County: Macon County
Location of courthouse: E. Washington St., end of N. Rollins St., Macon
Location of county: NE quadrant of state; crossroads of US-63, MO-3, MO-149 & US-36, MO-156
Organized: Jan. 6, 1837
Named after: Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina, U.S. congressman and senator
County seat: Macon
Elevation (highest): 266 meters (873 feet
Population: 15,251 (2017)
"From the most reliable information that can be obtained, the first white man to erect his cabin home in the present limits of Macon County was James Loe, who came to Howard County,Missouri, in 1820, from Wayne County, Kentucky, and located near the old town of Fayette, where he remained, as above indicated, until 1827, when he and his family came to Macon County. They located south of Callao, on Section 13, Township 57, Range 16.
"William Morrow was the third settler. He came from Clay County, Kentucky, in 1819, to Missouri and opened a farm, six miles northwest of Glasgow, in Howard County. After residing in Howard County for three years, he moved to Marion County, Tenn., where he remained six years, and then returned to Missouri, this time settling in Randolph County, near Fox's Mill on the Middle Fork of the Chariton River. After living there for one year, on March 15, 1831, he came to Macon County and located on the southeast quarter of Section 2, Township 56, Range 16 in Chariton Township.
"At the date of Mr. Morrow's coming there were no settlements in the region of the county including Adair, Schuyler, Putnam and Macon, excepting those made by James Loe, and others. Mr. Morrow erected the first grist (corn) mill that was put up in the county. . .He was not only a pioneer miller, but was the pioneer blacksmith. The neighborhood where he settled was called the "Morrow Settlement."
"The Blackwell Settlement was made on Grand Prairie five miles north of Macon, and was composed of William Blackwell, Nathan Richardson, and John Walker, an Old Revolutionary soldier. Mr. Blackwell came to Macon County April 12, 1831.
'"Blackwell Settlement" was afterwards called "Moccasinville," so named because the pioneers had no leather to make shoes of and were compelled to wear moccasins instead. The next emigrants to the county came in 1832, and formed the "Owenby Settlement." Their names were Joseph Owenby, and Clemens Hutchison, and located where the town of Bloomfield now stands. Joseph Owenby was one of the first three county judges.
"At the session of the General Assembly held in the City of Jefferson in the winter of 1836 and 1837, an act was passed organizing a new county called Macon in honor of Nathaniel Macon.
"The commissioners who were appointed to select the county seat chose the Owenby Settlement,in 1837, and which place was called Bloomington.
"Macon county was the fifty-seventh county organized in the state and was the smallest. Fifty-seven counties have been formed since then. Macon County is the largest county in the State in area excepting Texas, Shannon, Howell and Bates; the county of Vernon contains the same number of square miles that Macon contains.
"Nathaniel Macon, for whom the county was named, was born in Warren County, North Carolina and died at his plantation in the same county June 29, 1837. He was a Revolutionary soldier." ~ History of Macon County, 1884, St. Louis, National Historical Society, , pp. 702-704, 709-710.