Of course one can get a quick write-up of Seligman on the
Wikipedia article, but it is much more fun to dig through the Barry County history information about Seligman on the
rootsweb site within ancestry.com, and the
Barry County Museum documents. The information posted herein has been learned from reading many documents over hours of enjoyable reading.
Some of the earliest settlers to the area were a family named Herd or Hurd. The area (not a town) was called Hurdsville. Scant documentation exists from that era. Note that the street just north of the city hall is Hurd Street. Later, still before the Civil War, the Roller family moved to the area and started a settlement (still not a town) called Roller Ridge. There are still many of the Roller family descendants in the area, and there are many Roller place names (e.g. Roller Ridge Road, Roller Cemetery, etc.).
During the Civil War the area was not significant for supply nor transportation. There were only four established towns in Barry County during the Civil War: McDowell, Keetsville (later Washburn), Corsicana (also known as Gadfly), and the new city and county seat of Cassville. The main thoroughfare, which was the old Trail of Tears and Butterfield stage route, ran from the Northeast of the county to the Southwest, about 5 miles west of Roller Ridge. This road was also called the Old Wire Road because the telegraph line was set up along it. Troup movements, for the most part, bypassed the little settlement of Roller Ridge as they moved up and down the Old Wire Road which, after leaving Blockade Hollow at Washburn, continued southwest through what is now Rock Springs Road / Farm Road 1050, meeting up with what is now Missouri Secondary State Route D (where it bends southwest) and down into Arkansas toward Elkhorn Tavern, which is now in the Pea Ridge National Battlefield.
However, after the Civil War, the US began building railroads again. When the tracks came through the area in a more north/south orientation, the Roller Ridge area was platted and incorporated into a new town called Seligman. The name came from the New York investor in the railroad that brought life to the new town. (It is doubtful that Joseph Seligman ever visited the town named after him in Missouri.) The Missouri Highway Department chose to build the main north/south highway, 37, alongside the railroad track, literally leaving the Trail of Tears / Old Wire Road in the dust in most places; but continuing to bring commerce to the erstwhile town of Seligman.