Fair Play, a small railroad town in western Polk County (MO), had a population of about 250 people when it was visited on Sunday afternoon, September 19, 1887, by a fire that destroyed nearly all the business district.
Initial reports said the fire originated on the premises of S. L. North and Co. General Store and Bankers and could not be contained. Efforts were concentrated on removing all the goods that could be saved, and the North general store and adjoining bank, the lumberyard, and a millinery in the upper story of the North building were the only businesses that were unable to remove their stock.
A later report said that the only buildings to escape the fire were the McAckran and Co. Hardware store, a blacksmith shop, a small grist mill, and a few dwellings. Businesses, in addition to those mentioned in the previous paragraph, which were burned out were B. S. Brown & Son General Store; Brown and Hopkins Drugstore; Fox, Potts and Paynter General Store; Gordon & Drake General Store; P. D. Spraque Jewelry; W. Vanzant Hotel and Restaurant; and W. Robenstine General Store. Total loss was estimated at between $30,000 and $40,000.
Fair Play rebuilt rapidly after the fire, and today it is still a flourishing little town of about 450 people.
Sunday, May 18, 2025
Sunday, May 11, 2025
Marion C. Early High School
When I attended Fair Grove High School many years ago, we occasionally played Morrisville in basketball or baseball, but the school was called Marion C. Early High School, not Morrisville High School, and I remember wondering why. Why didn't the school simply have the name of the town in its title like nearly all the other small-town high schools I knew about?
I'm pretty sure I could have learned the answer if I'd been inquisitive enough to do a little research or even to ask a few people who might be in a position to know, but I did neither of those. Recently, though, I learned the answer without really trying. I was just scrolling through some Springfield newspapers when I came upon a 1925 article about Marion C. Early's donation of the land and buildings for the school.
Born in 1864, Early, a St. Louis lawyer, grew up on a farm near Morrisville. Although limited educational opportunities were available to him, he managed to obtain enough early schooling to enroll in Drury College in Springfield. After working his way through Drury, he studied law at Washington University in St. Louis, earned his law degree, and was admitted to the bar.
Although Morrisville did not have a high school during the early 1900s, it did have a junior college, Morrisville-Scarritt College, which was founded in 1909 with the merger of Morrisville College (previously Ebenezer College) and Scarritt College of Neosho. The deed to the land on which the college was located stipulated that it had to be used for educational purposes.
However, when the college closed in 1924, the people of Morrisville could not afford to purchase the land. Mr. Early, who had been a trustee of Morrisville-Scarritt College, bought the eight-acre tract of land and the college's four brick buildings for an estimated $100,000 and donated them to the town of Morrisville for use as a high school. A consolidated school district was organized, and the town's first public high school opened in September of 1925 as Marion C. Early High School.
I'm pretty sure I could have learned the answer if I'd been inquisitive enough to do a little research or even to ask a few people who might be in a position to know, but I did neither of those. Recently, though, I learned the answer without really trying. I was just scrolling through some Springfield newspapers when I came upon a 1925 article about Marion C. Early's donation of the land and buildings for the school.
Born in 1864, Early, a St. Louis lawyer, grew up on a farm near Morrisville. Although limited educational opportunities were available to him, he managed to obtain enough early schooling to enroll in Drury College in Springfield. After working his way through Drury, he studied law at Washington University in St. Louis, earned his law degree, and was admitted to the bar.
Although Morrisville did not have a high school during the early 1900s, it did have a junior college, Morrisville-Scarritt College, which was founded in 1909 with the merger of Morrisville College (previously Ebenezer College) and Scarritt College of Neosho. The deed to the land on which the college was located stipulated that it had to be used for educational purposes.
However, when the college closed in 1924, the people of Morrisville could not afford to purchase the land. Mr. Early, who had been a trustee of Morrisville-Scarritt College, bought the eight-acre tract of land and the college's four brick buildings for an estimated $100,000 and donated them to the town of Morrisville for use as a high school. A consolidated school district was organized, and the town's first public high school opened in September of 1925 as Marion C. Early High School.
Sunday, May 4, 2025
Gasconade Bridge Tragedy
Construction of the Pacific Railroad west of St. Louis began in 1851. The road was supposed to become the first transcontinental railroad, and by the fall of 1855, it had reached the Missouri state capital at Jefferson City. To mark this milestone, a celebration was planned in Jefferson City for November 1, and early that morning an excursion train of 12-14 cars carrying about 600 passengers left St. Louis to attend the festivities.
The trip to Jefferson City was about two-thirds complete when, shortly after one o'clock in the afternoon, the train approached a wooden bridge over the Gasconade River at the present-day town of Gasconade. The bridge was not yet complete, but it was supported by a temporary trestle that was thought safe. However, as the train started across the bridge, the structure gave way, precipitating the front locomotive and ten of the passenger cars into the river. The bridge was about thirty feet above the river, and the water that the train cars plunged into was as much as twenty feet deep.
The rear locomotive and one of the passenger cars became disengaged from the rest of the train and were thus saved. In addition, some of the passengers had gotten out of their respective cars before the train started across the bridge in order to inspect the bridge and to observe the crossing. They, too, were saved, unless they happened to be on the bridge as the train started across it. Still, over thirty people were killed in the disaster, and another 100 or more were injured.
The rear locomotive raced back the way it had come to give an alarm, but details about the disaster were slow to reach the cities. As information about the tragedy trickled into St. Louis over the next couple of days, the entire city was thrown into "a dark time of distress."
A reporter for a Jefferson City newspaper reached the Gasconade bridge on Saturday morning almost 48 hours after the disaster. He described the scene as "such a heap of ruin as few mortals ever before gazed upon."
The Gasconade tragedy was the first major bridge collapse in American history with large-scale casualties.
The trip to Jefferson City was about two-thirds complete when, shortly after one o'clock in the afternoon, the train approached a wooden bridge over the Gasconade River at the present-day town of Gasconade. The bridge was not yet complete, but it was supported by a temporary trestle that was thought safe. However, as the train started across the bridge, the structure gave way, precipitating the front locomotive and ten of the passenger cars into the river. The bridge was about thirty feet above the river, and the water that the train cars plunged into was as much as twenty feet deep.
The rear locomotive and one of the passenger cars became disengaged from the rest of the train and were thus saved. In addition, some of the passengers had gotten out of their respective cars before the train started across the bridge in order to inspect the bridge and to observe the crossing. They, too, were saved, unless they happened to be on the bridge as the train started across it. Still, over thirty people were killed in the disaster, and another 100 or more were injured.
The rear locomotive raced back the way it had come to give an alarm, but details about the disaster were slow to reach the cities. As information about the tragedy trickled into St. Louis over the next couple of days, the entire city was thrown into "a dark time of distress."
A reporter for a Jefferson City newspaper reached the Gasconade bridge on Saturday morning almost 48 hours after the disaster. He described the scene as "such a heap of ruin as few mortals ever before gazed upon."
The Gasconade tragedy was the first major bridge collapse in American history with large-scale casualties.
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