Endicott Peabody arrived in Tombstone January 29, 1882, when he was
twenty-five years old. He had come to take over the Episcopalian ministry in
Arizona's largest city, where over 800 mines were being worked. Born in
Salem, MA, Peabody graduated from Trinity College of Cambridge, England in
1880. He entered the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge in 1881 and
subsequently accepted a temporary assignment to Tombstone.
Peabody quickly established himself in the community. He organized a
baseball team, was the umpire and president of the baseball association, and
also a boxer. His primary mission was to finish construction of a church and
bring in the faithful. His ability to secure funding was legendary, for some
of it came from unusual places. Once he encountered a group of mine
superintendents gambling. When asked for donations, each gave $150. Saloons
sold the largest blocks of tickets for fund-raising bazaars and operas. When
a parishioner, Mrs. E. B. Gage, offered a gambling pot she had confiscated,
Endicott replied, "The Lord's pot must be kept boiling, even if it takes the
devil's kindling."
Peabody would not see his church consecrated, for he returned east in July
1882, his assignment ended. His is most noted for founding and serving as
headmaster of the Groton School for boys in Massachusetts. According to
Peabody, school was not to prepare boys for college, but for life. One lad
who graduated from his school was future president Franklin D. Roosevelt.