Monopoly challenger fared badly

Editor’s Note: The Yuma Sun is reprinting articles from past newspapers honoring Yuma’s unique history. This column is one in a series written by local historian Frank Love that appeared periodically in the newspaper.

Bearing the name of a famous hero from American history was no guarantee of success in frontier Arizona, as an 1863 arrival, Samuel Adams, would discover.

He was from Pennsylvania rather than Massachusetts, the home of the famed Revolutionary hero. Born in Beaver County in 1828, Pennsylvania’s Sam Adams was related on his mother’s side to John Hart, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, but no relative of the famous Sam Adams.

Adams later said that he came here to the Colorado River as a representative of Edwin Stanton, secretary of war in the Lincoln Administration. Stanton sent him to discover how far north steamboats might travel on the Colorado River, he claimed.

After Adams returned East in 1869, he submitted an expense claim to the government, asking for $20,000, which he said was due him for services for five years. His bill went to a House committee which reduced the claim to $3,750.

It was never paid. Stanton was dead in 1877 when a committee decided that Sam acted without authority in going to Arizona.

Sam’s claim that Stanton sent him here to explore the Upper Colorado River appears questionable since he never got around to it until 1869, five years after he arrived. Upon coming to Arizona in 1863, he first settled in Prescott where he practiced law.

Political position rather than river exploration seems to have been his goal at first. He ran for delegate to Congress in the 1864 election, getting only 34 votes. He tried again for the position in 1866 and lost, but did get 134 votes more than in 1864. A third try in 1868 netted him only 52 votes.

Despite his failure in politics, Adams was soon trying to challenge the Colorado River Steamboat Company, which had a near monopoly. Believing that competition was needed, Adams went to San Francisco early in 1864 to see if he could get someone to compete with the established company.

Adams found a steamboat operator who was willing to try in Capt. Thomas True-worthy. They came back to the Territory with True-worthy’s vessel, the Esmeralda, in the spring of 1864.

A letter published in Prescott’s Miner newspaper on April 26 accused Adams of telling absurd stories to a San Francisco newspaper about the need for competition on the Colorado. It reported that the steamboat company already there could carry every ton of cargo needed, and True-worthy’s boat wasn’t large enough to make any difference.

It appears from what followed that the letter writer was correct. Within less than a year, Adams and True-worthy had decided that the only way their competing company might survive was by traveling farther upriver where they might transport supplies needed by the merchants in Salt Lake City. They were by then operating a second vessel, the Nina Tilden.

To get Mormon business in Salt Lake City, Adams and True-worthy went there in 1867 to implore Latter-day Saints leader Brigham Young for assistance. What came of the trip is unknown, but it seems likely that they got no encouragement.

Prescott’s Miner newspaper soon afterward reported their steamboats were “given out.” It wasn’t a total loss because the other company bought their two boats.

With his steamboat business finished in 1868, Sam made his third try at winning election to Congress as Arizona’s delegate. Opposed by Richard Mccormick, who had been the territorial governor, and John Rush, Adams worked hard to win the position but had no chance at success with the leading newspaper of the Territory, The Prescott Miner, in opposition.

A Miner editorial on May 30 accused Sam of making a “vulgar and obscene” speech in La Paz and of falsely telling voters in Yuma that Rush had withdrawn from the contest.

The paper also reported that Sam got into a fistfight while campaigning in Tucson. It claimed that after Sam punched Joseph Bosselle in the eye, the other man set out for Sam with his pistol. Adams “did some responsible running when a shot was fired after him,” the Miner announced. Sam finished last in the race, getting only three votes in Prescott.

Sam’s exploration of the Upper Colorado didn’t happen until June of 1869. It lasted until August and brought an end to his Arizona residence. He went back to Washington to ask for the $20,000 in expenses, which he never got.

Sam had another losing try at politics in 1872 when he promoted the candidacy of Horace Greeley, who was defeated by General Grant. The oil industry was then beginning in Pennsylvania, and Sam invented a portable oil drilling machine. It worked but he got little from it because others copied the device, ignoring his patent.

The other Sam Adams died in his home state in 1915.