Rev. Vanderhoof and FBCS

Part Three

Teaching experiences

Various sources of information presentl available cast some confusion as to exactly when and where Verner and Jane acquired their teaching experiences. Descendants of the Vanderhoofs wrote the following, which they based on an article Verner wrote for the alumni association newspaper TEMPE NORMAL STUDENT, Vol. II, No. 29, May 1, 1908.

Along about graduation time (Spring of 1897) Verner began sending out applications for schools. However, schools near Tempe were full and weren’t accepting new applications [Interestingly, Jane apparently held one of those “near Tempe” teaching positions at Double Butte School, southwest of Tempe.]. He kept sending, and sometime in August he received a letter from Dragoon (a small town about 60 miles east of Tucson), and another offer from a place above the Tonto dam site (now Roosevelt Dam), ninety miles from any railroad. The remoteness of the second place wasn’t to Verner’s liking.

After a long wait, he received a letter from a Dragoon school trustee saying, “come on, school begins Sept. ___, eight months, $65 per month, will meet you at the station.” Verner left Tempe Saturday evening, reaching Dragoon at break of day Sunday morning. The trustee transported Verner by buggy to the home of the Haldermans where he was boarded during his first term of teaching. The welcome and the breakfast that Mr. and Mrs. Halderman had awaiting him were both homelike and encouraging. The people were all pleasant. It was a delightful place up among the pines and large granite boulders. The school was small but there were a great variety of pupils from little tots to one who had gone two years to the University at Tucson.

In addition to his teaching duties, Verner himself received an education in Arizona Border style of living. The many new activities he was subjected to included helping with the branding of calves on the first Sunday he lived there, resolving encounters with skunks that seemed to like coming into one’s house, and going on his first deer hunt.

A delightful winter and a delightful term of school came to an end all too soon, but Verner was pleasantly surprised to find that the trustees had extended his employment for the next year. The next term he taught only a short time before he contracted typhoid fever and had to give up his school.

His third, and last, term of school teaching was at the small mining town of Harshaw, twelve miles from the Mexico border, near Nogales in Santa Cruz County, Arizona Territory. Harshaw was an old mining camp with decaying buildings, deserted except as a dwelling place for several families who sought employment in the various surrounding mines. This was a tough school in a tough town, and Verner’s practical education was extended even more. The clerk of the school board was one Dick Farrell, who also was a mining man, store and saloonkeeper, justice of the peace, and whatever else might have been needed at any given time. About the middle of the term one woman said, “Mr. Vanderhoof, you hain’t never whipped my boys yet, not once. I told you I wanted you to whip them. I won’t be about to do nothing with them when you are gone.” Verner’s compassion was demonstrated here when he told the woman that he didn’t think they needed a whipping yet, and in fact didn’t think they ever would again. He suggested that she just try a few kind words when a task was well done to see if it would not beat whipping. She reported later that it worked all right and there were tears in her eyes as she talked to Verner about them.

Verner was told he must watch one little boy. He would steal everything he got his hands on. A few days after school opened Walter was reported to have stolen a horse collar. Verner called the boy to one side and lectured him for over half an hour and then the boy said, “It might be here behind this big stump,” and he dug it out of the dry leaves. However, the boy always insisted, “No sir, I never done it.” Verner never could make him “own up” but he never took another thing as far as Verner knew.

Another phase of Verner’s education gave him an insight into the character of some of the “citizens” that lived in the area. The country along the border was infested with all sorts of bad men trying to evade arrest. It was common in Harshaw to see men riding through with Winchesters on their saddles. “We asked no questions. Neither did they.”

One morning at break of day an armed officer rode up to Verner and asked for a peace office. Verner learned that this man headed a posse from Nogales that had just raided what was reported to have been an outlaw camp near there. About one hundred shots were exchanged and one outlaw was killed. He wanted a coroner’s jury to take the dead man off his hands and find out how he died. Later in the day the dead man was buried just below the schoolhouse. A few days later the man who had reported the location of the outlaw camp disappeared. A month later his body was found in a canyon where some members of the gang had shot him down.

One of Verner’s most prized experiences was the organization of the first Sunday school ever held in Harshaw. Everyone took hold and made it entirely pleasant. Rev. Oglesby of Nogales came up and preached the first sermon some of them had heard for over twenty years. The Sunday school went on after Verner left.

Verner Vanderhoof and Jane Martin marry

From the various accounts of the Vanderhoof and Martin families, one concludes that Jane’ s parents moved from Prescott to Tempe at some point when she started at Arizona Territorial Normal School or while she was attending there.

The “Tempe Daily News” of July 1, 1898, included the following article:

Vanderhoof - Martin

The marriage of Miss Janie Martin and Verner A. Vanderhoof last evening was witnessed by the bride’s relatives and a few of the most intimate friends of the contracting parties.

The ceremony was performed by the Rev. S. L. Guthrie of the M/E church, at the residence of the bride’s parents Mr. And Mrs. R. W. Martin. The bride wore a charming gown of cream colored silk, trimmed with lace, and tastefully made. The happy couple has for several years been numbered among our most popular and highly respected young people. The bride being possessed of so many graces of heart and mind that she won the love of her associates, while the sterling qualities of the groom have gained for him the entire confidence of the community. Both graduated from the Arizona Territorial Normal School in the class of ’97, of which Mr. Vanderhoof had the honor to be president, and both have successfully taught in the public schools of the territory.

From Teaching to Ranching and Family

The next Spring (1899) the Vanderhoofs took charge of the Bryan Ranch, of 160 acres, a mile and half east of Scottsdale. Here they resided for the next 16 years until 1915.

The Bryan ranch was an adobe house located around what is now known as Pima Road and East Indian School Road. Where the Bryan Ranch was located in relation to that area is presently unknown. In 2004, the intersection is surrounded by tract homes, part of the Gila and Salt River Indian Reservation, Loop 101, the Indian Creek Texaco Food Mart, and a plowed but unplanted field on the west side of Loop 101, extending north about 3/4s of a mile to a Wal-Mart store.

Wesley Dennis Vanderhoof was the first child born to Verner and Jane April 15, 1899 before the end of the 1898-99 school year. Unfortunately he died on August 9, 1899, probably when they had moved to the Bryan Ranch. The Vanderhoof clan records that Perla May Vanderhoof was the first Anglo child born in Scottsdale. The chances are nearly 100% that their additional five children were born in the adobe house on the Bryan Ranch. Perla May was born on August 2, 1900, James Verner Vanderhoof on May 11, 1902, and Flora Lucy was born on December 27, 1903,but also died in her first year on November 29, 1904. Thereafter, Mittie Jane was born on September 23, 1905, and last, Benjamin Luther Vanderhoof was born on April 28, 1909.