Reviewed by Jo Schaper
When Leland & Crystal Payton’s 300 plus page book, “Damming the Osage: the conflicted story of Lake of the Ozarks and Truman Reservoir” arrived, the sheer weight of the book was impressive.

Flipping through it, the number of photos, documents and the dense type, set in four columns across the page [...]

Van Buren, MO – During the fall and winter of 1862, the Union Army, consisting of 8,000 men under the command of John Davidson, left their post at Patterson, Missouri, to slowly make their way toward Northern Arkansas. Their movement was part of the Federal winter campaign to discourage Confederate raiding and bushwhacking in [...]

State Park Stories
By Tom Uhlenbrock
BUTLER, Mo. – A plot of rolling prairie near the Kansas border is Missouri’s newest state park facility, serving as a monument to the bravery of the African-American Union soldiers who fought a small but important Civil War battle there.
The 240 soldiers, most of them escaped slaves, were members of [...]

By Jo Schaper
At the invitation of Gail Cross (see the article on her and her old-time farm in the October Traveler) Jo and Eugene visited her 16th Annual Mid-Missouri Horse, Mule, Ox Farming and Historical Craft Days at her WitnessTree Farm near Gerald, Mo.

It was a crisply cool October day, and while the [...]

By Jo Schaper
Long ago a large cave on the Meramec River bore the name Saltpeter Cave. It’s likely that the cave, and its contents so important to frontiersmen were discovered by early French explorers, perhaps as early as 1698, as they traversed the Meramec River valley looking first for gold, then silver, but finally being [...]

The Missouri Fox Trotting Highway is scheduled to be dedicated Saturday, Sept. 8, at 5 p.m. at the Missouri Fox Trotting Horse Breed Association in Ava, Mo.
Representative Tony Dugger sponsored the legislation, naming Highway 5 in Douglas and Wright Counties from Ava to Mansfield the Missouri Fox Trotting Highway.
Developed from horses in the Missouri [...]

By Jo Schaper
Rain pelted the dark expanse of Hwy. 21 entering Carter County, and as we turned south from U.S. 60, hordes of frogs hopped maniacally, flashes of green-white in the headlights over the steaming pavement. Gusts of wind caught the car, and by the time we got to the motel in Doniphan, [...]

A reenactment of an old-time Ozark tie raft float will take place on the Current River near Doniphan on Saturday, Sept. 1.
According to Ray Joe Hastings, who is helping to organize the event, the raft of 200 ties will be assembled at Float Camp, five miles above the Hwy. 160 bridge at Doniphan and will [...]

By Jo Schaper
What was I doing, sitting high on the third tier of portable bleachers, next to the West Plains Civic Center at 3 p.m. in the blazing sun, with about 250 other people, string music in the background, the air smelling of kettle corn, road apples, root beer and politicians, around a temporary corral [...]

Old Fish Hawk (4 audio CD set)
Written and narrated by Mitch Jayne
There is something eerie about hearing the dead speak, even in this modern age when we take audio and video for granted. Considering the theme of the late Mitch Jayne’s audio rendition of his novel Old Fish Hawk, that eeriness is trebled and sent [...]