Newspaper Page Text
THE DAILY MISSOURIAN, FRIDAY EYEMSO, SEPTEMBER 7, 1917.
Page Two
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5
HOTEL A HAVEN FOR
Ti
OURISTS
Noted Cross-State Highway
Passes Directly In Front
of the Tavern.
STORY OF THE ROUTE
It is the Road That Made
Missouri Originally the
Boon's Lick.
Not even Columbia residents will
more appreciate the new Daniel
Boone Tavern than will tourists on
the Old Trails Koad from St. Louis
and Kansas City.
There has been some misunder
standing of late as to whether or not
Columbia is still on a cross state
road. This is due to the fact that
Jefferson City enthusiasts made a
fight recently to have 'their town des
ignated as the one through which the
chief state highway would pass. It
has been proed that Jefferson City
was merely trying to get a road
through that place that could com
mand attention from the government
when road money was divided, and
that it was not the town's purpose to
get a place on the Old Trails Road.
Men Who Jhnc Aided.
Naturally, in all booster move
ments, there are certain men who
work 'early and long to get improve
ments for their town. Here in Co
lumbia a group of men became inter
ested in the good roads movement
and worked to have Columbia and
Boone County given their proper place
on the chief state highway. Among
the men who are working today for
road betterment are some who have
been interested in the movement from
the very beginning. The names of
Dr. TV. P. Dysart, Dr. J. B. Cole, E.
C. Anderson, S. P. Conley, E. W.
Stephens, J. A. Stewart, Walter
Williams, J. A. Hudson, S. C. Hunt,
J. M. Batterton, J. P. Hetzler and
numerous others are known to good
roads advocates throughout the state.
It Is a well known fact that the Old
Trails Road, which passes directly in
front of the new (Daniel Boone Tav
ern on Broadway, is the best kept up
highway in the state, with the excep
tion of a few miles between Columbia
and Boonvllie, and if plans of the Co
lumbia road boosters materialize, this
section will be Improved without de
lay. Further plans include the secur
ing of federal aid for the "Old Trails
Road, by raising a fund in this district
to help do the county's share in the
work of Improving.
The Story of the Road. ,
The historical significance of the
Old Trails Road has been recognized
by the Daughters of the American
Revolution and the national road
planners. Dean Walter Williams, for
mer president of the Missouri Old
Trails Road Association, thus tells
the story of the Old Trails Road and
of the connection of the Boone fam
ily with the famous old highway.
The old Trails Road from St. Louis
to St. Charles on macadam boulevard
follows the old line of travel for im
migrant and stage-coach. From St.
Charles to Kansas City it follows, in
the salt. The place in western pio-1 permanent white settlements were on
neer slang was a "lick" and, because the Boon s Lick road.
the Boones there manufactured salt,
the 'locality was named Boon's Lick.
The Boones spelled their name indif
ferently with or without the "e".
Two years later a settlement of English-speaking
men and women was
made near 'Boon's Lick and shortly
afterward the town of Old Franklin,
twelie miles distant, upon the Mis
sour?",river, was founded. Then arose
the necessity for a highway between
Old Franklin and St. Louis and St.
Charles, then the. large cities of the
new west, each with several thousand
inhabitants. The Boon's Lick road was
the result.
A 'Trace" of a Road. ,
It was then not much of a road as
roads go now. It was not macadam
ized or naved or graveled. Indeed it
was little better, in its early days, than
The first white settlers were from
the Southern states of Kentucky, Vir
ginia, Tennessee and the Carollnas.
Within a few years came the Scotch
Irish of farther north. The road
brought immigration for the making
of the new states. It brought also
schools the first In the new state
the institutions which made the
states possible and permanent.
New Institutions Come In.
The old road brought political In
stitutions with it into the wilderness.
Early Missouri, or rather Loulsana,
had been Spanish or French. Customs,
procedure, political institutions were
of European origin and coloring. The
Boon's Lick brough the American
institution, the sovereignty of the
people, the right of each community,
within proper limits, to govern It
self, manhood suffrage excluding the
negro until emancipation came. The
French had governed, the Americans
became governors.
As .the school was dominant on
the old road, so the political senti
ments of the dwellers along the road
molded the early life of Missouri
Howard county, where the first road
(Continued on page 8)
COLUMBIA LEADS OTHER TOWS
Hotel Where Located Rooms Cost of Building
Daniel Boone Tavern Columbia 100 $165,000
.Merchants Moberly 100 75,000
Madison Jefferson City 100 ' 40,000
The Terry ' Sedalia 80 40,000'
Colonial Springfield 135 100,000
Snapps Excelsior Springs 100 400,000
the main, the Boon's Lick Road and
Santa Fe Trail.
The most famous highway in the
central west was the Boon's Lick
Road. Survejed in 1S15 from St.
Charles, 25 miles west of St. Louis, to
Franklin, Missouri, 150 miles farther
west, it turned immigration toward
central Missouri, into the union as a
state. It was the road that made
Misouri. It was the father of the
Santa Fe Trail, which extending west,
brought commerce and Immigration
to Kansas, Colorado and New Mexi
co. The making of roads means the
building of commonwealths. The
Boon's Lick road is a notable exam
ple. In 1S04 two sons of Daniel Boone,
the great pioneer of the west, Daniel
and Nathan M. Boone, made salt at
salt springs found in central Missouri.
The county was then a wilderness.
The Boones and their companions
were the only white men in the terri
tory west of St. Charles. They boiled
the spring water in huge iron ket
tles and the crude salt which formed
the residue they floated in hollow logs
down the Missouri river to be sold at
the French village of St. Louis. Deer
had come to the salt springs to lick
a mere "trace", or hint of the road's
direction. The surveyors sought, how
ever, the easiest grades, the shortest
way, and the road remains today the
shortest way with easiest grades
across Missouri.
The two Boons, with surveying par
ties, ran a line that followed the ridge
or watershed between the Missouri
and Mississippi rivers. The smaller
streams were forded. On the large
rivers were primitive ferry boats, hol
low log canoes locked together. There
were no'bridges. The sign posts
were the "blazes" or marks cut In the
forest trees along the roadway. The
road machinery consisted of a rifle,
an ax and a grubbing hoe. Into a
wilderness where hostile Indians were
on every hand, the Boon's Lick high
way ran.
Immigration followed the road
building. Before the road came the
old settlers had hugged closely the
great rivers. The streams afforded
an easy avenue of escape from the
savages. The Boon's Lick highway,
ten to thirty miles inland, took settle
ment from the river and planted it
first by the big springs and, later,
along the entire length of the road.
West of the Mississippi River the first
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Everything for the School Child
County and City Texts
SCHOOL STARTS SEPTEMBER 10.
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rush that always occurs when school opens?
We are prepared to furnish thechild with every
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SCOTT'S BOOK SHOP
920 BROADWAY
PHONE 356 BLACK
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A CENTER OF INTEREST TO PEOPLE ABOUT TO FURNISH
THEIR HOMES
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