EDITOR'S PAGE

JEROME, perched precariously on the side of Mingus Mountain, has long been one of Arizona's most distinctive towns. Now a faint if lively shadow of the mining center that once numbered 15,000 residents, it is still a popular tourist destina-tion. Visitors search out the symbols of its copperrich heyday, including the Jerome State Historic Park, and browse the shops and galleries supplied by today's concentration of artists and craftsmen. When I was growing up in Prescott in the 1930s, I often visited this interesting town with the marvelous views out over the Verde Valley to the tinted walls of Oak Creek and Sycamore canyons. Jerome was only about 30 miles from Prescott, but the winding climb over pine-covered Mingus Mountain made the drive seem a real journey. In recent years I have discovered that Bill Bennett, the father of Highways Art Director Gary Bennett, was living in Jerome in those same years. Memories of the town handed on to Gary by his father and grandparents coincide with many of my own.

The other day the mail bag brought some detailed reminiscences of the Jerome of an even earlier period from Rita Ysabel Lopez of National City, California.

"Of special interest to me have been your articles on Prescott and Jerome," Mrs. Lopez wrote. "I was born in Prescott, July 8, 1914. Later I went to school in Jerome. "My Dad was a copper miner and moved around the mining towns. There were three children in our family. In 1920 Dad threw a tarp over one of his wagons and made it a covered wagon, and we left Mayer for Jerome. "Your articles on Jerome have missed a very important part of the town. It was called El Golcho (The Gulch) and it was indeed a gulch at the bottom of Cleopatra Hill. There the families of the Hispanic miners of the Little Daisy Mine formed a close-knit community. It was kept very clean; the homes had flower and vegetable gardens and neat dirt roads. There was a river bed that was a sight to see when the rains came. The water would flood the gulch. "In the center of town was the plaza, where street dances were held on the Fourth of July and on Septem-ber 15-16, Mexican Inde-pendence Day. In the early dawn of the 15th, we would hear pistol shots fired in the air and cries of 'Viva Mexico!' coming from the gulch. "We also had parades, with floats and a queen. Sometimes there were rock-drilling contests on the hill. "I remember other Jerome landmarks: the cemetery where my mother and baby sister are buried; a Salvation Army hall; a Chinese restaurant that once was a railroad car; the livery stable on Main Street; the Yavapai Drug Store; a bakery; a cafe; the T. F. Miller General Store; the post office (our box number was 586); the Opera House, where dances and social events were held. And the Catholic Church, where I made my first com-munion at age 6.

"I remember when the hospital was built. A neighbor, an Austrian lady by the name of Sabin, took her daughter Mary and me to be vaccinated for smallpox. The doctor gave me a penny because I didn't cry. "There was the Reese Garage where Dad bought a used Dodge car to go to California after my mother died in 1922. I also remember the jail-house. There was a vacant building next to it where we held my mother's wake. "My memories of the Hispanic social life in Jerome consist of many weddings, christenings, and birthdays. Dad and Mother were a very popular couple in Jerome for two reasons: Dad used to make "white mule" in a still, and Mother was an accomplished musician.

"The family names most prominent in the Hispanic community were the Chacons (my family), the Siqueiros, the Bablotts, the Olmos, the Canos, the Navas, and the Serranos. Later, as we moved up and down California's San Joaquin Valley, we lost track of these old friends. "I was seven years old when we moved from Arizona. I have always wanted to return for a visit; I am now 74 years old. I wonder if there are any left somewhere who remember my parents, Pascual and Rosa Chacon."

Our thanks to Rita Ysabel Lopez for an evocative glimpse of an important Arizona town of seven decades ago. -Merrill Windsor