 Frederick J. O’Hara, 1875-1901 Member of the Fraternal Order of Eagles Buried in Porter Cemetery, Block 17, Space F (Grave marker photo courtesy of Pioneers’ Cemetery Association, Inc.) Fred J. O’Hara was born on July 3, 1875, in Kent County, Michigan. He was the son of Sarah J. Lamoreaux and her second husband, Bryan O’Hara. Bryan O’Hara seems to have been a two-fisted Irish immigrant who caroused and drank heavily.
From at least 1874 to 1887, the O’Haras lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Bryan worked as a cabinet-maker. Sarah divorced Bryan in 1885, claiming that he was a drunkard and failed to support her and the children. On December 7, 1887, Bryan O'Hara died as a result of injuries received during a saloon fight in Evansville, Indiana. Sarah and her two children moved west to Tacoma, Washington, after Bryan’s death. Son Fred may have become a touring musician, as his comings and goings from Tacoma were occasionally noted in the newspapers. Apparently, his banjo was briefly stolen—but recovered—in 1895. He soon joined the Eagles, a fraternal organization formed in 1898 in Seattle which drew its membership from among those in the performing arts. Suffering from an unspecified illness, Fred had moved to Phoenix, Arizona, by 1901. He died of peritonitis at Sisters’ Hospital on November 1, 1901, and was buried in Porter Cemetery by the local chapter of the Eagles, Aeyrie 178. The Eagles also provided his grave marker. © 2025 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 20 February 2025. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!
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 James B. Lacy, about 1847-1896 Owned the Phoenix Illuminating Electric and Gas Works Buried in the IOOF Cemetery, Block 16, Lot 3, Grave 6 (Grave marker photo courtesy of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association) James B. Lacy was born January 26, 1847 in Erinsville, Ontario, Canada. The name of the town is appropriate, since it was founded by Irish, largely Roman Catholic, immigrants. He was the third of eight children born to Bryan Lacey and his wife, Ellen Clancy. The Laceys were farmers who had immigrated to Canada from County Wexford, Ireland.
In 1868, James Lacy had emigrated to the United States and was living in Mendocino County, California. Around 1873, he moved to Virginia City, Nevada, possibly with a cousin named Bernard. They were employed as miners, working the Comstock Lode. Like many miners, Lacy followed the latest strikes. By 1889, he was in Tombstone, Arizona Territory, where he was employed as a watchman at the Contention Mine. Lacy eventually moved to Phoenix around 1894, where he purchased the Phoenix Illuminating Electric and Gas Company. Being a prominent businessman, he was elected to a term on the City council. He was said to have been genial and well-liked. At the age of 49, Lacy passed away rather unexpectedly of heart disease. Whereas he had always appeared to be hale and hearty, a few days after Christmas 1895, he complained of edema in his right arm. Soon it became clear that his kidneys were failing, too. He was attended by Drs. Stroud, Helm, and Goodfellow, but nothing could be done for him. James Lacy died on January 1, 1896, and was buried in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows Cemetery. In accordance with his beliefs, his funeral service was conducted by a Free Thinker, not a Roman Catholic as might have been expected. John F. Kearney, a cousin of Lacy’s, was a miner in Congress, Arizona. On January 9, Kearney’s wife Katie entered Lacy’s will into probate, and J. W. Jensen was appointed executor. Lacy’s estate was divided between his mother and his sister. © 2025 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 22 February 2025. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  Catherine A. Lacy, 1860-1896 Died in a House Fire Buried in the IOOF Cemetery, Block 16, Lot 3, Grave 2 (Grave marker photo courtesy of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association) Catherine A. Lacy was born March 1, 1860, in Erinsville, Ontario, Canada. The name of the town is appropriate, since it was founded by Irish, largely Roman Catholic, immigrants. Catherine was the youngest of eight children born to Bryan Lacey and his wife, Ellen Clancy. The Laceys were farmers who had immigrated to Canada from County Wexford, Ireland.
While living in Canada, Catherine’s father seems to have Anglicized his name to Bernard. He died on January 23, 1878, and was buried in the local Catholic cemetery. In 1881, Catherine was still living on the family farm near Sheffield with her widowed mother and several siblings. Her older brother James, however, had emigrated to the United States and was working as a miner in Virginia City, Nevada, possibly with a cousin named Bernard. Catherine seems to have joined James after he had moved to Phoenix, Arizona Territory. James passed away rather unexpectedly in Phoenix on January 1, 1896, of heart disease. He was buried in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows Cemetery. Catherine herself died just a few months later on May 15, 1896, of burns received in a house fire. Ironically, her apartment was located in a building behind the Phoenix Gas Works, previously owned by her brother James. She had arisen early and lit a portable gas stove with a match to heat water for her bath. She may have left the stove or match unattended for a moment, for the curtains ignited. As she attempted to extinguish the flames, her robe also caught fire, enveloping her in flames. She tried desperately to get the door open but apparently the smoke was so thick she couldn’t find the doorknob. Passersby noticed flames, broke out the window and put out the fire, but by then she was unconscious and burned almost beyond recognition. She died an hour later. After a Catholic funeral service, Catherine Lacy was buried near her brother in the IOOF Cemetery. Neither one of them had ever married. © 2025 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 15 February 2025. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  John B. Kelly, 1837-1896 Butcher and Saloon Owner Buried in Masons Cemetery, Block 3, Lot 2, Grave 8 (Grave marker photo courtesy of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association) John Barnes Kelly (or Kelley) was born about 1837 in Hermon, St. Lawrence County, New York. Although he and his older brother Henry initially went to California in 1851 in hopes of finding gold, they instead made their fortune in the butchering trade.
J. B. married Elizabeth Ann Morrow on July 8, 1860, in Jackson, Amador County, California. They had four daughters, including a set of twins born in Sutter Creek, Amador County, California. Apparently Elizabeth died in 1874 or 1875, as J. B. then married Laura E. Hoyt on December 1, 1875. They had a son and a daughter while living in California, after which they relocated to Phoenix, Arizona, and had three more daughters. As a butcher, J. B. worked closely with the Balsz family of Phoenix. The Balszes operated a large ranch near Yuma as well as feedlots in Phoenix, and J. B. was one of the butchers who turned steers into steaks for local restaurants. The Kellys lived in a fine house at Center and Monroe Streets. J. B. joined the local Masonic lodge and made a foray into politics; he ran for sheriff but was narrowly defeated. Men outnumbered women in 1880s Phoenix, so J. B.’s three oldest daughters were a welcome addition to the social scene. All three married local men. Harriet Lillian married J. J. Sweeney, a butcher like her father. Addie married Daniel P. Conroy, and her twin, Ada, had a career as a schoolteacher before and after her marriage. J. B. died on February 24, 1896, of a stomach hemorrhage. (possibly a perforated ulcer?) He was buried with Masonic and Episcopalian rites in Phoenix’s Masons Cemetery. The Cabinet, his upscale saloon on Washington Street, he left to his widow. She sold it two months later and eventually returned to her home state of California, where she settled in Oakland. She was last recorded on the 1930 federal census, living with her youngest daughter, Laura R. Kelly. © 2025 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 15 February 2025. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  John D. Murphy About 1830-1897 Veteran of the Civil War Buried in Cementerio Lindo, exact location unknown (Image of a Civil War soldier, generated by Bing AI) John David Murphy was a Roman Catholic of Irish descent. Records imply that he was known throughout his life as John D, John David, or Jerry.
In April 1853, John married Sarah C. Jacobus. It was a ‘runaway marriage’ or elopement, so the young couple married in Essex County, New Jersey, where they were not known. The Murphys had five children: Jane, Sarah Elizabeth, Mary, Jerome Franklin, and Loretta. The federal census of 1860 recorded the Murphys living in Orange, Essex County, New Jersey, where John was working as a carpenter. The family seems to have been quite poor. Notwithstanding his age, John D. Murphy volunteered to fight in the Civil War. He enlisted on May 23, 1861, and was assigned to Company F, 72nd New York Infantry. His unit fought in the Peninsular Campaign, and Murphy was reported as wounded at the Battle of Williamsburg on February 5, 1862. After the war, Murphy was unable to work and, by 1880, he was no longer with his family. Family members say that he had developed a mania for wandering around the country. He lived for a time at the Old Soldiers Home in Dayton, Ohio, before heading out for Arizona. Around July 1, 1897, Murphy was living in a boarding house in Phoenix when he fell ill. His landlord cared for him for four days before sending him to the County Hospital. Murphy died there on July 10, 1897, and was buried in the Salt River Cemetery. Upon Murphy’s death, $600 in cash was found among his belongings, as well as letters from his daughter, Mary Murphy Hilliard. When the administrator of Murphy’s estate notified Mary of her father’s demise, he was surprised to learn that Murphy had a wife back in New Jersey. However, she was illiterate and depended on Mary to keep in touch with Murphy. After Mr. Murphy’s final expenses were deducted, his widow Sarah received what was left--$486. She was still living in 1910, when she was recorded on the federal census as residing on a farm in Montana, with her son Franklin and his wife. © 2023 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 24 September 2023. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  Loretta Mary Huntington McDonald 1875-1902 Teacher Buried in Rosedale Cemetery North (Grave marker photo courtesy of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association) Loretta was born in Halleck, Elko County, Nevada on July 29, 1875 to Cornelius Edson Huntington and Sarah nee O’Connor. At the time of her birth, her father was a soldier in the U.S. Army’s 12th Infantry, Company H, stationed at Camp Halleck. Camp Halleck had been established to protect the California Trail and construction workers of the Central Pacific Railroad. Shortly after Loretta’s birth, he was promoted to commissary sergeant.
Sgt. Huntington was reassigned to Camp Independence in Inyo County, California in 1876. Thereafter, the family remained in California while Loretta’s father was transferred from post to post. By 1880, they were living in San Diego, and three additional children had been added to the household: Edson (born 1876 in Nevada), Daniel (born 1878 in California), and Adele (born November 1879 in California). Another son, Paul, was born in 1883. After Huntington’s discharge from the military, he worked as a bookkeeper in San Pedro, California. This is where he died on August 24, 1893.* Loretta and the rest of the family had moved to Phoenix, Arizona, between 1880 and 1890, where Loretta entered college to become a teacher. Newspapers describe a young lady who enjoyed her friends and traveling to Prescott during the summer with her sister Adele. Loretta taught school for several years before marrying Samuel John McDonald, a stockman, on August 27, 1900. However, the couple had no children and Loretta was eventually diagnosed with tuberculosis. By 1901, her health had begun a steady decline. She died May 12, 1902, surrounded by her family, and was buried in Rosedale Cemetery. Her husband Samuel remained in Phoenix, unmarried, until about 1909, when he left for parts unknown. Both Loretta’s sister, Adele Walters, and brother, Paul Huntington, also succumbed to tuberculosis and appear to be buried near her in Rosedale Cemetery. *There is a discrepancy regarding when Cornelius died. His wife Sarah applied for a widow’s pension in August 16, 1890, while in Arizona, but the death record in California clearly shows that his name was not added to the register page until 1893. © 2020 by Patricia Gault. Last revised March 2020. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  Luke Monihon 1841-1879 A Rancher Murdered Buried in City Loosley Cemetery, Block 2, Lot 6, north half (Grave marker photo courtesy of Pioneers’ Cemetery Association, Inc.) Luke Monihon was born on November 15, 1841, in Waddington, St. Lawrence County, New York. He was the son of James Monaghan and Ann Martin, immigrants from Ireland who had arrived in the United States between 1833 and 1837. The Monaghans were farmers.
James Davidson Monihon, Luke’s older brother, caught ‘gold fever’ in 1854 and went off to California to become a placer miner. In 1860, Luke was working as a hired hand for a Rutherford family, also in St. Lawrence County. No evidence has been found that Luke himself served during the Civil War, although his brother James enlisted in Company F, 1st California Infantry, which brought him to Arizona in 1863. Evidently James saw potential in the Salt River Valley and invited his brothers to join him. Of Luke’s and James’s siblings, Joseph and Christopher also came to Arizona. While their kin back in New York continued to spell their surname as Monaghan, the brothers in Arizona were known as Monahans, Monahons and, finally--Monihons. Luke Monihon was in Arizona by at least August 1875, when he filed on a homestead near his brother James’s, in the new Phoenix township. After “proving up," he received his homestead patent in May 1878. He married Sarah Elizabeth Wilcoxen, daughter of his neighbor Andrew Jackson Willcoxen, although the marriage appears to have been of short duration and there were no children. Sarah had been married previously and had a son by her first husband. On August 19, 1879, Monihon was driving home with a load of wood when he was shot in the back by an assailant who had been lying in wait along the road. The team of horses continued home where a ranch hand, seeing no driver, backtracked and found Monihon’s body. The following morning, deputy sheriffs Blankenship and Garfias picked up the trail of a man on foot near the site of the murder. A Maricopa Indian tracker followed the trail to the ranch of Monihon’s father-in-law, A. J. Willcoxen. The boot track was found to match that of John Keller, one of Willcoxen’s ranch hands who had reportedly been infatuated with Luke’s wife Sarah. The deputies arrested Keller but he was lynched by an angry mob a few days later. Monihon was originally buried in in the first Phoenix cemetery, but his grave was relocated to Loosley Cemetery after it opened in 1884. Monihon’s widow Sarah sold his ranch shortly thereafter, and the entire Willcoxen family moved to Ventura, California, to escape local opprobrium. © 2024 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 27 February 2024. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  Dennis Flynn About 1849-1906 Miner Buried in Porter Cemetery, Block 47, Space E (Grave marker photo courtesy of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association, Inc.) Dennis Flynn was born about 1849 in Ireland. He came from Ireland to Boston at a young age, and an uncle provided for his schooling. He was in Virginia City, Nevada, during the height of the Comstock Lode in the 1870s. From there, he moved to Austin, Nevada, and Grass Valley, California. His name being a common one, it has not been possible to document his movements before he arrived in Arizona.
After moving to Arizona, he resided mostly in Yavapai County. He was a construction foreman on the Walnut Grove Dam at some point between 1886 and 1890. From about 1898 on, Flynn lived in Yarnell. The 1900 census recorded Flynn living in a boarding house in Wagoner, Yavapai County. He was single, said he came to the United States in June 1884 (perhaps he meant Arizona?), and was not a citizen, although he had registered to vote in Arizona from 1892 on. In 1900, he was a foreman at the Crown Point mine owned by Alexander Brodie. Flynn was a miner for about 25 years, although he apparently supplemented that income with other jobs. In 1905, he was road overseer for the county road from Kirkland to Congress and Octave. Somewhere along the way, Flynn contracted tuberculosis and his health began to fail. Seeking a warmer environment, he came from Peeples Valley to Phoenix on December 7, 1906, and took lodgings at the Commercial Hotel. Scarcely a day later, he was stricken unexpectedly and taken to Sisters hospital by his friend Ross Moore. That hospital being full, he was taken to the County hospital, where he died on December 9th. Another friend, Leopold Wallrath, arranged the funeral. Flynn’s obituary describes him as being of a pleasant and kind-hearted disposition who would be missed by those who knew him. He had no known relatives in this part of the country. Flynn was buried with a fine granite marker in Porter, Block 47, Space E. Although he was believed to have owned several mining claims, no probate has been found. © 2023 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 30 December 2023. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers!  Christopher Baine About 1832-1899 Carpenter and Firefighter Buried in City Loosley Cemetery, exact location unknown (photos courtesy of Baine descendants via Tim Kovacs) Christopher Baine was born about 1832 in Dublin, Ireland—possibly to Lawrence and Ellen Bain. It is not known when he immigrated to the United States but, by 1860, he was living in Sacramento, California, and working as a wheelwright and wagon-maker. Several newspaper articles attest to the fact that, while living in Sacramento, Baine was a member of the city’s fire department. He served in Engine Company #2.
Baine was in Arizona City (now Yuma), Arizona, in 1868, when he married Jesus Dominguez Esquer, born 1844. At the time of the marriage, Jesus Dominguez already had a little daughter named Maria Cruz by her previous relationship with Donaciano Cruz. With Baine, she had a daughter Guadalupe, born 1869; a daughter Emilia, born 1871; a son Thomas/Tomás, born in 1873; a daughter Sarah, born in 1875; and a daughter Juanita, born in 1879. Baine seems to have been well-respected while living in Yuma. He worked as a carpenter and served for a time as coroner and school trustee. He also owned a store on the corner of Main Street, Maiden Lane, and Second Street, which he rented to Isaac Lyons. The Baine family’s life in Yuma was thrown into turmoil on July 29, 1879, when Baine shot and killed his brother-in-law, Antonio Ruiz, who was married to Jesus’s sister. At about 1 AM, Ruiz, drunk, appeared at the Baines’ house, from which he had been ejected a month before. When told to leave, he did, but returned a few hours later. Baine, fearing that Ruiz had come back with a gun, again ordered him to leave. When Ruiz advanced instead, Baine fired four times. Ruiz died several hours later. Baine immediately turned himself in to the sheriff. The grand jury set his bail at $1000. It does not appear, however, that Baine was charged with anything beyond defending his home from an intruder. As time went on, the Baines had two more children: a son Angel, born 1882, and a son Jose, born 1888. Newspaper articles describe Baine as working as a carpenter, joiner, and cabinet-maker between 1880 and 1895, although somewhat hampered by neuralgia. By 1884, the Baine family had relocated to Phoenix. On January 23, 1899, Christopher Baine died of typhoid fever and was buried in City/Loosley Cemetery. So thoroughly was Baine identified with the Mexican community, that an El Paso newspaper described him as “one of the best known and most respected Mexicans of Maricopa County”. Although the exact location of his grave is no longer known, Baine has a cenotaph brick in the Pioneer & Military Memorial Park’s memorial garden. © 2023 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised June 15, 2023. If you would like assistance researching our interred, you can find more information on our website. You can contact us at [email protected] at any time. Thank you for your interest to preserve the history of Arizona's pioneers! |