For the historical editorial for this month, I was going to write about why the original St. Louis and San Francisco Railroad spur line from Plymouth (Monett) to Fort Smith, Ark., didn’t go through the county seat of Barry County, or through Cassville. There’s got to be a story there, but I was not finding much information, so we will pursue this story at another time.
Instead, I will talk about the connections that I and my family have had with one of Barry County’s great citizens and newspaper people, Bob Mitchell.
In 2014, I decided to retire and come back to the beautiful Ozarks in Barry County and Cassville. In 2015, I was at my cousin Allen Sparks’s gun shop when this big, burly man walks in starts talking to everybody. Eventually, he looks at me and says, “I should know you.” I look at him, and say, “Well, I should know you.”
I wasn’t having much luck going through the rolodex in my head, and he finally said, “You’re a Hilburn, aren’t you?” I said, “Well you’ve got me, Lynn Hilburn, Herman’s son, but you still have me at a disadvantage.” He said, “Just call me Bob” and he further asked, “You’re Elree’s grandson, aren’t you?”
It turns out that Bob occasionally went fishing and coon hunting with one of my uncles, Lavern Hilburn and that he and Grandpa Elree were two of the strongest Democrats in Barry County. Even if one of Grandpa’s staunchest adversaries was on the Democrat ticket, he still only made one mark at the top of the page “Straight Democrat.” Even though when it was rumored that if John Kennedy got elected president that the Pope would be running America, Grandpa still voted “Straight Democrat.”
Granddad became a strong Democrat for all the right reasons. In the 1930s, President FDR, with his “New Deal” programs gave a “backbone” back to a lot of down and out, destitute American families, especially Granddad and his six boys. Grandad worked with the WPA, actually helping build the “Old Rock Gym,” and my dad and several of his brothers worked in the CCC camps. So, Grandpa and Bob were kindred spirits.
Immediately after I graduated from Cassville High School in the 1964, I went to work for Lee and Willie Bowman, carpenters in the area who built custom houses. Every Thursday, just before noon, we picked everything up, locked everything up, and they took off.
After a couple of weeks, I asked, “where are you guys going? I need the hours. I need the money.” They stated they were going golfing, and they were not to be deterred. They went and played on the old sand green course.
Of course, most of the golfers wanted grass greens, but nobody had the money for it. One of Bob’s big accomplishments was facilitating the construction of the “Grass Greens” Cassville Golf Course on Highway 112 in the mid-1960s.
As the story goes, Bob was reading a “Mitchell,” S.D., newspaper, and they were applying for a Farmers Home Administration (FHA) loan for their golf course. Bob and friends got the application going and kept pushing it until Cassville became the first city to receive an FHA loan for a golf course in the state of Missouri.
How does this tie into me? I love to play golf, and I love this golf course. I have played over 1,500 rounds of golf from Scotland to Cabo, Mexico and from Connecticut to Monterey, Calif., and I guess I could have retired about anywhere in the United States, but I chose Barry County because of the scenery, the four seasons weather, that I have so many relatives in the area and the fact that I love this golf course.
For a community this size, to have a course this beautiful and playable — it is amazing. Of course, a big Thank You goes out to the board members since 1964 who have kept this course in such great shape, but without Bob it might not be here.
Thank you, Bob. In the late 1950s, Bob joined a group of local civic and business leaders in a campaign to overturn a federal decision not to build a bridge across the emerging Table Rock Lake at Shell Knob; their successful efforts resulted in the completion of the Central Crossing Bridge. Local families were ferrying kids across the new lake as the old bridge was being submerged (I am sure Bob sent in pictures).
My tie to this is that my uncle, Newt Taylor, who was a master carpenter and who had worked on large construction projects all over the Midwest was able to come home and work on this significant project. The bad news is that just before the bridge was completed, my uncle fell approximately 100 feet from the bridge onto the partially filled lake and broke his back and a few ribs, but survived.
Another tie in that Bob and I had in common was the concern about flooding in Cassville. It is said that “one of his favorite stories to cover was when the National Flood Insurance Plan was introduced in the 1970s.” I guess it was understandable back in the 1970s and with the not knowing for sure what the Federal government might do, local property owners fought tooth and nail not to have to belong to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP).
But, I’ve worked for FEMA, I’ve been floodplain administrator for three cities and a county and I have seen the devastation that flooding can do, and more importantly, I’ve seen the help that the federal government can provide in post disaster situations, especially if the community is a member of the NFIP. With the diligent following of the National Flood Insurance Program guidelines, and with appropriate and timely requests for Mitigation construction funding, most of Cassville’s past flooding problems would not be problems today.
So, Bob, this story has another chapter, and I hope you get copies of the Cassville Democrat at your address in heaven.
I tried to get some time to spend with Bob, but things never did work out.
Bob, with the thousands of people that you met in your life, I know you will be very busy in heaven, but I trust that you will find some time to go fishing and coon hunting, that you’ll have time to get in a little golf and that you and Grandpa don’t tear down too many Republicans.
To our friends who love genealogy and history, we are still working on funding for the columns on the front porch and for the other repair work at the Bayless-Salyer House, and we still have three columns that need to be funded.
But, come and join us at one of our meetings, or if you would like to visit the Bayless-Salyer House, let me know, or if you have a story about your family that you would like to bring out to the public, you can contact me at hlhilburn@hotmail. com.
Lynn Hilburn is an officer in the Barry County Genealogical and Historical Society, and invites all to come and join meetings, to provide information about their families or to look up information about their families. Hilburn may be reached at hlhilburn@hotmail. com.
