Why McClintock?

Donna Reiner, a local historian and a good friend of Get Your PHX, has written many articles over the years for the Arizona Republic and others about Phoenix history. We use her services when we list properties of historic significance to help us tell the stories behind the homes.

We are happy that Donna is allowing us to re-publish some of her articles on a monthly basis. If you or your business ever needs a historian, let Donna know at laydeescholar “at” hotmail.com.

McClintock Hall. McClintock High School. McClintock Road. Aren’t those all in Tempe?

So what do they have to do with Phoenix history?

James H. McClintock came to Arizona as a young boy in 1879 to visit his older brother who was the publisher of the Phoenix Herald. Like many others before and after him, McClintock fell in love with the area and never moved away. He did move around the territory for several years and eventually moved to Tempe where he decided to go back to school. Enrolling at Tempe Normal School (now ASU), he was a member of the first Tempe Normal graduating class in 1887. He briefly taught school in Tempe which was a far cry from his early dream of being a mechanical engineer. (The clues to why there are three places in Tempe where McClintock is honored.)

During the 1880s, McClintock worked for newspapers as an editor and/or journalist. He kept up this line of work for most of his adult life helping with the Arizona Republican in its early days, acting as correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and a number of other papers.

McClintock’s Republican political activities provided a variety of experiences too. He was appointed a Justice of the Peace in 1886. The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors named him to a team to scout for dam sites in 1889. The team did locate and map the site of what would be Roosevelt Dam. He was the state representative to the National Irrigation Congress which selected the Roosevelt Dam site following the passage of the Reclamation Act in 1902. Active in the Republican Party Committee for over 30 years, McClintock ultimately ran, unsuccessfully, for US Senator in 1922.

Service in the Spanish-American War with Bucky O’Neill, commander of a regiment to quell labor problems at the copper mines, deep interest in archaeology (he donated his library on this topic to Pueblo Grande Museum), State Historian, Phoenix Postmaster for 12 ½ years, author of a three-volume definitive history of Arizona, and school board member are just a few of the other civic activities McClintock participated in.

In 1911, McClintock and his wife moved into a lovely new 1 ½-story bungalow at 323 E. Willetta Street where they lived until shortly before his death in 1934. Dorothy McClintock was a botanist and authored a pamphlet on the classification of Southwestern flora. She also put her talents to work by landscaping their home with various fruit trees, roses and other flowers, and vegetables such as pumpkins and tomatoes. Today you only find juniper trees by the front entrance and date palms along the curb.

Colonel James H. McClintock was indeed a prominent Arizona pioneer.

Donna Reiner is the co-author of three books on Phoenix history.