A black and white postcard of the Boy Scouts raising an American flag on Buckey O'Neill Hill on June 5, 1917. Mrs. Fred McKinney can be seen on the left. (She made the 48-point flag.) We became the 48th state in 1912. The front caption on the left reads “"Boy Scouts Raising Flag-June 5th "Bucky O'Neil Point" Bisbee" The caption along the right edge reads “Mrs Fred A McKinney Made This Flag" The postcard is unused, and the publisher is unknown. Carl Lowell Sandquist Collection.
The Bucky O’ Neill Hill was named after a frontiersman and a Captain of the Rough Riders. Bucky O’ Neill was born on February 2nd , 1860 in St Louis, Missouri as William Owen O’Neill. He attended the Gonzago College High School and the Georgetown Law School. In 1879, he moved to Phoenix, Arizona and worked as printer for the Phoenix Herald. A year later he moved to Tombstone to work at the Tombstone Epitaph and to experience the excitement of the booming silver town. A year later he traveled to California and New Mexico. He was back in Phoenix working a deputy for Marshal Henry Garfias He finally settled down in Prescott, Arizona where he established the Hoof and Horn, a newspaper for livestock and joined the local militia. He married Pauline Schindler on April 27, 1886 and had a son who died in infancy. O’Neill supported the women’s vote in municipal elections in 1897. Bucky O’Neill joined the Rough Riders during the Spanish-American war in 1898, on July 1, 1898, he was stuck down by enemy fire, and he was buried on San Juan Hill. Eight months later his family wanted to return O’Neill’s body back to the United States. After some difficulty, Bucky O’ Neill’s body was exhumed and reburied at Arlington National Cemetery. In his Prescott, a statue was created by Solon Borglum to honor his memory and was unveiled on July 3rd 1907. The monument remains at Courthouse Plaza. The Boy Scouts of Bisbee would raise the flag at Bucky O’ Neill hill to herald special events, in one case a much-anticipated baseball game between the Calumet & Arizona team and the visiting military team led by Lieutenant Hammond. The hill was also the practice site for Bisbee’s football team.
1976.91.29a