Carry A. Nation

Carry A. Nation (1846 – 1911) = Best known for her hatchet as a temperance crusader. Carry Amelia Moore was born at home in Garrard County, Kentucky, November 25, to George and Mary Campbell Moore. She was a sensitive and strong-willed child.

Her father held Sunday services in his home for his family and slaves in Kentucky. When Carrie was old enough, she took over the Bible reading. Often bored in the meetings, later in life she said she was grateful for her knowledge of the Word.

Carrie moved with her family to a farm near Belton, Missouri when she was nearly nine. It was located in the northwest corner of Cass County close to the Kansas border and south of Kansas City.

Her father became a member of the local Disciples of Christ Christian Church. He persuaded Carry when she was ten to go with him to a revival being held at the Hickman Mills Christian Church across the line in Jackson County. She went to the altar, knowing she was a sinner, knelt, and felt purified at her conversion experience. The next day, she was baptized in a stream with winter ice in it.

Carry married two men. Dr. Charles Gloyd in 1867 who died of alcohol poisoning and Rev. David Nation, an ordained minister and lawyer who pastored a church in Medicine Lodge, Kansas.

Carry believed God had a special mission for her to do in life and was often at odds with the established clergy and law. It was while they lived in Medicine Lodge that her crusade against the evils of liquor began. She called herself the Home Defender and her motto was "Prohibition." She smashed bars with a hatchet in hand.

She died June 2, 1911 and was buried in the Belton, MO. cemetery.

More to Read:

1. The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation. Steves and Sons, Topeka, 1908.

2. Webster's Biographical Dictionary. G and C. Merriam, 1956.

3. Jackson County Pioneers. By Pearl Wilcox. 1975

4. “The Joint Smasher: Carry Nation” By Ellen Miller. Midwest Genealogy Center News Bytes. June 2011.

5. Dictionary of Christianity in America. Editors: Daniel G. Reid, Robert D. Linder, Bruce L.Shelley, & Harry S. Stout, Intervarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL, 1990.

6. The History of Johnson County, Missouri Including a Reliable History of the Townships, Cities and Towns. Kansas City, MO, Kansas City Historical Company; 1881. Reprinted 1970. P. 511.
7. Introduction to Carry A. Nation
8. Carry A. Nation's Diary and Scrapbook

9. Carry Amelia Nation's Papers
10. Kansas Carry A. Nation Trading Card!
11. Vintage Photographs
12. Findagrave #756

Places to Visit in MO. and KS.:
1. Belton Museum, 512 Main, Belton, Mo.

2. Belton, MO. cemetery

3. Carry Nation Marker, K-8, south edge of Kiowa, Barber County, KS. 37.007829, -98.489842
4. Carry A. Nation's Home Museum, 211 West Fowler, Hwy 160, Medicine Lodge, Barber County, Ks.

Victor Paul Meador (1920-2010)

I just received the sad news of the passing of Victor Paul Meador, a photographer, genealogist and the Jackson County authority on pioneer cemeteries. He has compiled and published his own family history as well as several volumes of Jackson County records. Mr. Meador helped me identify an old cemetery dating from the Santa Fe Trail era near the neighborhood I grew up in. His obituary was published in the Kansas City Star on March 4, 2010.

Findagrave # 49063889

Dr. George T. Ashley

Dr. George T. Ashley (1864 – aft. 1941). Schoolteacher and Methodist Circuit Rider. George T. Ashley was born and brought up in a Primitive Baptist church in Mississippi. He professed "conversion," joined the church and was baptized by immersion at a revival meeting held during the summer when he was 15 years of age. He was intensely interested in the salvation of his schoolmates and felt the call of God upon his life. His pastor and neighbor provided the means for him to go to a Baptist College for two years. He later attended a Normal course to teach. As for the rest of his education, George said he obtained it, as Ralph Parlett once put it, in the great "University of Hard Knocks."

He was a licensed Baptist preacher and a schoolteacher, but was expulsed from membership because of his views on open communion.

George married his beloved wife, Marion Amanda Knight (d. 1940) and they remained married for more than fifty-six years. They had two children, a boy and a girl named Mary Fletcher.

He joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, South in Louisiana thereafter. His first annual conference met at Shreveport in January 1888 and the Presiding Elder sent him to the Trinity Circuit on the Black River and later to a circuit near Colfax where they served until they moved to Liberal, Missouri (Barton County) to take up a circuit for the Methodist Episcopal, North church in May of 1890.

Two years later, he was appointed to go to Rolla, Missouri (Phelps County). Blind John Boone played a concert there during Ashley's tenure. After retiring, at the age of seventy-seven, he wrote a little book about his years as a circuit rider called "Reminiscences of a Circuit Rider" which was published in Los Angeles, CA in 1941.

A Bit of Trivia:
1844 = May 1. Great Division of the Methodist church into the Methodist Episcopal North and South. New York.
1939 = Uniting of the North and South Methodist Episcopal churches into the United Methodist church. Kansas City.

More to Read:
Primitive Baptist Library, Carthage, IL

Places to visit in Mo.
JW "Blind" Boone, Columbia

Alexander Majors

Alexander Majors ( 1814 - 1900). Best known for his shipping firm and for the Pony Express. Alexander emigrated with his parents, Ben & Lauraina, to Missouri territory in 1819 from Kentucky. They settled in the future Jackson County. Elder Ben Majors, Alexander's father, was ordained previous to Concord Cumberland Presbyterian's organization along with Ezra Gregg in April of 1826. Within ten years Concord divided; one group moving to Independence and the other to Westport. After Alexander grew up, he became a ruling elder in the Westport Cumberland Presbyterian church and served for many years.

Alexander married his sweetheart, Katherine, who had migrated with her parents, James and Rebecca Stalcup from Tennessee. At first, they were farmers, but after seven children (five daughters & two sons), he began to carry freight to Santa Fe in 1848. Alexander decided each man he hired for his freight company and Pony Express had to agree to a code of conduct during employment: (oath paraphrased)

Before the great and living God, I hereby do agree to conduct myself as a gentleman while in the employment of Russell, Majors, and Waddell. I will uphold the principles of the Bible and in every respect I will be honest, faithful to my duties, and act so as to win the confidence of my employers. I will under no circumstances use profane language, nor drink any intoxicating liquors, nor quarrel or fight with any other employee of the firm. Should I fail to follow the standards of the company, they have the right to terminate my employment without due payment; so help me God.

Alexander also did not believe in working on Sundays.

The residence Alexander built for his family in 1856 is the third-oldest structure in Kansas City. In the day when closets were taxed as rooms, he had several built into his home as well as glass windows.

NOTE: I wish to thank Nancy Ehrlich, a Heartland Presbyterian Historian for graciously sharing information with me on the Presbyterian church in Missouri. I would be remiss without her help.

More to Read:

1. Alexander Majors: The Man Behind the Opening of the West Tourist Brochure.

2. Kansas City Directory Alexander Majors’ Great Transportation Line to Pike’s Peak Tourist Brochure.

3. Seventy Years on The Frontier. By Alexander Majors. 1873 (or 1892).

4. Jackson County Pioneers. By Pearl Wilcox. 1975.

5. Tramping Through Western Missouri. By Martin Rice. 1893; reprinted 1994.

6. Frontier Freighter: Alexander Majors. By J. L. Wilkerson. Acorn Books, 2000.

7. The Pony Express: A Photographic History. By Bill & Jan Moeller. Mountain Press, 2002

8. Pony Express: A Hands-on-History Look at the Pony Express. By Mary Tucker. Teaching & Learning Company, 2004.

9. Here Lies Kansas City. Wilda Sandy. 1984.

10. National Historic Trails Auto Tour Route Interpretive Guide: Western Missouri Through Northeastern Kansas, National Park Service, US Dept. of the Interior, Sept. 2005.

11. National Pony Express Association

12. Following the Santa Fe Trail: A Guide for Modern Travelers. Marc Simmons, 1986.

13. Findagrave #7097
14. Wm. Bradford Waddell Findagave #7098

Listen to this Story about Buffalo Bill Cody who rode for Alexander Majors on this Old Time Radio Broadcast on the Internet Archive. It originally aired in the 1930s! 

Historical Note: Territory v. Benjamin Cochran, Jan. 1, 1856

Places to Visit in MO. & KS.

1. Alexander Majors Historic House and Park, 8201 State Line Rd., Kansas City.

2. Russell, Majors & Waddell Park, Ward Parkway & 83rd Street, KCMO

3. Lexington Museum, Library Building, 112 South 13th St., Lexington, MO. (a replica of a Pony Express saddle, print of Russell, Majors, & Waddell & other Santa Fe Trail memorabilia)

4. Hollenberg Pony Express Station, on State Route 243 two miles northeast of Hanover, KS.

5. Pioneer Park, Westport Road & Broadway, Kansas City, MO 

6. 1963 Westport Historical Society Marker Dedicated to the Memory of the Pioneers Who Settled the Town at the Westport Shopping Center, 1002 Westport Road, Kansas City, MO.

7. Patee House (Pony Express Business Office), 12th & Penn Street, St. Joseph, MO.

8. Pony Express Museum, 914 Penn, St. Joseph, MO.

9. Original Pony Express Home Station NO. 1 Museum, 106 S. 8th St., Marysville, KS.

10. National Frontier Trails Center, 318 W. Pacific Ave, Independence,

11. The Santa Fe Trail

12. Both Red Bridges (old & new), spans the Blue River, connecting the two ends of Red Bridge Road between Blue River Parkway and Holmes Road, Kansas City, MO. Park at Minor Park and walk both, taking note of the historic people posted on the new along with their biographies. But be careful! Traffic will be heavy during rush hour. (Note: There are a couple of other historical spots in the general area -- east side, abt. a quarter of a mile south of the bridge, on the bluff above the river, near the first picnic shelter, is a marker for the Pottawatomi Trail of Death and on the east, up on the hill are Santa Fe Trail swales, marked by a DAR marker).  (Renew the Blue River) 
13. Westport Historical Society, 4000 Baltimore, Kansas City

14. Westport Presbyterian, 201 Westport Road, Kansas City (burned 12/29/2011)

15. Union Cemetery, 227 E. 28th Terr, Kansas City, MO 64108-3277

Our Field Trip:
My husband and I visited the Pony Express Museum in St. Joseph, MO. during its 150th anniversary celebration. I took a photo of the Pony Express Motel sign while there. (click on photo to enlarge)

Written by Dolores J. Rush. Updated: 10/25/2020.