Information Sheet
R Kansas City,
Fort Scott, and Memphis Railroad Company.
1071 Booklet, ca. 1890s.
One folder.
This is Snap
Shots in South Missouri, a promotional booklet to encourage land sales
along the Kansas City, Fort
Scott, and Memphis,
and Kansas City, Clinton
and Springfield railroads in Missouri.
The area is presented as ideal for fruit-culture and raising livestock.
In the 1890s the Kansas City,
Fort Scott,
and Memphis Railroad Company and its affiliate, the Kansas
City, Clinton
and Springfield Railway Company, had thousands of acres of rural land along
their comparatively new rights-of-way that they wanted developed for
agricultural uses. This 64-page booklet,
consisting mostly of full-page photographs of successful farms, vineyards, and
orchards, was distributed in an effort to promote that development. In the early 1900s these railroads became
part of the St. Louis and San Francisco (“Frisco”) Railroad’s system.
To sell lands along the “Memphis”
route in Howell, Oregon,
Ozark, Douglas, Texas,
and Shannon counties in south-central Missouri,
the “Memphis
line” established the South Missouri Land Company, whose agents (C. J.
Trowbridge at Willow Springs and E. C. Markham & Company at West Plains)
offered land at two to four dollars per acre on generous terms.
This booklet includes views along the K.C., Clinton & Springfield
line in St. Clair, Henry, and Polk counties, and along the K.C., Fort Scott
& Memphis line in Barton, Greene, Wright, Howell, and Oregon
counties in Missouri and Fulton
and Lawrence counties in Arkansas.
In some cases the name of the farmer or corporate farm is included in
the caption. There is a map of the
railroads on page 62, and a list of corporate officials on page 64.
For an example of E. C. Markham & Company’s
promotional efforts concerning this land in 1900, see WHMC-Rolla collection
number R972.
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