Progress Notes

Last week I had the opportunity to visit once again the home of Betty and Bill Roark of Olean (photo 01).

01 Bill and Betty Roark

Both are very well informed about the history of northern Miller County and in particular, the Olean area. They have been contributors to the museum and this website on many occasions in the past. The reason for my most recent visit was to scan a photo of the old Franklin general store in Olean for the recent Progress Notes about the Franklin family. The store later was owned by the A.J. Haynes family (photo 02).

02 Franklin Haynes Store - Olean

While there once again Betty showed me many historical items from her photo collection and newspaper clippings. So, although without a particular theme, I thought I would share with the readers of this site some of the interesting historical items of Betty and Bill’s about the Olean area.

First, having to do with the old Missouri Pacific train station in Olean, Bill showed me a model of the building made by John Stickney (photo 03).

03 Olean Missouri Pacific Train Station - Road Side

Notice how closely it resembles the station itself (photo 04).

04 Olean Train Station - Currently

The Olean community has renovated the building and in the near future is planning to utilize it for a museum. Bill also showed me an original calendar which hung on one of the station’s walls (photo 05).

05 Old Missouri Pacific Calendar

When the passenger trains used to stop at the station, the ladies were helped into the waiting horse driven carriage by this large stone with a step chiseled out of the side of it (photo 06).

06 Style Step

Bill found the stone in a field of a local farm where it had been moved when the station closed.

Another interesting item belonging to Bill is this pocket knife (photo 07):

07 Pocket Knife made by Olean Knife Co., NY

It is very old and was originally bought from one of the local stores. Bill said the knife was wholesaled to a local store by a “drummer”, a term used years ago for traveling salesmen. This particular drummer regularly came to Olean by train and one of the companies he represented was located in the town of Olean, New York where the knife factory was located. If you look closely at this next photo, you may be able to read through the magnifying glass the name “Olean” on the blade (photo 08).

08 Knife Magified Name
Click image for larger view

Bill told me that the drummer suggested the name of Olean for the town. Previous names for Olean considered in the past had been Proctor, Cove and Chester. But for one reason or another these names couldn’t be used. Perhaps by the time the drummer came along the town fathers were ready to accept any reasonable suggestion for a name! You can read more about the history of Olean on our website at this URL:

http://www.millercountymuseum.org/communities/olean.html

Now for some more interesting items showed me by Bill and Betty in no particular order:

Here is an advertising card used by one of the local stores long ago (photo 09):

09 Advertisement Card
Click image for larger view

Betty showed me some interesting old photos. Here is one of cars lined up to make a trip to the Tuscumbia Courthouse to lobby for improvement of roads in the area (photo 10).

10 Road Improvement

On the back of the photo is listed their names (photo 11):

11 Road Improvement

Here is a photo of the first Olean Street Fair (photo 12):

12 Olean Street Fair

And here is the history of that event as written by former Advertiser reporter, Madolyn McFarmer:

First Olean Street Fair 1909

Eldon Advertiser 1979

Madolyn McFarland

Olean’s street fairs were recalled by Herbert H. Allee, former Olean resident, who sent the picture identified as a photo of the first fair from Kansas City. The date was September 11, 1909.

“Seventy years ago, I was in the first grade at the Olean School…and it seems just like yesterday,” Allee said.

The band, directed by Jim Gartin, played several times a day during the fair, from the bandstand shown in the photograph taken at the foot of Main Street.

“The band met the Bagnell Branch at 8:10 a.m. and on the return trip to Jefferson City at 10:20,” he said. “The fair visitors were greeted with some real live band music when they alighted from the train.”

The street fair in Olean was a festive occasion, drawing many visitors to the town.

“The Olean Hotel was filled to capacity, and served three meals a day of delicious home cooked food,” Allee said. “The Main Street had many stands selling hamburgers, hot dogs, ice cream cones, lemonade, and red and white soda pop. One stand was selling fried fish sandwiches. Also, some stands had novelty items.”

He recalled that it was at the Olean Street Fair that he got his first introduction to “cotton candy.”

Displays were featured at the Olean fair, too, with competition for the blue ribbons.

The building shown back of the tent in the photograph housed these displays of canned vegetables, cakes, etc., Allee said.

On the back of the photograph, Allee’s mother had penciled “September 11, 1909, Olean’s first street fair.” Allee identified the group standing in front of the crowd as, from left, F.W. Inglish, hardware merchant; Rea H. Allee (Herbert’s father), cashier of the Miller County Exchange Bank holding hand of son, Dick, John W. Miller, in charge of the horse show, and the judge, whose name could not be recalled but who was from the Enon Russellville area; and, “holding the reins of the beautiful horse ready to receive the blue ribbon,” James W. McFarland (father of then Advertiser staff member, Madolyn McFarland), an Olean merchant).

Betty has an old Community Fair pamphlet for the year 1915. Here are scans of the cover and a couple of the advertisements in the booklet (photos 13, 14 and 15):

13 1915 Fair Booklet	14 1915 Fair Ad	15 1915 Fair Ad
Click images above for larger view

Betty’s father, Ray Harrison, was a barber in Olean for many years. Here is an old photo of him in his shop (photo 16).

16 Ray Harrison Barber Shop - Chas. Kneisley Helper

And here is a photo of the William Atkinson family with names (photos 17 and 18):

17 William Atkinson Family
Click image for larger view

18 William Atkinson Family
Click image for larger view

You will notice that the caption indicates that the woman named Lola who is third in the second row is holding a baby named Max. Betty said that Lola was a sister to her father, Ray Harrison, and that Max was the Atkinson who later became the well known Miller County auctioneer.

Betty’s mother collected newspaper stories about the one room schools in the north part of the county as well as some just across the county line in Morgan and Moniteau counties. Some readers who have roots in Olean or the north part of the county will find interesting the following collection of the one room school stories accumulated by Mrs. Harrison. I have identified by an “M” the ones in Miller County. I have noticed that visitors to our museum really enjoy finding a relative of the past in our school photos on display in the one room school house replica (photos 19 - 38).

Just click on any of the photo thumbnails to view a larger image:

19 Buchannan School - M	20 Enon School 1	21 Enon School 2
22 Enon School 3	23 Goodman School	24 Grant School 1
25 Grant School 2	26 Harbison School - M	27 Lone Jack School
28 Manning School 1 - M	29 Manning School 2 - M	30 Mount Pleasant School - M
31 Mt. Herman School - M	32 New Zion School	33 Pleasant Hill School - M
34 Prairie Hill School	35 Sand Hill School - M	36 Shelton School - M
37 Skinner School - M	38 Spring Garden Institute - M

Doris Martin Wiggins, one of our regular weekly volunteers at the museum, spent several years of her early life in the Olean area. When the Olean School was consolidated into the Eldon School system the school class and athletic team pictures of students which had been hanging on a wall were transferred to a storage area at the Eldon School. Doris and some other interested former students did the research to find the pictures, with the help of school superintendent Matt Davis. They found that the pictures had been stored all these years in one of the Eldon school buildings. They were in good shape although dusty. Doris then spent much time photographing each group picture of the classes and athletes. But what is so great about these photos is that Doris made sure she listed the names of each and everyone (photos 39 - 64)!

Just click on any of the photo thumbnails to view a larger image:

39 Class of 1921	40 Class of 1922	41 Class of 1923
42 Class of 1924	43 Class of 1925	44 Class of 1926
45 Class of 1927	46 Class of 1928	47 Class of 1929
48 Class of 1930	49 Class of 1931	50 Class of 1932
51 Class of 1933	52 Class of 1934	53 Class of 1935
54 Class of 1936	55 Class of 1937	56 Class of 1938
57 Class of 1939	58 Class of 1940	59 Class of 1941
60 Class of 1942	61 Class of 1943	62 Class of 1944
63 Class of 1945	64 Class of 1946

Also interesting is this collection of several years of the school basketball teams (photos 65 - 72).

Just click on any of the photo thumbnails to view a larger image:

65 Boys Team - 1920	66 Boys Team - 1930	67 Girls Team - 1930
68 Boys Team - 1931	69 Girls Team - 1931	70 Girls Team - 1934
71 Girls Team - 1935	72 Schedule 1919-20

After my visit with Betty and Bill Roark I took advantage of the opportunity to drive a little farther north on FF Highway and take the Mt. Herman Road over to the Allen Cemetery. It is in this cemetery that at least six of our county’s young men were murdered by the infamous bushwhacker, “General Crabtree.” The event occurred on Curtman Island which is in the Osage River downstream St. Elizabeth. The story has been told well by Peggy Hake:

MASSACRE ON CURTMAN ISLAND, MILLER COUNTY, MISSOURI
by Peggy Smith Hake

The Civil War years in central Missouri were times of great distress and at times, pure terror. Missouri was a controversial state during the war. In fact, it has been said Missouri fought her own Civil War. It was a borderline state where the people simply could not decide which side to fight for. There were pioneers who had migrated from the southern states of Tennessee, Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, and the Carolinas and they, naturally, tended to support the Confederacy. Another faction of pioneers came from the northern states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and New England. The Union Army was often infiltrated by men who actually favored the South, but joined the Northern armies because they knew they would get a monthly pay voucher....the Southern Army was much poorer!

Guerilla forces, called bushwhackers, were very prevalent in Missouri. Some of the bandits of central Missouri were actually an arm of Quantrill's Raiders who terrorized all of Missouri and Kansas. Their atrocities are well documented in the history of the Civil War. A Confederate general named Crabtree and his raiders ran rampant in the central Missouri area and especially in the region of southern Cole and northern Miller counties. He and his forces had their local headquarters in caves along the Osage River near the old railroad town of Hoecker in northeast Miller County. At first, Crabtree's intent was to round up able-bodied men so they could be sent on to southern Missouri, near the Arkansas border, to join General Sterling Price's army. He recruited many men for this cause but after awhile, it seemed his greater pleasure was terrorizing the local residents and their families. His band of marauders began to steal and plunder anything they could get their hands on....horses, livestock, wagons, food, and provisions. High on his priority list was grain sheds and smokehouses where the farmers had stored cultivated crops and meat supplies. Many homes, barns, crops, etc. were torched and burned to the ground. It was not beneath him to torture families in order to get information about military activities in the area....he was also interested in their valuables and where they were hidden.

After some time, area-wide enrolled militias were organized. One of these militia groups, the Provisional Company of Mt. Pleasant-Missouri Militia, was commanded by Capt. Thomas Babcock who operated from the small village of Mt. Pleasant, Saline township, Miller County. Capt. Babcock kept his men on Crabtree's trail constantly. In the second week of August 1864, one of Crabtree's men, John P. Wilcox, was captured and sent to Jefferson City. He was tried for war crimes by a military commission and was ordered executed. The execution was carried out immediately ... Receiving word of the execution of one of his men, Crabtree sent his band of guerillas out on rampaging maneuvers ... plundering, burning, and killing.

In late August 1864, Babcock sent sixteen of his men out again looking for Crabtree in his own 'backyard' in the Wet Bottom region of the Big Tavern creek. On August 30, they reached Curtman Island, located in the middle of the Osage River near where the Big Tavern creek empties into the Osage. The men were under the command of First Lt. John Starling. At the noon hour, the militiamen stacked their weapons and relaxed for awhile, enjoying their meager provisions. That was a tragic mistake! Suddenly, about 25 of Crabtree's men surrounded them. Seven of the sixteen men were ordered to line up on the sandy soil of the island. Those picked were Lt. John Starling, William Gibson, Samuel McClure, Yancy Roark, Pharoah B. Long, Nathaniel Hicks, and Stephen S. Crisp. Hicks and Crisp were brothers-in-law. The seven were executed on the spot by gunfire. The other nine men, including Boyd S. Miller and Joseph Hicks, were told to run and not look back till they got to Mt. Pleasant and when they got there to tell Babcock that "Crabtree was responsible for the execution of the seven men".

A group of the militia returned to the island to bring the bodies of the soldiers back to their families for burial. Only six were found. At a later time, the bones of the seventh man were found on the island. Evidently he had crawled some distance away from his comrades before death overtook him.

This cruel episode was the beginning of the end for General Crabtree. The execution of the seven men on Curtman Island was an act of revenge by Crabtree, but he seemed to know it was a drastic mistake and went into hiding in the various caves and hollows of the Big Tavern country.

As I approached the Allen Cemetery, Peggy’s story told above about the massacre was on my mind. The cemetery is located on an elevated ridge with a beautiful view to the east and south. Here are a couple of photos of the cemetery (photos 73 and 74):

73 Allen Cemetery

74 Allen Cemetery

My mission was to find the tombstones of the six soldiers massacred by Crabtree known to be buried there. Many of the tombstones in the cemetery are very old and it is difficult to read the inscriptions. But I was able to find them. The next part of Peggy’s narrative gives a short history of each of the soldiers buried there. The first soldier Peggy mentions is the only one not buried in Allen Cemetery but is buried in Spring Hill Cemetery.

THE SEVEN SOLDIERS EXECUTED ON CURTMAN ISLAND IN 1864...
by Peggy Smith Hake

The following is a brief history of each of the seven Union soldiers who were executed by General Crabtree's forces on Curtman Island on a hot, sultry day in August, 1864...

1. STEPHEN S. CRISP was a son of Joseph and Phoebe Crisp, natives of North Carolina. Stephen (called Dick) was born in Kentucky on 2 May 1838 and was 26 years old when he died. He married Elizabeth Mahala Bond (dau. of Joseph and Charity Bond) in Miller County in 1862. They had one child, Mary Jane Crisp, born 1864. Stephen's widow, Elizabeth (Bond) Crisp, later married Robert Hill and they had 6 children. Stephen is buried at Spring Garden cemetery in northern Saline township. His brother-in-law, Nathaniel Hicks, who married Elizabeth Crisp, also died on Curtman Island.

2. WILLIAM GIBSON is a man of some mystery. Not much is known about him. In Miller County marriage records, a man named William Gibson married Martha Young in February 1841. They do not appear in census records, so it is not known if he was the same man as the one massacred on Curtman Island. In 1860, Wiley Gibson, his wife Mahala, and 5 children lived in Richwoods township. He was about 31 years old, born in Tennessee c/1829. It is possible he could be the William killed by Crabtree's raiders. It is a known fact that William Gibson, one of the 7 executed, is buried at Allen cemetery near Olean (photo 75).

75 William Gibson Headstone

3. NATHANIEL HICKS was born in Kentucky about 1837, a son of Nathaniel Hicks Sr. and his wife, Lucinda. They were both natives of Virginia. Nathaniel married Elizabeth Crisp, daughter of Joseph and Phoebe Crisp and a sister to Stephen Crisp who also died on Curtman Island. Nathaniel and Elizabeth had at least three sons: James L. Hicks, Joseph N. Hicks, and Stephen S. Hicks. Nathaniel died at the age of 27 years and is buried at Allen Cemetery near Olean. In December 1866, his widow, Elizabeth, married John A. Tracy (photo 76).

76 Nathaniel Hicks Headstone

4. PHAROAH (Farrow) LONG was born in Tennessee about 1832, a son of John Long (1801-1888) and his wife, Nancy (1804-1891), both natives of North Carolina. He married Martha Hix/Hicks in Miller County in January 1851. They had two daughters, Nancy J. Long and Jemima E. Long. Pharoah, called Farrah, died at the age of 32 years and is buried at Allen cemetery where his parents are also buried. (Some have not agreed that Pharoah is actually buried at Allen Cemetery.)

Note: However, the tombstone clearly has his name written on it (photo 77).

77 Farrow Long Headstone

5. SAMUEL MCCLURE may have been a son of Anna McClure, born c/1815 in Kentucky. No records have been found for him in Miller County census records. He is buried at Allen Cemetery per cemetery inventory records and has a military stone. Also at Allen Cemetery is William M. McClure (1852-1926). He may have been a brother to Samuel. Some reports state he may be buried at Amos Cemetery in Moniteau County.

Note: Again, the tombstone clearly has his name (photo 78).

78 Samuel McClure Headstone

6. YANCY ROARK was born in Kentucky on September 2, 1827, a son of William and Candace Roark. He was 36 years old when he died on Curtman Island, just 3 days before his 37th birthday. In November 1849, Yancy married Leah Vernon in Miller County and they had three children: Henry Nolan Roark, John B. Roark, and Martha Roark. Yancy has two stones in Allen Cemetery; one that was placed by his family and the other is a government-issued stone. His wife, Leah Vernon, Roark, never remarried but remained his widow and died in 1907. She is buried at Eldon Cemetery as well as their three children (photo 79).

79 Yancy Roark Headstone

7. JOHN P. STARLING was a son of Thomas Day Starling (1796-1880) and his wife, Elizabeth (1801-1872), natives of Maryland and Tennessee, respectively. John was born in Tennessee on 24 March 1832 and was 32 years old when killed. His wife's name was Sarah E. (maiden name unknown) and they had 4 children: James Starling, William Starling, Samuel Starling, and Louisa J. Starling. John is buried at Allen Cemetery where his family is also buried. John was the commanding officer in charge the day they patroled Curtman Island. He held the rank of First Lt. of the Provisional Company (photo 80).

80 John Starling

FOOTNOTE:

Curtman Island was named for Charles Nicholas Cary Phillip Otto Curtman, who once owned the island before the Civil War. Charles was an immigrant from Giessen, Hesse Darmstadt, Germany. He was a son of William J.G. Curtman and Adelheid Kroenke and was born on July 27, 1829. Charles came to America in the early 1850s and settled in Miller County. On June 24, 1852, he married Miss Sarah Boyd, a daughter of James and Ruth (Clark) Boyd, natives of Greenup County, Kentucky. They had homesteaded in the same general area about 1835. In 1854, Charles Curtman, who by profession was a doctor, opened his medical practice at an early-day store on the west bank of the Osage River, called Fairplay. He and Sarah had three children: Minna Ruth 1853-1855, William 1855-1857, and George Washington born 2 Nov 1857. Sarah Boyd Curtman died when George W. Curtman was only 7 days old. George was the only surviving child of Sarah and Charles Curtman. He followed in his father's footsteps, becoming a well-known physician in Miller and Maries counties.

This coming weekend, Saturday, October 10, we will be hosting a car cruise event in which local classic car aficionados are invited to bring their cars to the museum grounds for a public exhibition. We will be serving Chili and soup for lunch midday. Also, we will keep the museum open until six p.m. for those who are coming into town for the annual Tuscumbia Alumni Reunion which begins at six p.m. So, if you are coming to the reunion, come earlier this year and take a look at the cars as well as the museum.

That’s all for this week.

Joe Pryor