Mineral Monument: Kingman

 The Miner's Mineral Monument was constructed by C Russell and is to commemorate all the miners of Mohave County from 1860s on.  It is located next to the train station at Fourth and Andy Devine.  The stones included in the monument include : quartz, travestine, agate, onyx, jasper, petrified wood and obsidian.  Inside there is a box to be opened after fifty years.

There are thousands of local mine, active and inactive.  This is a popular copper area but other minerals have been mined: silver, gold, copper, lead, zinc, turquoise, feldspar, tuff stone, aggregate (gravel/stone) among others.  

Farm and Household Implements: Bannock County Museum

 There was a significant display of old farm implements, wash board, spinning wheel at the Bannock County Museum.  

Old Pocatello Replica

At the Bannock County museum is a replica of historical Pocatello with schools, churches, stores and other important buildings. 

 

Fort Hall and Fort Hall Replica

The Fort Hall Replica is in Pocatello in upper Ross Park.  It is about thirty miles fro the location of the original Fort Hall.  In fact the town of Fort Hall which is on the Indian reservation is about 11 miles east of the original Fort Hall and trading post.  Fort Hall was first established in 1834 as a trading post for the Rocky Mountain Fur Company by Nathaniel Wyeth and named for an investor in his trading enterprise.  When the Oregon Trail became popular Fort Hall was the only fort along the trail after Fort Laramie.  The Army was assigned to protect the trail.  With the Civil War emigrant traffic lessened and the fort was abandoned.  It was washed out by flood waters from the Snake River in 1863.  Another Fort Hall was built and manned from 1870 to 1883.  This fort was further east.  After its use was discontinued for the army it was used as a school for Native Americans.  Later the buildings were moved to the Shoshone Bannock reservation.  Today, neither fort still stands.  

In the 1960s the replica fort was built in Pocatello.  It is used as part of the Bannock County Museum and is open in the summer.

Beale Memorial

 The Beale Memorial is on the opposite end from the locomotive at Locomotive Park.  The memorial has three different sides, each used to high light a different aspect of the Beale Trail.  One side commemorates Lt. Edward Beale who in 1857-58 led the expedition that established the trail from the Colorado River to California.  Another side commemorates the use of camels as part of this expedition.  Finally the third side high lights the establishment of Fort Beale Springs as a way station along the route and then later as a fort and then as a temporary reservation for the Hualapai people.  

Kingman Radar Hill

 Kingman took its place in the Cold War as an Air Force station was here on Radar Hill; a prominent hill in the middle of town.  The base opened in 1955 as part of the air defense program CONAD.  It was a radar manned by 17 officers and just under 100 airmen.  It lasted only three years as it closed in 1958 due to its proximity to other radar systems in Nevada and Arizona.  

When the radar was in place they offered tours to the local population.  However the spot is now used for cell towers and is not open to the public.  I remember touring a similar place in Othello as a youth.  It looked like a big golf ball with radar equipment inside.  

Native American Artifacts: Mohave Museum of History and Art

The Mohave Museum of History and Art offers a very good collection of Native American artifacts.  My pictures show only a small sample.  It also has displays talking of the history of the Native American populations in the area.   The displays show many different medium, including beaded moccasins, weaving, basket weaving and pottery.  The displays also represent several different Native American groups.  Most prominent is Hualapai but there are also Navajo and Hopi.  In the doll house collection is a representation of Pocahontas.

Grinding rock

Two depictions of Pocahontas

Navajo blanket

Native American Biography: Sacagawea

 Sacagawea, 16, Lemhi Shoshone, guided Lewis and Clark and their expedition, while pregnant, to the Pacific ocean.  She traveled with the group from North Dakota and made important cultural contacts with other Native American groups as they traveled west.  Sacagawea was born in the Salmon, Idaho area.  However at about age twelve she was captured by the Hidatsa in a raid, and thus came to be in North Dakota.  The Hidatsa sold her to Toussaint Charbonneau, a trapper from Quebec.  Lewis and Clark hired Charbonneau and Sacagawea to go with them on the expedition to help with translating.  They wintered with the expedition and Sacagawea had her baby, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau.  While traveling up the Mississippi Sacagawea rescued papers from the river that included the journal and records of  Lewis and Clark.

When they made contact with a Shoshone tribe, Sacagawea was employed to interpret.  She discovered that the chief was her own brother and reacquainted with many relatives.  The Shoshone bartered horses with the travelers for their overland route which then took them to the Columbia River Basin

Sacagawea continued her journey to the Pacific ocean.  She provided her beaded belt so it could be traded to procure a fur coat to be taken back to President Jefferson.  She was a le to see the carcass of a whale that had beached close to where they camped for the winter.

Sacagawea continued her duties on the return trip.  She provided useful information on a couple of occasions, leading them through Gibbons Pass and through the Bozeman Pass.  Her presence on the journey signaled to those they met of the peaceful intention of the group--a woman and child traveling with them.  

After the trek she and her husband and child remained with the Hidatsa for a few years.  They then, at the invitation of William Clark they relocated to the St. Louis area.  Jean Baptiste was adopted by William Clark.  Sacagawea had a daughter.  However (here the stories vary) she may have passed away at this time, 1812 at the age of 25.  Another story has her returning west and marrying a man of the Comanche and later making it back to her Shoshone people.  She was now known as Porivo.  This woman had more children.  This story has her passing away in 1884 and being buried on the Wind River reservation.  

Sacagawea has been honored with both a postage stamp and also a gold dollar.

Historical Buildings in Kingman

(Information taken from Kingman Arizona Historic District)

The Armour and Jacobson Building was built in 1921 as store fronts on the lower level and office buildings above.  E.E. Armour was a baker.  Robert Jacobson was a mining engineer.

426-430 East Beale

Next door to the Armour and Jacobson Building is the Gruninger Building.  The Gruninger Building was constructed in 1921 as an investment property by Gruninger and Sons.  They had their offices upstairs while downstairs was available to retail.  

424 East Beale

This building has four murals on the side.  They honor the Hualapai Tribe, Kingman, Arizona and Mohave county

Masonic Temple was built in 1939.  It was a WPA project.  

212 North Fourth

The Van Marter Building sits opposite the street of the Armour and Jacobson Building.  It was built in 1921 for the Van Marter enterprises which included mortician, grave stones, music, shoe shop and office space.  Today it houses an antique shop.

 423-27 East Beale

Central Commercial Company Building was completed in 1917 and became the commercial center of Kingman as he company had furniture, lumber, hardware, auto parts, groceries, clothes, farming and ranch supplies and more.  It remained vibrant until the I-40 bypass.  The building now houses several businesses including a church.  

Corner Andy Devine and Fourth

The J.C. Penney building was not built until the 1950s.  With the I-40 bypass completed in 1978, J.C. Penney moved to Stockton Hill Road in a strip mall.  The building is now occupied by Beale Street Celebrations.

Corner Beal and Fourth

State Theater was constructed in 1939 as a movie theater.  It was hurt with the I-40 bypassing the area, but still survived.  Another theater built in town in 1983 and the theater closed soon after.  It is now being restored as a live theater by the Kingman Arts Council.  

Theater 304 Beale

Mural on back of theater

Old Red School House is on Fourth Street and now houses a court.  It was the first permanent school in Kingman erected 1895-96.

The original Kingman post office is across the street from the Red School.  It is used for city government.

The American Legion, located on Oaks, is in a building that was originally a movie theater for the Kingman Army Air Field.  The building was relocated to where it is currently.