Did You Know....

The following excerpts were taken from Seeking and Searching Ancestors, a monthly newsletter published by Peggy Smith Hake.

Centuries before the white man came to Miller County, it belonged to people known as the Osage Bluff Dwellers and who also were referred to as Mound Builders. Traces of them have been found over the years along the Osage bluffs, the Auglaize and Tavern creeks. Rock formations, called cairns, have been found and excavated by archeologists.

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The first Roman Catholic land owners who patented land in the county were Thomas and Nicholas Browse in 1837. Their land was located near the Osage River north of present-day St. Elizabeth. The next year, two brothers, Owen and Calvin Riggs, patented land in the same general area. Owen Riggs of Tyler County, Virginia was responsible for the establishment of the first Catholic church in Miller County.

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1-- Of the hundreds of counties in the United States, only three bear the name of Miller ---- located in Arkansas, Georgia, and Missouri........

2 -- The first United States Census taken in Miller County, Missouri was in 1840, three years after formation of the county in February 1837. The total population was 2,282 whites and 111 slaves. Saline township had 489 persons; Equality 424; Glaize 380; Richwoods 370; Jim Henry 322; and Osage had 297 persons. Franklin township was not organized until 1860 and many folks living in that section in 1840 and 1850 were enumerated in Morgan County.

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The Lennox Branch, Gardner Branch, and Rabbithead Creek are all the same stream of water that flows near Iberia toward the Big Tavern Creek northward. The name Lennox came from an early settler who had a general store near the town; Gardner was named for a family in Iberia who owned land that the creek passed through; and, Rabbithead is said to have been named by a hunter who liked rabbit heads and wanted his wife to cook them.... she wouldn't and that's the beginning of another far-fetched tale!!!

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In Olean (once known as Chester, Cove, and Proctor's Station), Mt. Zion Colored Baptist Church was established in 1873. They picked that name because the city of Jerusalem was built on one of the hills in Israel named Mt. Zion.

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Eldon was first given the name Elmira in honor of the wife of an early settler in the region named George W. Weeks? The name was rejected by the post office department because there was already a town named Elmira in Missouri in Ray County.

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Humphreys Creek in Osage township was once called Hanging Rock Creek and Branch? It was first given that name for the locally famous hanging rock where the creek empties into the Osage River.

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According to Campbell's Gazetteer of Missouri, published in St. Louis by R. A. Campbell (publisher), Brumley (also called Mill Creek and Thompson's Store) had one general store in 1876. One year later, in 1877, the town of Brumley was laid out by James M. Hawkins.

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The Pleasant Hill Cemetery, in the Madden/Pleasant Hill community, was once called "Peaky Cemetery".

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In 1900, there were quintuplets born to a woman named "Smith" in Marys Home. The Post-Tribune (Jefferson City) newspaper only printed one small paragraph about this incredible event! To read more about this county event, please visit: Quintuplets Born in Marys Home

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St. Anthony of Padua Church was organized in 1906 and, the next year, a wood building was erected in the then newly formed St. Anthony on land donated by D. C. and Lewis Crane. In September 1906, the Crane's donated the cemetery block and Blocks 3 and 4 in their new town to Bishop John Joseph Hogan, Bishop of the Kansas City Diocese, for the construction of a Catholic church and school.

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In 1921, when Women's Suffrage Amendment #19 was only a year old, the women of Missouri organized "Women's Republican County Committee" and became a strong force in Missouri politics. Miller County did not lag behind... in 1921, they organized the "Miller County Women's Republican Committee" and served for several years. In time, the men and women became a joint county committee and have served together for many decades.

Note: Peggy Smith Hake held the position of committee woman for the County Committee of the Republican Party in 1990, 1992, 1994, and 1996 for Osage township in Miller County.