Arizona weekly journal-miner., 1897-04-07
Arl.on. rAIr,y Year. Ago.

Arizona ThIrty Years Ago.
 In "G Greater Los Angeles" paper published in the city bearing it's name, Ben c. Truman, one of the pioneer journalists of California, and whom the present editor of the JOURNAL MINER met in the above city in 1874, contributes an article under the heading used for this article, in which he describes a trip, through Arizona as special agent of the post office department. His companion on the trip was General Rusiing, U. S. Army. The portion of the article referring to his visit to Prescott is as follows:
 In all my life l was never So glad to go to bed as upon my first night st Prescott. If it had been . day of national thanksgiving, l should have studied up some very emo tional things to have uttered before blowing out my candle. We had passed through Bells Canyon and over Antelope mountain, two of the most uninviting, wild and God for saksn looking elevations I had ever seen, although we fairly flew through the beautiful forests which for rInileS surrounded Prescott, which was a great relief even for hours before we reached our actual point of des- tinstion. It was early in April, aud the mornings were like those in the Eastern and Middle States in May Prescott had been named after our eminent historian, and touches Of the environments of many places 1 had visited in Vermont and New Hampshire. The site is upon a lit tie pearly stream called Granite creek, and embraces the quarter sec tion selected by its first governor in the spring of 1864. It is fifty-six hundred feet above the level of the sea, and is, therefore, one of the most elevated cities west of the Rocky mountains.
 There was newspaper, of course, the ARIZONA MINER, and, at the time l was there, a man named Meacham edited it, set up its type, and "work- ed it of. 1 we'll remember him as an old, odd, poor looking man, but he told me. with emotion, that be had seen better days, and that his wife had once been rich, and had lived elegantly in New York. and then he took me to his house, where l met Mrs. Meacham, fair, fat and over forty, good old woman, who showed me yards upon yards of old point lace that she had purchased, herself, fifteen years before, at Brus. sels. This about al 1 have left," !" she said, land some mining stock, which will put Meacham and me on top in year or two.
 This hopeful woman prophesied truly, for in less than three years afterwards l met Mrs Meacham and her husband st the Occidental botel, in San Francisco, on their way to Europe, ana 10 me she whis- pered, in accents betraying more of thankfulness than of exultation, "Meacham and l have S200,000 out at interest, and we can snap our fin gers at the world"
 There is much that is picturesque and inviting in the scenic frame word of this beautiful city of Pres colt. Sixty-four miles to the north, San Francisco mountain uplifts its majestic proportions l5.000 feet above the level of the sea. It is a volcanic pile, undoubtedly, twelve miles in length, of granite founda- tion, built up by tri-mountains and pinnscled with a cluster of peaks clothed in garments of almost per petual snow.
 Fifty miles to the northwest is Bill Williams mountain, nearly 10,- GOO feet in height, and between the latter and the San Francisco peak are Mounts Ken tricks and Sitgraves. The country between these noted earth giants and Prescott is varied and consists of foot hills, forest and plain, while here and there are groves of pines, junipers, cedars and patches of valleys susceptible of a high order of cultivation, and through which the Santa Fe road takes its picturesque way.
 Rusling and I at last left Prescott with our s:aff of drivers and cook with an escort of six men, and reached the Colorado river in safety and stayed over at Fort Mojave, not great ways from the "Needles," three days. Here there was 6 garri- son of four companies. as the Ysva- pals and Hualapais of Northwestern Arizona and the Flutes of South eastern California were all hostile, and every week or two, small parties en route between Prescott and San Bernsrdino were ambushed and kill ed. AR escort of twelve men wa. given us st Fort Mojsve, which &C., compsnied us to Soda Lake, about half way between the river and San Bernardino. Al the latter place we rested forty ght hours, and then drove to Los Angeles. sixty miles. in