What
used to hold small towns together besides churches was a network of general stores
outside larger towns that sometimes had access to railroads. That was the case in West Plains, Missouri
until automobiles made the trip to town for supplies an hourly instead of a
major undertaking. It was too much for a
team of horses to go the 12 miles and make the return trip fully loaded. That’s why country people used to livery
their horses and stay at a relative’s house or – if they could afford it – to
stay at the Midway Hotel.
My great grandfather, George Washington Cherry was a teamster on the Oregon Trail in
the 1850s with Russel, Majors, and Waddell hauling supplies west in Conestoga
wagons. Such wagon trains are the stuff
of American history. (See the largest
collection of horse drawn wagons in the U.S. at the museum at Ft. Leavenworth). In the bigger cities like Kansas City the
variety of hardware and foodstuffs heading west from St. Louis was
amazing. Visit the Steamboat Arabia Museum when you’re there. It sank in 1856 and tons of hardware, bottled
food, and even perfume were dug up from the mud and put on display – the
biggest trove in the U.S. I think it’s
better than the Nelson Art Gallery.
Lesser
known is the story of freighters who kept the little Ozark towns like China,
Leota, and South Fork alive. Maud’s
General Store was in Leota and I can remember it as a boy in the
mid-1950s. It was magnet in its day
where the men folk gathered to hear the latest news and tell tall tales around
the wood stove. They smoked Price Albert and Velvet pipe tobacco as they told stories of fox hunts, crops, lost
silver mines, or reflected on the terrible weather. I made a trip there once with Grandpa
Newberry on his horse-drawn utility wagon when the road was still gravel. It was a graphic and memorable world for a youngster:
horses, lots of leather harnesses, and the sound of
chains jingling.
East
of Leota was China General Store not far from grandpa’s farm. He used to send Aunt Bessie (when she was a
girl) up there for a five cent plug of tobacco. China was supplied by a network of local
haulers like those in the picture who had camped across the road from the
farm. The picture was taken in 1919 and
Grandpa is nearest the tent with the derby hat.
Next to him in the smoke is my father, four
years old.
The smoke clouds the photo. The
guy smoking a pipe cradles a long barrel shotgun; there were still wolf
packs in those days. To the right is a
wooden margarine box. Besides Sunkist tobacco, the freighters carried
the basics for the stores that even diversified farmers couldn’t get like sugar, coffee, and coal oil. Galvanized wash tubs were
popular. After the visit they gave
grandpa a packet of apple seeds.
