AZ: The History of Arizona podcast

After suing the U.S. government, Reavis prepared his Peralta Grant story for the scrutiny of a court case. Unfortunately, there was no way his scheme was going to survive that level of scrutiny.

James Addison Reavis returned to the US in 1887 and kicked off Act II of his ambitious land claim scheme. However, soon old enemies returned and began tearing down his carefully constructed house of cards.

Having failed the first time around to prove it was legitimate, James Reavis takes things to the next level, including inventing a flesh-and-blood heir to the Peralta Grant.

James Reavis kicks his Peralta Grant scheme into high gear, sending out an army of thugs and goons to persuade people to pay him for land they already owned. However, just as he was raking in the cash, the whole con would hit a hard wall.

In which James Reavis produces documents showing the land grant bestowed upon Don Miguel Nemecio Silva de Peralta y de la Córdoba … who never existed.

In 1880, a brilliant liar and forger arrived in Arizona to pursue a 13-year old land claim of dubious veracity. Little did anyone suspect the breathtaking scheme he was about to launch.

In the space of four years, Arizona was both shaken to its core and then nearly drowned.

Nineteenth century politics was nothing if not full of ugly fights and very questionable shenanigans - something that was on full display during the short tenures of Arizona territorial governors Hughes and Franklin.

Just as the Gilded Age presidents came and went with frequency, their appointments to the governorship of Arizona would be nothing more than a revolving door of less-than-popular figures.

With the frontier coming to a close in 1890, Arizona started making noise about leaving its territorial status behind - something easier said than done.

One of the great ironies of the Old West is that lawlessness wasn’t just confined to outlaws.

A roundup of famous Arizona lawmen whose names aren’t “Earp.”

The legal drama over Tom Graham’s death would stretch on for years, but, in the end, the Pleasant Valley War closed with Ed Tewksbury probably getting away with murder.

After the early fall of 1887, the Pleasant Valley War seemed to have died out. Years later, one shocking act of violence would prove this conflict was not over yet.

In which my third (fourth?) cold of the season has left me unable to write and, more importantly, record.

After teenager Billy Graham is gunned down, his family opts for extreme retribution.

The disappearance of Old Man Blevins begins a spiral of violence, starting with the party searching for him having a deadly encounter with the Tewksburys.

In February 1887, we have the first fatality in the Pleasant Valley War, as a nameless shepherd will fall victim to the larger conflict around him of cattlemen versus sheepherders and Grahams versus Tewksburys.

Before gunplay became involved, the Grahams and the Tewksburys would square off in the court, with each side accusing the other of being lying, stealing, no-good ruffians.

After a violent confrontation in Pleasant Valley over cattle rustling, ranch owner James Stinson tries to be a little sneakier.

In the 1870s, a new spot in one of Arizona's most isolated corners suddenly opened up for American colonization. Among the few daring souls that would try their hand at ranching in this place known as Pleasant Valley were two families - the Tewksburys and the Grahams.

Sorry to say that real life (and a suddenly real first baby) managed to delay our return to podcasting by a week!

As we look at the commercial forces of late 19th-century Arizona, we have to talk about the ecological and economic disaster that was the cattle boom and bust of the 1880s and 1890s. And ostriches. We definitely have to talk about ostriches.

For Halloween, we again take a tour of the mysterious, strange, creepy and spooky to be found in Arizona.