Volume 2, Number 9 - Fall 1966
The Editor Speaks
In mining camp vernacular we really hit the jack pot this time. (I taught in the Couer d’ Alene mining district in Idaho and at Bonne Terre in southeast Missouri, and my mother hated the slang expressions I learned, but I find them quite as colorful as Missouri dialect.)
Margaret Gerten sent 95 pages of Taney County material; Charles E. Rogers who just thought that because he was born in Ozark county that I would not know and love him. He sent his remembrances of Ozark in Christian County; Paul Greer, former state editor of the Post Dispatch for 29 years, sent to me his copy of "Ozark and Vicinity in the Nineteenth Century," written by William Neville Collier; a copy that Charley Rogers had made and sent to Paul. Since it was copyrighted Charley Rogers asked the family to grant me permission to reprint the book for which much research must have been done.
Then there were smaller manuscripts and good letters, too. Fred De Armond, Springfield, says: "Paul Shelton showed me the original manuscript of the Lyman Bennett Diary. I was most impressed with it. Bennett was a keen observer. ... The Minutes of the Mincy Valley Church is a gem. It reminds me of some passages in a book in my library, ‘The Scotch Irish In America’, by Henry Jones Ford, relating the Presbyterian Church discipline in Scotland and Northern Ireland and after the emigration to the colonies in the 18th Century. Then I recalled a sentence in Vance Randolph’s ‘From an Ozark Holler,’ in which a hillman says, ‘I preferred to do the right thing but they churched me anyway.’ Maybe that wasn’t such a bad custom at that. It probably made hell-raising a lot less prevalent than it is today."
I thank you, Mr. DeArmond, for the words of praise you gave to the editor.
Charley Rogers says: "Two of my brothers, both in their 80’s live in Ozark. My oldest brother, Herbert Newton Rogers is a retired accountant and my next oldest, Robert Emmett Rogers, a retired naval officer, (retired commander, Naval Academy graduate of the class of 1908). The middle brother, John Byron Rogers, a retired engineer, lives in San Francisco, and our only sister, Ruth Elinor Rogers, a retired social worker, lives in Los Angels. One of my brothers, James Winston Rogers, an M. D., died several years ago. He was next to me."
Then in ‘Who’s Who", I find that Charles Elkins Rogers, was 1st Lt. in the World War, and that along with all the honors reported in the newspaper article we print in this issue, that he is a Phi Beta Kappa and that he is a Unitarian and a Mason.
Mrs. Carl Bledsoe, Wild Horse, Colorado, says: "My husband’s grandparents, Issac Newton Bledsoe and Sarah Ann Shumate Bledsoe, lived on their farm about 6 miles north of Galena all during the Civil War. He was an active Confederate soldier. As soon as the Civil War ended, Issac B. moved his family to Texas to get away from the persecution that followed the war. I have been trying for years to connect Issac B. and his wife to their rightful parents. He was born in Tennessee, she in Missouri.
"I have tried to find descendants of Hard (Hardin) Bledsoe who was living with his family in Taney County in the 1840 census.., but not in the 1850. Hard was a brother to our Issac, so tradition tells. Tradition also says great Uncle Hardin ‘want west looking for gold. I have Cisco’s book, ‘Historic Summer Co Tenn.’ It tells of many Bledsoes, but I cant tell for sure who were the rightful parents of our Issac."
Myking and I leave the day I send this copy to the printer, to attend the 50th anniversary celebration of Myking’s graduation from Angusburg College in Minneapolis. Who knows I may find a bit of history of the White River Valley up there. Isn't it in Minneapolis that hangs the painting of the well, one of the greatest of Missouri discoverers?
The cupboard stands bare. The treasury has no funds. The White River Valley Historical Society has no money in its bank account. That means every member of the society must pay the dues of two dollars a year or we cannot publish another Quarterly. The Quarterly belongs to the Society, which must pay for its publication and mailing. The editor receives no salary. It takes more than $50.00 to send out 'Pay Dues' notices. It is up to all of you. Do we or do we not put out another issue?
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