History
Our previous article told the story of the public execution of convicted murderer Robert Shehane, an event witnessed by thousands in Thomasville in August 1858. There are several variations of the story, including misidentifying the name of the victim and suspect and even the location and...
One hundred seventy years ago, the fledgling communities of South Central Missouri were abuzz with the news of a murder. Howell County was still part of Oregon County, with the seat of government in Thomasville, the largest town in the region. The story we now tell has several versions, resulting...
For years, I observed the abandoned old store on the east side of what became Howell County Route U, never knowing the treasures inside or the many stories of its importance to a rural village like Hutton Valley. I didn't realize the building was over one hundred years old when I first started...
With football season underway and the sassafras leaves beginning to turn scarlet, for me, it means chili—Texas red with beans—notwithstanding the International Chili Society (and Texas purists) define chili as not having “beans or other fillers.” The bean issue has sparked numerous arguments, but...
In September 1917, West Plains’ Stephen W. Thompson and his outfit, the United States 1st Aero Squadron, arrived for training in Amanty, France. He would spend the next five months learning to be an aerial observer in open-air two-seat bombers. The job included protecting his aircraft with a...
Growing up in Willow Springs in the 1950s and 1960s left me with memories of the freedom a small child could experience in a small town in a more innocent time, with a feeling of safety that sadly is no longer there. As kids, my brothers and sisters and I were allowed to walk unaccompanied in our...
I do not recall a time when I didn’t know Judy Mizer. Certainly, my first recollections of her are before kindergarten in Davenport, Iowa.
After World War II, our fathers, Loren Mizer and Jack Whitaker, Sr., went to work for Merchants Transfer and Storage, an Allied Van Lines agent, in...
"Wars are things that bring their nasty selves right up to your front door for years and years after they are over. Of course, I get right down and think about it, seeing one of my own cousins with an arm shot off and hearing him laugh about how he got it done while he was trying to steal some...
Once again, the source material for this column arrived in the mail. This time, courtesy of retired Lawrence County Associate Circuit Judge Samuel Jones.
From writing historical research papers in college, I learned the value of primary source documents. Eyewitness accounts and contemporary...
The first settlers and pioneers of Howell County ventured into an unsettled wilderness with little or no government services accessible to them. With sparse communication from the outside world, one might expect the early citizens coming here to ignore the activities of their government or look...