The Newspaper of Record since 1878

Christmas in Globe City, 1875-78

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By Clara T. Woody

Arizona Record newspaper, December 22, 1960

Courtesy Bullion Plaza Cultural Center & Museum, Miami, Arizona

1875 was the first time prospectors set up a camp of sorts at the present site of Globe.

Christmas today in Globe is a scene of beautiful decorations and music, of modern stores and futuristic gifts. This year we observe a warm, comfortable Christmas in a modern, comfortable American city.

But the first Christmas celebrations in Pinal Basin were not warm, modern or comfortable. 

What was Globe like in those first years? Who were the people who first got a foothold in this rugged country, and who banded together to pay tribute to Christ’s birth during those first cold, lean winters of Globe City’s existence?

The Pinal Basin, ringed in by the Pinal Mountains, the Sierra Apache and the Sierra Ancha  with a hump across it which divides the waters between the Gila and the salt Rivers, was a remote and hidden retreat of the Apaches until first invaded by  prospectors in 1871 and 1873 when it was discovered to be richly mineralized. But it was not until 1875 that the prospectors were sufficient in number to remain in the basin. They set up a camp at Ramboz Spring and on Nov. 25, 1875, at the tent of Any (Doc) Hammond where they organized the Globe Mining District.

This was a bachelor’s Eden, for families did not come until the following year. So difficult was it to reach this hidden Eden with a wagon that only to the south could a way be easily found by which a wagon could drive into the narrow Pinal valley.

There was a pack trail along the Gila from New Mexico, but the first wagon to follow it into the Pinal Mountain country was that of Joseph Chamberlain, with a family – two sons, Manley and Freeman, two daughters, Elizabeth (Lizzie) and Lucy. They came from Colorado, and settled on the west side of Pinal Creek, on what later came to be known as School Hill, where Central School is now.

John Branaman and wife, with four sons, brought in the next family wagon. They settled on the west side of the creek, too – on the flat long known as Scott Street, but now merged with Broad Street in the 90-1000 block of North Broad.

Branaman, a Kentucky horseman, had freighted for a time, but then settled on a ranch at Huerfano north of Denver.  Mrs. Branaman, an English woman, came to Minnesota with her family as a child. Later she went to Denver where she set type for the Rocky Mountain News. It was here she met Branaman. They were married and their two older sons, Robert and John, were born at this ranch.

Then they set out for Arizona. Jack was born at Agua Fria below Prescott, and Taylor was born at the Vickers ranch at Date Creek en route  to Prescott.

Branaman and George Scott owned a partnership and located a good claim in 1877 on the western slope of the Pinal Mountains above Silver Creek.

Branaman was killed not long after this claim was located, and was buried on the hill east of the creek, which later became Fourth and Sycamore Streets. There were other burials at this point which were later smoothed over, and the site was lost.

Continued next week