USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 18
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An impressive structure for its generation was the Buchanan tavern in Florida. It was of brick and equipped on a scale which befitted a community with strong hopes of being the county seat of one of the rich counties of Mis- souri. The time came when Florida and Paris engaged in one of the most .exciting county seat contests in the history of the state. A compromise settle- ment was offered; it was proposed to make two counties out of Monroe with Paris and Florida as county seats. One of the Florida boomers was John Marshall Clemens, the father of Mark Twain. The compromise was defeated.
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Major Howell and Dr. Flannagan were members of the legislature and both favorable to Paris. They got through an act cutting off a slice of Monroe county and adding it to Shelby. This reduced Monroe to the extent that it spoiled the argument for two counties. It also made Paris the more natural location for the county seat. It was a great victory for Paris but the people who were moved into Shelby long insisted that they belonged in Monroe.
A Praying Landlord.
Ferdinand Ernst who traveled about Missouri and Illinois in 1819 had this experience :
"The landlord at the next tavern received us with the remark that tavern keeping was a secondary matter with him, and he requested of his guests that they accommodate themselves to his wishes, and whoever would not consent to this might travel on. The company of travelers regarded the words of the landlord as very strange, but resolved to put up here as the next tavern was quite a distance off and men and horses were very tired. After supper the landlord and his family began to pray and sing so that the ears of us tired travelers tingled. Many of the travelers would have gladly requested them to desist from this entertainment if the landlord had not taken the precautions upon our entrance. After prayers the landlord related to me that he had often been disturbed in his religious exercises and even been shamefully ridiculed by travelers. He, therefore. had been obliged to make that condition upon the reception of guests. He was a Quaker."
On the Grand Pass, in the thirties, when the stream of migration and com- merce flowed along the Santa Fe Trail. John and William Early, cousins of Bishop Early of Kentucky, kept tavern. Grand Pass was a strip of high land between Salt Fork and the Missouri bottoms. Two bodies of water in the bottoms were known as Grand Pass and Davis lakes. Tavern keepers in those days included Missourians of high repute. The vocation was an honorable one. Lieutenant Francis Hall, an Englishman traveling in America in 1817. said :
"The innkeepers of America are, in most villages, what we call vulgarly, topping men-field officers of militia with good farms attached to their taverns, so that they are apt to think what, perhaps, in a newly settled country, is not far wide of the truth, that travelers rather receive than confer a favor by being accommodated at their homes. The daughters officiate at tea and breakfast and generally wait at dinner."
It is an historic fact that the first tavern in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was kept by a deacon of the church who afterwards was steward of Harvard. When Lafayette made his triumphal tour in 1824. his party stopped at fifty taverns. One who was of that party wrote:
"We were received by the landlord with perfect civility but without the slightest shade of obsequiousness. The deportment of. the innkeeper was manly, courteous, and even kind; but there was that in his air which sufficiently proved that both parties were expected to manifest the same qualities."
Almost contemporaneous with Missouri's statehood was J. S. Halstead, of Breckrenridge, who celebrated his one hundredth birthday in 1918. He had been eighty years a resident of Missouri; in his younger days he was in
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close relations with Henry Clay. He carried a cane presented to him by Clay who had received it as a gift from Senator Jenifer of Maryland. The cane had a history. The Maryland senator brought it from an olive tree near the burial place of Cicero. He gave it to Mr. Clay on the occasion of the lat -- ter's famous speech expounding the Missouri Compromise. One day a dog attacked Clay on the street in Washington. Defending himself with his cane, Clay hit a fence and broke the cane. He tried to have it repaired but was dis- satisfied with the result and passed the historic stick along to his young friend, Halstead. At the observance of his centennial, Mr. Halstead told a corre- spondent of the Kansas City Star this tavern story as he had it from Mr. Clay :
An English nobleman traveling in the United States called upon Mr. Clay. He stopped at a tavern, having with him his valet. The tavern keeper noticed that the valet seemed to keep at a distance but did not take into consideration any difference in station. When it came time to go to bed, the tavern keeper showed milord and the valet to the same room. The nobleman protested. He said: "But I am not accustomed to being in the same room with my valet."
"I can't help that," said the tavern keeper. "It's there for you. You will have to make the best of it."
When the Englishman got away from Lexington he wrote Mr. Clay a letter telling of his tavern experience and commented good naturedly on the democratic ideas of American tavern keepers.
An Ozark Menu.
When "Dad" rang the dinner bell in good old-fashioned way, on the porch of a West Plains hotel one September noon, the guests who gathered about the long table running the length of the dining room counted eleven forms of fruit before them. In the center was a pyramid of apples, peaches, pears and grapes. The fried chicken was in a setting of boiled apples. With the pork was a dish of fried apples. The dessert was a choice of apple dump- ling or peach cobbler, or both. By way of relishes there were pickled peaches, plum butter and apple jelly,-eleven forms of fruit, count 'em,-and it was no extra occasion.
Some of these Missouri taverns outlived the stage coach. The old Ensign tav- ern at Medill in Clark county was razed within the past half decade. It was a once popular stopping place on the road from Alexandria to Bloomington, by which the traveler journeyed from the Mississippi landing into the in- terior of Northeast Missouri. At Bloomington Squire Absalom Lewis kept tavern in what was the first house in that part of the state with the chimneys inside of the walls. Squire Lewis came honestly by his judicial title. For years he entertained the judge and the lawyers and the clients during court sessions. A rule of the tavern during this periodical congestion of custom was that only the judge could have a bed to himself. From years of close asso- ciation with his guests, Lewis came to have such familiarity with law and prac- tice that he was prompted to run for justice of the peace. When a tavern keeper went out for office he was generally successful, such was the esteem in which the vocation was held by Missouri constituencies. Squire Lewis was
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AN OZARK TAVERN
AGE ยท HOTEL
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"'DAD" An old time tavern keeper of Missouri
MCGEE HOTEL ON GRAND AVENUE One of the pioneer taverns of Kansas City
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elected and proceeded to administer justice according to his previous observa- tion. In one of his earlier cases he was called upon to pass upon many ob- jections raised by opposing counsel. With strict impartiality, the squire ruled in favor of the lawyers alternately. But at the end of the trial, two consecu- tive rulings were made in favor of the plaintiff.
"Look here," said the lawyer for the defense, "squire, you decided for the other side last time and this was our turn to get the decision ?"
"I know how I done," said the squire, with dignity. "In order to be fair to you fellows, I gave half the pints to the plaintiff and half to the defendant, and never put one single pint for myself till the close of the case. And then you kick. Seems to me you don't appreciate fair treatment."
Squire Lewis believed in upholding the dignity of his court. On one occasion he left the bench and whipped a lawyer for contempt.
Captain Kidd Kidded Vest.
He was a Missouri tavern keeper who once got the better of George G. Vest in a match of wits. The occasion was in old Georgetown, once the county seat of Pettis, where Vest, as a young bachelor, lived at the tavern while he divided his time between practicing law, hunting and fishing. Judge Henry Lamm told the story :
"In 1854, Vest went back to Kentucky and married, bringing his wife to Georgetown. It is said that Vest had nettled his landlord a little by intimating it was unsafe to eat his pies without first pounding on the crust with a knife handle to scare out the cock- roaches. Be that as it may, the said landlord, Captain Kidd, felt no occasion to be other- wise than frank, and, when Vest brought his bride to his house and took him to her for an introduction and proudly asked him what he thought of her, Kidd replied: 'By gum, George, you must have cotched her in a pinch for a husband.'"
A fine representative of the type of Missouri landlords was "Weed" Marshall who furnished "entertainment" at Mayview for twenty-nine years. "Weed" was the familiar name by which the traveling public knew him. The proper initials were "J. W." Marshall was courteous to a punctilious degree ; but it did not do to presume upon his good nature. A young traveling man left a call for three o'clock in the morning and in a rather unpleasant manner im- pressed the importance of it. Marshall had no night clerk and sat up to make sure that the guest did not miss the train. At three o'clock to the minute he pounded on the door. A grunt was the response.
"Get up," shouted Marshall. "It's three o'clock."
"I've changed my mind," growled the traveling man. "I'm going to stay and take later train."
"No, you're not," said Marshall. "Confound you! You get up and get out this minute. You can't fool me." And the young man left on his early train.
Marshall had been in the Confederate army. He was "with Shelby" and proud of it. When he retired from the Mayview tavern the Kansas City Star told this: Traveling men found it entertaining to start a controversy as to the war record of Shelby's brigade just to arouse the ire of "Weed." One night a big drummer, new in that territory, and under the prompting of other Vol, 1-10
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traveling men, started something. He began with a reference to the Civil war and his own alleged part in it. He said his command had met a body of Missouri Confederates under Shelby.
"We not only made them run," he said, "but we captured a lot of them. I captured one myself. And I made that fellow do all sorts of stunts. He was so scared he would do anything I told him. I made him roll on his back like a dog and bark when he wanted food; and lick the mud off my boots. Funny thing about it, Mr. Marshall; you somehow remind me of that man. You weren't ever with Shelby, were you?"
"Yes sir. I was with Shelby. I was that very man you captured. I have been looking for you ever since. I made a vow then that if I ever met you, I'd kill you."
With that Marshall opened a drawer of his desk and pulled out a re- volver. The big traveling man apologized hastily, said his war reminiscence was all a joke and that the other traveling men had put up a job on him. The honors of the hour were with Marshall.
Far and wide in that part of Missouri the Mayview house of entertain- ment under Marshall was famed for immaculately clean beds and good living.
In a reminiscent letter to the Saline County Index published in 1900, Dr. Glenn O. Hardeman testified to the modest charges at a famous old Mis- souri tavern :
"On my first visit to Saline, in 1840, I landed at Arrow Rock from a steamboat in the night, and as I intended going to the country in the morning, I took lodging only at the hotel kept by that well known and popular citizen, Joseph Huston, Sr., for which I was charged the sum of 121/2 cents, or I should say a 'bit.' On my return in a few days I dined at the same hotel and was charged another 'bit' for an excellent dinner. The currency of that day was exclusively Mexican or Spanish coin."
One Missouri tavern has not only survived, but, with the marking of historic trails and the promise of good roads to encourage the motor travel. has entered upon a new period of popularity. The fame of the tavern of Arrow Rock is growing rapidly with the tourist. Built of brick burned by slaves in 1840, with wide fireplaces, with solid walnut finish, with antlers of Missouri elks, Arrow Rock tavern charms the visitor today. Patriotic women have added relics, such as Daniel Boone's fiddle, and dainty draperies.
What has been done at Arrow Rock suggests the possibilities of the re- naissance of the Missouri tavern as the era of leisurely and independent tour- ing opens with Missouri's second century.
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CHAPTER V
WORSHIP IN WOODS AND CABINS
The Campmeeting in Missouri History-When Mckendree Became a Bishop-Jesse Walker, the Pioneer-Thrilling Scenes at Three Springs-Bush Arbors and Egg Shell Lamps-The Ministerial Attire-Old Antioch-"Devil's Camp Ground"-A Sermon a Day for a Year-The Programme-Old Time Hymns-"God Greater Than Tom Benton"-Sni Grove's Vast Assemblages-Old Freedom-Physical Manifestations of Conviction-"The Jerks"-Law and Order Regulations-Pioncer Church Discipline- Rucker Tunner-A First Covenant in Boone-Perils of the Itinerants-"Meeting House" Architecture-Theology of the Pioneers-Rev. Moses E. Lard's Recollections -- Shackleford on the Wave of Infidelity-The Saving Influence of Good Women- Marvin's First Sermon-The Bishop on the Early Settlers-A Colaborer with Cart- wright-Matrimonial Fees-Militant Men of the Church-A Dry Land Baptist-"Snag- boat" Williams-Baptism at Old Nebo-Bonnet Show Day in Clay County-Immersions in Midwinter-The First Communion at Zumwalt's-Conversion at Hen-egg Revival- Services in a Pike County Cabin-Eccentric Henry Clay Dean-An Ozark Preacher's Prayer for Rattlesnakes-Fanatical Pilgrims-The Millerite "Last Day"-Champ Clark on the Chaplain-Beginnings of the Christian Church-"Brush College" Train- ing-The Missouri "Marthas"-Stribling's Gift-Mr. Barger's Astonishing Text-First Meeting on Baxter Ground-Saving Grace of Humor in the Pulpit-Preachers' Nicknames.
4. That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences; that no man can be compelled to erect, support or attend any place of worship, or to maintain any minister of the gospel or teacher of religion; that no human authority can control or interfere with the rights of conscience; that no-person can ever be hurt, molested or restrained in his religious professions or sentiments, if he do not disturb others in their religious worship;
5. That no person on account of his religious opinions can be rendered ineligible to any office of trust or profit under this state; that no preference can ever be given by law to any sect or mode of worship; and that no religious corporation can ever be established in this state .- From the first Constitution of Missouri, adopted 1820.
One of the first campmeetings in Missouri, according to Rev. J. W. Cun- ningham, church historian of fifty years ago, was held somewhere between the Meramec and the Missouri rivers. Four ministers, McKendree, Gwin, God- dard and Travis, came from Illinois and walked forty miles to preach at that gathering. McKendree went on to Baltimore to attend the general conference of the Methodist church. He was "clothed in very coarse and homely gar- ments which he had worn in the woods of the West." He preached to the conference with such power that Bishop Asbury said "that sermon will make him a bishop." And it did. McKendree was elected a bishop a few days later. He came back and was in Missouri the next year to attend the first campmeeting north of the Missouri river. The meeting was held on the Peruque near what is now O'Fallon. Settlers came from long distances to "hear the
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bishop preach." A tent was constructed for the bishop. The saddle blankets of several preachers were sewed together and spread over a pole which was held up by forked posts. One end of the tent was closed with green branches. The other was left open, with a fire in front of it. The food prepared for the bishop consisted of meat. broiled at the end of a stick, and bread.
The First Missouri Campmeeting.
Bishop McKendree left a written record of his visit to Missouri to hold campmeeting, "the first meeting of the kind ever held northwest of the Mis- sissippi river." He said that his party "walked about forty miles in getting to it." With McKendree were Jesse Walker, who had arranged the Missouri trip. James Gwin and A. Goddard. Gwin was a man six feet high. He had been in the expedition which broke up the Cherokee pirates at Nickajack and made navigation safe on the Tennessee river. Further than that, Gwin had been Jackson's favorite chaplain at the Battle of New Orleans and had been put in charge of the wounded and the hospital there. Gwin left an account of that trip to Missouri to hold the first campmeeting :
"We crossed the Ohio river, took the wilderness, and traveled until night. Not being able to get any habitation, we camped out. Brother Mckendree made us some tea, and we lay down under the branches of a friendly beech, and had a pleasant night's rest. Next morning we set out early, traveled hard, and got some distance into the prairie, and here we took up for the night. The next night we reached the first settlement, tarried a day there, and crossing the Kaskaskia river, lodged with an old Brother Scott. Here we met with Jesse Walker, who had formed a circuit and had three campmeetings ap- pointed for us. After resting a few days we set out for the first campmeeting. In twelve miles we reached the Mississippi river, and, having no means of taking our horses across, we sent them back, crossed the river, and, with our baggage on our shoulders, went to the campground, having fallen in with Brother Travis on the way. About forty were converted at this meeting.
Thrilling Scenes at Three Springs.
"From this campmeeting we returned across the river to Judge S-'s, who re- freshed us and sent forward our baggage in a cart to Brother Garettson's where our next meeting was to be held, which was called Three Springs. We arrived on Friday morning at the campground, which was situated in a beautiful grove surrounded by a prairie. A considerable congregation had collected, for the news of the other meeting had gone abroad and produced much excitement. Some were in favor of the work, and others were opposed to it. A certain major had raised a 'company of lewd fellows of the baser sort' to drive us from the ground. Saturday, while I was preaching, the major and his company rode into the congregation and halted, which produced confusion and alarm. I stopped preaching for a moment and invited them to be off with themselves, and they retired to the spring for a fresh drink of brandy. The major said he had heard of these Methodists before; that they always broke up the peace of the people wherever they went; that they preached against horse racing, card playing, and every other kind of amusement." At three o'clock, while Brother Goddard and I were singing a hymn, an awful sense of the divine power fell on the congregation, when a man with a terrified look ran to me and said, 'Are you the man that keeps the roll?' I asked him what roll. 'That roll,' he replied, 'that people put their names to who are going to heaven.' I supposed he meant the class paper, and sent him to Brother Walker. Turning to Jesse Walker, he. said, "Put my name down if you please,' and then fell to the ground. Others started to run off and fell; some escaped. We were busy in getting the fallen to one place, which we
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effected about sunset, when the man who wished his name on the roll arose and ran off like a wild beast. Looking around upon the scene reminded me of a battle-field after a heavy battle. All night the struggle went on. Victory was on the Lord's side; many were converted and about sunrise next morning there was a shout of a king in the camp. It was Sabbath morning, and I thought it was the most beautiful morning I had ever seen. A little after sunrise, the man that had run off came back, wet with the dews of the night and with strong symptoms of derangement. At eleven o'clock Brother McKendree admin- istered the holy sacrament, and while he was dwelling upon its origin, nature, and design, some of the major's company were affected, and we had a melting time. After sacra- ment, Brother Mckendree preached, all the principal men of the country and all in reach who could get there, being present. His text was, 'Come, let us reason together'; and perhaps no man ever managed the subject better, or with more effect. His reasoning on the atonement, the great plan of salvation, and the love of God, was so clear and strong, and was delivered with such pathos, that the congregation involuntarily arose to their feet and pressed toward him from all parts. While he was preaching he very ingeniously adverted to the conduct of the major, and remarked, 'We are Americans, and some of us have fought for our liberty, and have come here to teach men the way to heaven.' This seemed to strike the major, and he became friendly, and has remained so ever since.
"This was a great day. The work became general-the place was awful, and many souls were born to God. Among the rest was our wild man. His history is a peculiar one. He lived in the American Bottom, had a fine estate, and was a professed deist. He told us that a few nights before we passed his house he dreamed that the day of judgment was at hand, and that three men had come from the East to warn the people to prepare for it; that so soon as he saw us he became alarmed, believing we were those men; and having ascertained who we were, he came to the campmeeting. He became a reformed and good man."
Jesse Walker, the Pioneer Preacher.
Bishop McTyeire describes Jesse Walker as "a church extension society within himself." He said that there was no man whose name was more fre- quently mentioned by Bishop McKendree than Jesse Walker. The bishop quoted one who knew Walker intimately as giving this description of him :
"He was to the church what Daniel Boone was to the early settler-always first, always ahead of everybody else, preceding all others long enough to be the pilot of the new- comer. Brother Walker is found. first in Davidson county, Tennessee. He lived within three miles of the then village of Nashville, and was at that time a man of family, poor and to a considerable extent without education. He was sent by the bishops and presiding elders in every direction where new work was to be cut out. His natural vigor was almost superhuman. He did not seem to require food and rest as other men; no day's journey was long enough to tire him, no fare too poor for him to live upon; to him. in traveling, roads and paths were useless things-he blazed out his own course; no way was too bad for him to travel-if his horse could not carry him he led him, and when his horse could not follow he would leave him and take it on foot; and if night and a cabin did not come together, he would pass the night alone in the wilderness, which with him was no uncommon occurrence. Looking up the frontier settler was his chief delight; and he found his way through hill and brake as by instinct-he was never lost; and, as Bishop McKendree once said of him, in addressing an annual conference, he never complained; and as the church moved west and north, it seemed to bear Walker before it. Every time you would hear of him he was still farther on; and when the settlements of the white man seemed to take shape and form, he was next heard of among the Indian tribes of the Northwest."
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Egg Shell Lamps and Bee-gums.
"Bush arbors" were the first places of worship in many parts of Missouri before churches of logs were built. They were especially popular in Southern Missouri where the seasons were mildest. A step in advance of the bush arbor was the "clapboard shanty." Dumklin county had one of these. The pulpit was "two blackjack poles driven in the dirt floor with a cypress board pinned on their tops." When tallow candles could not be provided, these primitive places of worship were lighted at night with egg shell lamps. A hole was punched carefully in the little end of the shell. The white and yolk were drained out. The shell was filled with bear's grease or oil from the raccoon. A cotton string was put in for a. wick. The egg shell was propped up in a saucer of salt. These lamps burned so well that the preacher standing behind the cypress board pulpit, easily read the scripture lessons from the Bible.
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