Prescott Was a Renowned Gambling Town

Several western towns were known for gambling: Tombstone, Deadwood, and Dodge City, for example. But if one were able to go back in time and ask the “sporting men” of the West, Prescott would be among the very best places to play. Gambling was immensely popular in the early days of Prescott. An 1884 account in the Weekly Arizona Miner proclaimed, “Faro dealers say that Prescott is the best gambling town in the West.” 

The Birth of Clarkdale, Arizona

The town of Clarkdale was a pet project for Senator William A Clark, owner of the United Verde mine in Jerome. It was the first planned community in Arizona and included all the makings of a modern town. It provided telephone, telegraph, electrical, sewer, and spring water services for its residents. Situated at the bottom of Cleopatra Mountain, it would be the smelter town for the mines of Jerome and the surrounding area. “To build a perfect town [was] to be the aim and ambition of former Sen. Clark,” the Mohave County Miner wrote, “and money will be lavishly spent to make it as near [perfect] as possible.”

William Randolph Hearst brings 15 Congressmen to Prescott

(Forgive the typo!)

In 1903, William Randolph Hearst was a 40-year-old newspaper baron and US Congressman from New York who was under serious consideration for the Democratic nomination for President the following year. He desired statehood for the southwestern territories of Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Arizona and took a delegation of other congressmen and their wives on a whirlwind trip through those three large land masses to find evidence that they were worthy of statehood to bring back to Washington.

On the 17th of October, the special train would stop in Prescott, and he would be completely surprised at what he found.

Prescott's 50th and 100th Anniversary Celebrations

Ironically, Prescott’s 50th anniversary was largely celebrated... elsewhere. It was the Phoenix Board of Trade that had the idea of celebrating the 50th anniversary of the founding of the territory, and they would make sure they hosted the event.

POTUS Visits Prescott, Statehood at Stake

The POTUS (President of the United States), William Howard Taft

It was 5:51pm, October 13th, 1909.

President Taft's special train was "drawn by two engines looking as proud as shining machines of brass and steel can look."  As the train pulled into the Prescott depot,  "there was tremendous cheering while the band up the street vigorously played 'Hail to the Chief.'"

Prescott planned long and hard to make it the perfect visit, and the Queen City of Arizona accomplished just that.