearly 70 by this time and walked with a stoop. He was still wearing a badge and was the law in the mining town of Clarkdale.

Old timers remembered Jim as the top gun in the notorious Pleasant Valley War between the Grahams and the Tewksburys. After that war ended, he became a lawman and was one of Arizona’s greatest peace officers.

Kids would hear about Uncle Jim’s days as a fearless gunfighter and lawman, but his appearance was disappointing. He didn’t dress like Tom Mix. They’d ask him to demonstrate his quick draw, and he’d slowly pull his nickel-plated Colt revolver out of his hip pocket and, holding it with both hands, would take deliberate aim.

Why, they asked, didn’t he fan his pistol like Tom Mix? And why did he pack his pistol in his hip pocket instead of using a silver-studded holster? Uncle Jim didn’t even wear a cowboy hat! They began to look at the old timer with doubt.

Uncle Jim just grinned and went about his duties, and in time, the children began to believe the stories their parents told were just tall tales.

All those doubts about Uncle Jim Roberts were laid to rest one day in 1928 when two bank robbers held up the Bank of Arizona in downtown Clarkdale. They walked out the door and jumped into their car with $40,000. It was the largest robbery in Arizona history at the time.

The desperadoes turned the corner just as Uncle Jim was making his rounds. Spotting the old lawman, one fired a shot that ricocheted off the sidewalk in front of him. As the car sped by, Uncle Jim drew his pistol from his hip pocket, took aim with both hands, and shot the driver through the head. The car careened off the road and the other robber meekly surrendered.

Those youngsters in Clarkdale knew they’d seen the real McCoy in action that day. As far as they were concerned, Uncle Jim could outshoot, outthink, and outfight those silver-screen cowboys any day of the week.

Uncle Jim died of a heart attack on January 8, 1934 while making his rounds. It seems fitting that one of the Old West’s greatest lawmen and the last gunfighter of the Pleasant Valley War should die with his boots on. But wait a minute—one thing I forgot to mention was that Uncle Jim didn’t wear cowboy boots.

By Marshall Trimble, Arizona State Historian

Readin’, writin’, and ’rithmetic, like many other cultural conveniences, were late arriving on the Arizona frontier in the mid-1800s. The lifestyle for young people residing in the territory was not conducive to learning the 3 Rs. Some communities were so rowdy that the citizens could assume no responsibility for any pranks their offspring might choose to inflict upon the teachers. One teacher in Tombstone came home from school one day to find his house had been painted with polka dots. Another took a pistol away from a youthful cherub and angrily tossed it into the pot-bellied stove. However, she forgot to remove the cartridges and the resounding gunfire inside the stove loudly punctuated her oversight.

Funds were not always available for schools, and the teachers had to make use of whatever materials and structures at hand. Josephine Brawley Hughes opened the first public school for girls in Tucson in an old brewery, while Mary Elizabeth Post taught pupils at Yuma in a three-room adobe building that had formerly served as the city jail. Graffiti scratched on the walls gave mute testimony to the characters and interests of the previous occupants, along with serving to broaden the educational horizons of the pupils.

One of the most articulate of the early educators was a former soldier named John Spring. He arrived with the Army in 1866 and decided to stay when his enlistment was up. His teaching career began in an adobe structure with a dirt floor that frequently had to be sprinkled with water to hold down the dust. The parents, in anticipation of future need, brought him a supply of ash flogging sticks. School opened with 138 students in one class, ranging in age from 6 to 21. Only a small few spoke English.

A teacher usually wouldn’t be hired if they couldn’t pass the qualification exam. That wasn’t always the case, though. In Florence, an applicant was hired anyway as the board member confessed he couldn’t pass it either.

In his last message to the ninth legislature in 1877, Governor Safford, today known as the Father of the Arizona Public Schools, was pleased to report much progress in educating the territory’s youth. He said that about half of the nearly 3,000 children of school age in Arizona had learned to read and write.

He has been called a cowboy singer, a humorist, and a storyteller, and is Arizona’s official state historian, but Marshall Trimble’s most treasured title is teacher. He hopes people will realize the importance and fun involved in Arizona history and culture. If you have a question about Arizona’s history, e-mail marshall@northvalleymagazine.com and you may find your answer in the next issue!

By Marshall Trimble, Arizona State Historian

On April 15, 1912, the same day that the Titanic sank in the north Atlantic, Arizona had its first native-born major league baseball player. Lee “Flame” Delhi took the mound in the seventh inning for the Chicago White Sox against the rival Detroit Tigers. The Tigers won the game 10–1. It would be Flame Delhi’s first and last appearance in the major leagues.

Delhi, the son of a hard-rock miner, was born in Harqua Hala, a gold-mining town twelve miles south of present-day Salome. Spring training in Florida was the first time he’d been east of Prescott. Soon, he earned the reputation as the best pitcher in the PCL, winning twenty-seven games for the Angels during the 1911 season. That winter, several major league teams held a bidding war for his services. The Chicago White Sox won the bid, purchasing his contract for $5,000. In those days, the money went to the team owner instead of the player.

Delhi’s nickname, describing both his blazing fastball and his shock of flaming red hair, was given to him by a reporter during the 1910 season while pitching for the Los Angeles Angels in the Pacific Coast League. His April 1912 performance wasn’t all that bad, but for reasons known only to baseball managers, Flame Delhi never pitched another major league game. His contract was resold to the minors the next week.

But Delhi’s days as a professional ballplayer were far from over. He was about to accept a generous offer to return to Los Angeles when he got an interesting offer from a mining town in his native Arizona: in exchange for pitching for the Ray Copper Mine team in the Copper Belt League, the company would teach him civil engineering.

In 1920, Delhi returned to Los Angeles, his ball-playing days behind him. Within a few years, he was vice president of Western Pipe and Steel, in charge of shipbuilding operations. During the Great Depression, long after his baseball career had ended, Delhi was earning $80,000 a year—the same salary as Babe Ruth’s!

“Flame Delhi” became one of the leading proponents of arc welding, building all-welded ships with no riveting. Under his leadership during World War II, the company built more than forty ships. The San Francisco Chronicle called him a “titan of western steel” in his obituary after his passing in 1966. But we Arizonans will always remember him as our first major league baseball player.

By Arizona State Historian Marshall Trimble

Arizona has always taken pride in marching to the beat of its own drum. For example, in the contiguous United States, all states but Arizona went on Daylight Saving Time (DST) last month. So, why doesn’t Arizona recognize DST? Do we have enough sunshine without it?

Arizona did go on DST with the rest of the nation on June 21, 1967. The sun didn’t set that day until almost a quarter of nine. Restaurateurs and owners of drive-in theaters protested that it was killing business. Baseball umpires were wearing sunglasses during night games. In the spirit of “when they turn up the heat, I feel the pressure,” the state legislature voted the following year to opt out on the law, and Arizona has been off DST ever since.

The concept of Daylight Saving Time has been around a long time. Ben Franklin first proposed it without success in 1784. It was formally adopted in 1918 during World War I to preserve daylight, provide standard time, and save energy. It proved so unpopular that it was repealed in 1919, but it was still a local option for states. It was reinstated during World War II. After the war, DST ended again, and from 1945 to 1966, there was no federal law addressing it. States and towns could decide whether they wanted it. This created a colossal mess, as in the twin cities of St. Paul/Minneapolis.

In 1996, the Uniform Time Act mandated that DST begin on the first Sunday in April and end on the last Sunday of October. Today, Arizona and Hawaii are the only states that don’t have DST. Even more confusing, in Arizona, the Navajo Reservation observes DST, but the Hopi Reservation doesn’t. It’s possible to drive north from Flagstaff to the Navajo Reservation and change time at Tuba City, then drive a mile to Moencopi on the Hopi Reservation and change time again. From there, drive across the Hopi Mesas to Ganado in Navajoland and change again. Then, drive sixty miles south to Holbrook and change time once more.

If that sounds confusing, consider the time the politicians tried to create “Phoenix Time.” During territorial years in Arizona, there was a long-running debate as to whether the territory was more closely tied to California or New Mexico, so a compromise was reached: Phoenix Time was created in which they split the difference, putting Arizona a half-hour after Pacific Time and a half-hour before Mountain Time. Needless to say, that one created even more chaos and was quickly dropped.

My Navajo friends tell me that the only thing that matters up on the Navajo Reservation is “Indian Time.” After reading this article, you may agree that they have the right idea.

By Marshall Trimble, Arizona State Historian

Arizona became the forty-eighth state on February 14, 1912. The bill that created the new state was ready to sign on the 12th, but because that was George Washington’s birthday, it was postponed until the following day. However, the 13th was considered unlucky. So Arizona became a state on Valentine’s Day, and thus became the Valentine State, Grand Canyon State, and for many years the Baby State, all rolled into one. As you can see, February was always an interesting month for Arizonans:

On February 14, 1862, Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederate States of America, proclaimed Arizona a territory. A year later, on February 24, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the congressional bill creating the Territory of Arizona.

Maricopa County was created in a legislative bill signed by Territorial Governor Anson P. K. Safford on February 14, 1871. Phoenix became the temporary county seat.

The town site of Phoenix, consisting of 380 acres, was officially filed in the United States Land Office on February 13, 1872. On that same day, George Buck and Matilda Murray became the first American couple to marry in Phoenix.

The city of Tucson was incorporated by legislative enactment on February 7, 1877.

The future Arizona State University, then called the Territorial Normal School, opened its doors for classes with thirty-three students on February 8, 1886. On the opening day, people discovered that construction workers had forgotten to build any toilet facilities at the institution!

On February 28, 1895 the Santa Fe, Prescott, and Phoenix Railroad reached Phoenix, linking the capital city with the northern Arizona mainline railroad at Ash Fork in northern Arizona.

February 24, 1901 brought the dedication of the new Capitol building by Governor Nathan Oakes Murphy.

The Salt River Water Users Association, later the Salt River Project, was organized under state laws on February 4, 1903.

The Carnegie Public Library was dedicated on February 14, 1908.

On February 1, 1936 the gates at Hoover Dam were closed and Lake Mead began to fill.

By Marshall Trimble

Did you know Arizona was once a part of western Georgia? In 1733, King George II declared that Georgia extended west all the way to the Pacific Ocean. We almost became part of another grand plan in 1849, when Mormons proposed the State of Deseret, which included one-sixth of the contiguous United States and encompassed most of what today is Nevada and Arizona, a large portion of California, and several hundred miles of seacoast, including San Diego. Also planned for inclusion were all of Utah and parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, and Idaho. Congress turned down the proposition, but in the Compromise of 1850 did create the territories of Utah and New Mexico. For the next thirteen years, Arizona made up the western half of the New Mexico Territory.

Following the Mexican War, Arizona’s southern boundary was the Gila River. But the need for an all-weather transcontinental railroad along the Thirty-Second Parallel moved Congress to send James Gadsden to Mexico to secure a piece of real estate more suitable for a railroad. In 1854, the Gadsden Purchase created the final boundary lines of the contiguous United States.

The unique diagonal line on our southern border provides the inspiration for one of this state’s most enduring urban legends, albeit in this case, a desert one. The story goes that the surveyors were marking the line west on a course that would have taken them straight across to the Sea of Cortez, thus giving Arizona a seacoast. The boys reached Nogales, and spent the night in a Mexican cantina. The following day, realizing the next saloon was in Yuma, they decided to make a beeline in a northwesterly direction to the river port on the Colorado. And that’s why, they say, Arizona was deprived of a seacoast.

It’s a good story, but its all hogwash. Sometimes the truth isn’t nearly as much fun as the legend. First, Nogales didn’t even exist when the boundary was surveyed. More importantly, Mexico didn’t want to lose its land route to Baja California, and Northern congressmen didn’t want the South to acquire any more territory than would be just enough to build a transcontinental railroad.

There are also colorful stories about Arizona’s shifty northern, eastern, and western boundaries, but I’ll save them for another day.

By Marshall Trimble, Official State Historian

Arizonans live by their myths and legends. Our state is a land of anomalies and tamales. We have birds that run faster than they fly, flowers that bloom only at night and, frequently, the hottest and coldest national temperatures on the same day. The only poisonous lizard in the United States—the Gila monster—calls Arizona home. The nation’s most dangerous scorpion is the bark scorpion, and it thrives in Arizona. Be forewarned: it doesn’t bark before it stings.

During the winter, it’s possible to snow ski in Flagstaff, then drive an hour and a half to the Valley and go water skiing. Our annual rainfall averages from thirty inches per year in the White Mountains to about three inches per year around Yuma. Arizona’s creeks usually have more water flowing than the rivers do. One river is so new that it’s never had any water in it. That’s why we call it New River.

Arizona is larger than Pennsylvania, Delaware, and all New England combined. Maricopa County alone is larger than the state of Massachusetts. And tiny Santa Cruz County is larger than at least seventeen nations in the world.

The town of Gila Bend isn’t in Gila County—it’s in Maricopa County. The town of Maricopa is in Pinal County. Pinal is in Gila County. The town of Pima isn’t in Pima County, but rather in Graham County. Fort Apache is in Navajo County, while the town of Navajo is in Apache County. If you’re not confused by now, you’re either not thinking clearly.

If you live in Moccasin on the Arizona Strip, you have to drive 360 miles and travel through three states—Utah, Nevada, and Arizona—cross over Hoover Dam, and drive another hundred miles to get to your county seat at Kingman. It’s only 140 miles as the crow flies, but the crow flies over the Grand Canyon. Speaking of the world’s grandest natural architectural masterpiece, the Grand Canyon is the only canyon among the world’s Seven Natural Wonders.