Washburn, Missouri USA
N 36° 35.337 W 093° 57.867
15S E 413726 N 4049707
One of the oldest towns in Barry County, Missouri
Waymark Code: WMRBPV
Location: Missouri, United States
Date Posted: 06/05/2016
Views: 1
Before the US Civil War, Keetsville was one of the 4 established towns in Barry County, along with McDowell (the former county seat), Corsicana (also called Gad Fly), and the newer established town of Cassville for the county seat. Three of those (all but Corsicana) were on the Trail Of Tears, which was also the old stage route from Springfield, MO to Fayetteville, AR and beyond; and was later called the Old Wire Road, because the telegraph lines followed the same route (often using the top wire of existing fences!).
Viewing the upper, old Keetville, area of Washburn, which is less populated than the lower, old O'Day, area. Ironically, due to state route MO-37 coming through here, the oldest area also serves as the newest area for businesses.
Keetsville was burned during the Civil War, with each side blaming the other. It was rebuilt, and the name was changed to that of one of the original settlers, Washburn. When a line of the Frisco (St. Louis San Francisco) was built to the west of Washburn (Keetsville), a new town was platted, which originally had the name O'Day.
The old O'Day along the railroad tracks. It was the newer portion in the 1870s and beyond, until MO-37 revitalized the Keetsville portion.
Looking east along MO-90 past the old O'Day portion toward the upper Keetsville portion, which is located where this route junctions into MO-37.
Throughout the 1880s and into the early 1890s the two portions remained two towns: O'Day and Washburn. When a new school was built just to the west of Washburn and east of the tracks, there was pressure to just combine the two locales into a single town. O'Day was disestablished along with its post office, and the two portions became the single town of Washburn.
Sources:
- Down the Wire Road in the Missouri Ozarks and Beyond, revised 2004, by Fern Angus, ISBN 0-9637913-0-3
- Goodspeed's 1888 History of Barry County; reprinted from History of Newton, Lawrence, Barry and McDonald Counties Missouri (etc.); Barry County portion reprinted by Litho Printers of Cassville, MO in 1975
- Keepsake Stories of the Ozarks, compiled by Litho Printers of Cassville, MO in 1972 (reprinted 1988)
I always like to become somewhat of a local historian in any place where I live; and in fact, the Washburn Wikipedia article references a geocache of mine, as seen in the references.