Town file
Prescott, Arizona
Prescott, Arizona (Yavapai County, Arizona) is the town in one episode of Small Town Murder, the comedy true-crime podcast: episode 357, "Crushed Skulls & Missing Golf Clubs" (26 January 2023). Carol Kennedy was a therapist, artist and teacher who had lived in Prescott, Arizona, for most of her adult life.
- Town
- Prescott
- County
- Yavapai County
- State
- Arizona
- Country
- USA
- Episodes
- 357
- Approximate location
- 34.592, -112.447
Episode 357 / 26 January 2023 / 170 min / full
Crushed Skulls & Missing Golf Clubs
"It's in central Arizona ... it's in Yavapi county, area code 928, and the motto here is 'welcome to everybody's hometown'." about 0:06:22
The case: Murder of Carol Kennedy (July 2nd, 2008). Read the case file.
The figures, as told in 2023
- Median age
- 56.6
- Median household income
- $45,190 a year
- Median home value
- $509,900
- Two-bedroom rent
- about $1,092
- Cost of living
- 122
- Religious
- 26.2%
- Property crime
- about average
- Violent crime
- about right about average, slightly below
History, in brief
- The Yavapai were there first; the Spanish explorer Antonio de Espejo came in 1583 looking for gold. about 0:07:15
- There was no permanent white settlement until the 1860s, when the Walker Party explored the area for gold. about 0:07:19
- Gold was found just south of town in 1863. about 0:07:31
- Gold was struck by Lynx Creek, Weaver Creek and Big Bug. about 0:07:54
- Arizona became a territory once gold was found in 1863. about 0:07:56
- Fort Whipple was established near Chino Valley and was the territorial capital. about 0:08:13
- Gold and silver mining increased fighting between the newcomers and the Native people already there. about 0:08:19
- Mary Sawyer was a woman who dressed in men's clothes, drank hard, swore and worked her own mining claim; in 1877 she was put in an insane asylum, where she stayed until her death in 1902. about 0:09:03
- Prescott was the capital of the Arizona territory until 1867, when the capital moved to Tucson. about 0:09:25
- The capital moved again, to Phoenix, in 1889. about 0:09:44
- Virgil Earp, Wyatt's brother, lived in Prescott from 1878 as a constable, and Doc Holliday was there in the summer of 1880 and appears on the 1880 census. about 0:10:02
The reviews read out
5 stars
"Prescott is super unique and makes for a very special hometown; the courthouse square is the most popular spot, and there is good hiking, several man-made lakes and the Granite Dells."about 0:10:29
4 stars
"A historian's dream with history pouring out of every building, though old people are pouring out of them too; not a modern high-tech city, and there is no diversity, but it is only about 102 at the hottest in summer."about 0:12:35
1 star
"The most boring, stupid town on the map; Californians keep coming and raising housing prices, there are no jobs and nothing to do but sit at the square for a drink, and the town keeps adding pointless roads and car washes instead of fixing the roads."about 0:13:50
Nearest Small Town Murder towns
- Williamson, Arizona9.4 miles
- Congress, Arizona39 miles
- Bagdad, Arizona42 miles
- Wittmann, Arizona57 miles
- Flagstaff, Arizona62 miles
- Apache Junction, Arizona98 miles
Everything here is as told in the episode, on the date it went out; figures and places may have changed since. Endings are covered: open an episode and use the spoiler switch to read them.