Abraham Lincoln signed the Arizona Organic Act, February 28th, 1863, creating the Arizona Territory and separated the future, forty-eighth State from the Territory of New Mexico (which was created September 9th, 1850). Fort Whipple, near what is now Prescott, Arizona, became the first Territorial Capital. ​ In 1864, Henry Wickenburg uncovered a gold-bonanza in the Bradshaw Mountains, establishing the extremely lucrative Vulture Mine, south of Prescott and east of Cave Creek