|
 Helen
Corbin was born on January 29, 1931, in
Philadelphia, Pa., and many of her friends believed
she was born with the determination to be successful
in life no matter what goal she chose.
You would call Helen a very dedicated and
conservative American. Her country meant everything
to her. She supported law enforcement all her life
and with all her heart. From the time she arrived in
Arizona she was a strong advocate of law and order.
Her husband, Robert K. Corbin, served as Maricopa
County attorney and also as attorney general of
Arizona.
Helen began her professional career in Arizona as
editor of the Arizona County Attorney’s and
Sheriff’s magazine. She won several awards from the
National and Arizona Association of Press Women for
her work with the magazine. Helen and Bob Corbin
became friends with many of the sheriffs of Arizona
counties. She edited the magazine for several years
and had an impeccable reputation of honesty,
integrity, and tenacity.
 Bob
and Helen were married in 1959 and after arriving in
Arizona it wasn’t long before they started hiking
into the Superstition Mountains. She visited Ed
Piper’s camp near the base of Superstition Mountain
in 1960. This trip and the stories Bob brought home
from his many experiences in the mountains kept
Helen very interested in the history of the area.
Bob Corbin believed in and hunted the Lost
Dutchman’s mine most of his life. He loved his trips
into the Superstition Wilderness Area with various
friends looking for the old Dutchman’s Mine. Bob and
I spent almost 20 years making trips in the
Superstition Wilderness Area. I was following a
dream and Bob was searching for a lost mine.
Often Bob would come home to Helen with stories
about his searches and the many characters he met.
Helen began to assemble these stories and write them
down. Eventually these stories became a book. Her
first book about the lost gold of Superstition
Mountain was The Curse of the Dutchman Mine
published in 1990. This book was followed by
Senner’s Gold in 1993. Helen believed when she wrote
The Bible of the Lost Dutchman Mine and Jacob Waltz
in 2002, she had written the final book on the
subject. Her book The Bible of the Lost Dutchman
Mine and Jacob Waltz contained copies of documents
about the Dutchman’s Lost Mine that had never been
published before. Such documents as the Olber’s
ship’s manifest with Jacob Waltz name on it. This
document also provided Waltz’s date of crossing the
Atlantic Ocean and his port of arrival in America.
The port was New Orleans and the date was November
of 1839.
Another important document in Helen’s book was the
Peeples- Weaver Party’s Expedition Manifest that
included Waltz’s name again. This document provided
proof of when Waltz arrived in the Prescott area of
the Bradshaw Mountains in 1863 with the Peeples-Weaver
Party. The party first panned and worked placer gold
along Lynx Creek near what is known today as Walker.
Helen’s chronicling of Waltz’s arrival in America
and accurately documenting information related to
Waltz between 1839 and the time of his death on
October 25, 1891, was a milestone in the story of
the Dutchman’s Lost Mine. This work provides future
historians with well documented facts about this
obscure Arizona pioneer.
Helen’s research and documentation has provided a
link between yesteryear and today not well
understood before her book. Historians in the future
will have Helen Corbin to thank because she provided
the information that will help them to continue
researching the topic.
Over the years, her husband met many advocates of
the infamous Dutchman story and provided Helen with
much of the material needed to put her books
together. Helen Corbin’s legacy will be that of a
wife, mother, grandmother, author and an American
patriot who met a major challenge in life and
overcame it.
Those of us who knew her understood the enormous
odds she had to overcome to accomplish the task of
writing about the Dutchman’s Lost Mine and the
Superstition Mountains. She has certainly left an
imprint on history of the American Southwest. Helen
visited Apache Junction on many occasions. She also
joined book signing parties on several occasions at
museums and book stores in the Apache Junction area.
Many people in the Apache Junction and Gold Canyon
area met or knew Helen Corbin. She certainly will be
missed by many friends in the area.
Helen Corbin passed away at her home near Walker,
Ariz., on Saturday, January 26, 2008. |
