Early Arizona Women in the Mormon Faith :: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Early Arizona Women in the Mormon Faith Imagine traveling across country, in uncharted territory without air conditioning. Believe it or not, thousands of people did it. These pioneers had to protect themselves, make good of the resources around them and try to have a normal family life on top of this. As if this was not hard enough, Mormon women had a much tougher challenge to face; they had to keep faith and teach the word of the lord to all they came in contact with. Many challenges had to be overcome even once they settled, building a house, a community, and a church, not to mention the boredom and loneliness of being far from their families. Pioneering was done mainly throughout the mid to late nineteenth century in America. Women were responsible for tending to the children, cooking whatever their husbands (or fathers or brothers) may have caught that day and cleaning. There were times when animals were hard to find and no kill was brought home that night to feast on; the women had to then compromise and pick plants around them and boil them into a soup. The types of animals that were mainly found were deer, buffalo and occasionally a dog was killed to feast upon. Some of the fears of traveling to Arizona consisted of Indian attacks, robbers and family and, or friends dying along the trail. Not all tribes of Indian’s attacked traveling settlers. In an account told by Mrs. Elvira Martineau Johnson, who, in 1876, traveled with her husband to Moen Copie tells of how Navajo Indians wanted justice, not revenge. According to her, three of the tribes cattle were killed and the Navajo’s wanted to know by whom. The head of the settlement, Jas S. Brown, was hospitable and fed the Navajos while he tried to get to the bottom of the story. Brown and the Navajos traveled to another settlement not far away and discovered half-starved colonists. The colonists admitted to killing the three cattle and explained they thought the cattle were owner less. Because of the time and effort Brown devoted to solving the problem, the Navajos were satisfied and did not ask for any reparations.1 Flagstaff became one of the first Mormon settlements in Arizona.