[ Transcript for: Building Memories on the Square ]
MS. ROBIN CARNAHAN: This is Missouri Secretary of State, Robin Carnahan. The following program is sponsored by Friends of the Missouri State Archives and the Missouri Secretary of State's office.
The State Archives hosts free monthly programs, like this one, at our office in Jefferson City. We're now offering these programs online as well, so that even more Missourians can learn about the rich history of our State.
We hope you enjoy this presentation and thank you for your support.
(Musical prelude.)
MR. DENNIS WEISER: I hope you enjoy the program, a little bit about the history of the book. This began as a photo exhibit in 2004 that I staged at the Rozier Gallery and some folks saw that exhibit and talked to Downey Publishers and they approached me about the idea of turning it into a book version. So, I took a set of new pictures and did research on the book in 2006, and as I stand tonight the anticipated publication/distribution date for the book is in March. Those of you who might be interested -- let me also hasten to mention this book is being produced in conjunction with the Missouri Preservation Society -- Missouri Alliance for Historic Preservation. Those are the folks who are actually --will be handling the distribution of the book.
So, let's go to Slide 1.
And, ask ourselves, "Why should we care about counties, let alone courthouses?" Well the county is the basic unit of government. It was carried into England by William the Conqueror and adopted by the British North American Colonies as people migrated from England into the United States. County government provides basic legal and infrastructural services for citizens. In the early pioneer era it was the major provider of law enforcement, civil and criminal courts, your land records, deeds, marriage licenses, all of documents of importance were stored at the county courthouse. The county was also responsible for collecting taxes and administrating elections and other functions of that nature. Also in more modern times the county has come to be the coordinating agency between State Agencies and Federal Agencies representing the people at the local grass roots level.
So, the county is very important. And, the courthouses in the county are the physical home for those county services. That's where you find the offices, where you find the elected representatives, and the staff of people who provide those services for the citizens.
The courthouse is also the physical concrete representation of a powerful and stable government. When we see the courthouse, especially one that resonates with what we think a courthouse should look like we innately have a sensation that we are dealing with a stable government and one that has power and influence in our life.
Slide 2, please?
One of the -- as courthouses were built -- one of the first things was built simultaneous with the courthouse was the county jail. Actually in many cases the jail was built before the courthouse. I guess they had their priorities a little straight then.
It was a rough time in the pioneer frontier and sometimes rather than worrying about whether they had their marriage license filed properly they were more concerned about whether the rascals and the horse thieves were locked up for the night.
County court, ah, county jails especially the one in Cooper County. This facility was in service until 1970. Inside the cells there is no electricity, there's no toilet, there's no heat, there's no light. When you threw away the key and spent a night in the county jail you didn't want to come back for a second session. So it was -- it was an experience to be placed in that facility. It was built by slaves and they were kept there until the slave auctions were held. So, it has kind of a grim and dastardly past, but the Cooper County Historical People have renovated it and they now use it as a museum and it's regained a new life.
In Hickory County their jail was basically a block building, just -- I have seldom seen such a sturdy structure. The only -- the only entrance and exit is this little window right here and this door. The rest of it is just stonewalls. If that wouldn't hold ya, you went inside and there was a metal cage that you were put into if you were a hard case. This is the county clerk and they use the building for storage now, but he illustrated to me -- he actually put me inside the cage for a few minutes. And, to spend the night in there would -- would be truly terrifying, I think. Hickory County also has the honor of being the last county courthouse in Missouri to do away with their outdoor privy. That was in 1996, so they have a roll of toilet paper to commemorate that event.
Let's look at the next slide, please?
Courthouses were constructed of various materials. The early counties in Missouri were geographically huge; some of them stretched from the Mississippi River all the way across to, what we now consider, the western edge of the State. But, they were sparsely populated. In order to bring Circuit Courts, you've heard of the phrase Circuit Riders well they were riding the circuit into the country and often times they would have an open-air court where the lawyers would meet on -- under a shady tree. The judge would put his law book on a tree stump, the jury would sit on the ground, and they would hear the evidence and the jury would then proceed to walk into the grove of trees to make their decision about the case.
Moving a little bit upscale from that when they founded a county seat or were searching for a county seat there may be only one farmhouse in the entire area, well they would use the farmhouse parlor for the county court to meet. So they had open air, and borrowed facilities. What they couldn't -- when the weather was in climate and when they couldn't find a friendly neighbor to allow them entrance, the county court for example would rent space.
And, one example of that was in St. Charles County. Some of you may remember -- recognize this lunette at the State Capital its Peck's Row and it's where the State Legislature met in 1821 to 1825. Well, prior to that time the St. Charles County Court used those same facilities for their meeting place. So, rental space was one of the earliest places where counties met county courts met.
Once the county seat was established the county court ordered the construction of a courthouse and that often, at the time, was made from the available material, which were trees. We had plenty of trees. So, they built two story log cabins. They were upgraded just a little bit from log cabin by squaring off the logs and joining them in a unique way at the corners, which was considered more polished and more refined then the basic log cabin. The other material they had was rough stone for the foundation and this painting shows the 1869 courthouse in Maries County as being brick but the shape was also similar to frame and wood buildings that were produced about the same time. In the -- inside the building this is in Phelps County again the -- that's the county post office that those folks are examining. The County Historical Society maintains the Dillon House where the first county court assembled in 1857 and inside the building, just inside the door, is the county courthouse or, excuse me, the county post office. Neighbors would come by and pick up their mail in little slots that were in the wall.
Brick by far was the preferred choice of building material. In Ste. Genevieve they have the honor of holding the building, which was considered the first brick building in Missouri supposedly constructed about 1800.
In Phelps County, again I picked this painting to demonstrate that this was the Dillon House the squared log -- hewn log building that I just showed you. Moving up to the county courthouse, which was a two-story brick building, which is a step up in -- an upgrade, if you will, in construction materials. So, they went from wood and rough stone to brick.
An alternative to that -- go ahead -- was native stone. Missouri is blessed with several deposits of natural stone, Red Granite, Carthage Limestone, Sandstone. Unfortunately the Red Granite is -- you can find that only in one place and that's in Oregon County. They built a courthouse with Red Granite in, as you can see, in 1939 during the Depression. Since then Red Granite has become so expensive that it's used only for decorative detail if you have a building you might have a column or a set of columns constructed from Red Granite. Or it can be used for tombstones or small items like that, but it's basically too expensive to build an entire public building with Red Granite anymore.
The Carthage Limestone also known as Marble is used to surface the upper floor of the Cole County Courthouse. They have rusticated rough stone on the first floor, as you can see.
Many of the courthouse building committees desired to use local stone in a Missouri deposit, but found out after getting an estimate from the contractor the cost of opening up a quarry bringing the stone out and dressing it for the building was so prohibitive that they had second thoughts and usually ended up ordering their stone from some of the quarries in Indiana or further out where the quarries were already open and could be produced and shipped to Missouri cheaper than what it cost to bring the native stone up out of the ground.
One of the unusual uses of stone was in Carter County. The original courthouse was built as basically a square framed wood building, two stories tall. And, in 1936 it was remodeled -- part of the WPA remodeling process that went on the many courthouses around the State. And, they coated the outside of the building with native Fieldstone. Sometimes people say it's Cobblestone well it's Cobblestone size Fieldstone. Cobblestone for roads and that sort of thing is a very hard, almost Granite material. It's very tough brick. Fieldstone of course, as you can see, in these close-ups is basically rock that they picked up from the creek bed or off the side a hillside. And, they're careful to keep conformities of the size. This rubble pile here is actually the supply of Fieldstone that was delivered to the county for a cost of $1,900.00 by the WPA in 1936. They also -- since then they've also expanded the size of the building and kept with the Fieldstone motif. This is the only example of Fieldstone on a county courthouse in Missouri. Even though it is used for many homes and establishments, this is the only courthouse that has such dressing.
Modern construction material, we're talking concrete, in poured forms. 1938 the Cedar County Courthouse was the first county courthouse in Missouri constructed with poured concrete. It stood up exceedingly well; it survived two tornados that we know of recently. And, it's been a very attractive building technique, which is now a very common -- you see it used for buildings all over -- all the time now. But, in 1938 it was a new technique and Cedar County was the first county courthouse to be built with poured concrete.
Dunklin County in 1937 had a concrete frame with brick in between the concrete framework. So it's a mixture of the two.
And, of course, Jackson County in 1934 you have the steel, iron high-rise skyscraper type of construction technique.
So, these are modern construction techniques that are used for courthouses. The architects and builders that I've talked to wouldn't dream of going back to the brick -- well they use brick and block too, but going back to the large Granite buildings or the stone buildings would be very difficult because Number 1: we don't have the stone cutters who can handle the job anymore. But, one of the things that we've lost in that transition is -- are the cornerstone ceremonies. When brick buildings and stone buildings were constructed -- laid row upon row upon row it was very important that they be true, that the structure be in perfect alignment. And, the cornerstone was the starting point for the rows to start from. So, it was very important that you have a good cornerstone. The Masons, the Masonic Lodges in Missouri -- Harry S. Truman was a well known Mason, but they -- when you built a courthouse prior to using the modern construction methods part of the building process was to have a cornerstone ceremony and these involved speeches, parades, they were also -- often in conjunction with a camping -- an encampment of Civil War Veterans. It was a high old time. Newspapers of the day would have sales associated with the cornerstone celebration. We still celebrate and dedicate new buildings of course, but the cornerstone ceremony itself which I've never seen one but from what I've read was quite an ornate celebration with the Masons going through a series of rituals and procedures that they still use when asked to dedicate buildings. But, we've kind of lost that in the transition of the modern building techniques.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Did you say Harry S. Truman, was a Mason?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Oh, yes.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Okay.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Yes. George Washington, Ben Franklin, a number of famous Americans were Masonic members. It was a very active and still is a very active and large organization in America. But, at one time it was probably the predominate men's membership group in a community, if you will. Let's look at the next slide, please?
Many counties have started installing or allowing or permitting, I'm not quite sure, some of them are commissioned murals being built in the courthouse. This is one panel of a five-panel set that covers the entire first floor lobby of the Newton County Courthouse. Beginning with the Native American settlement moving through the different eras of the community. This one was unusual I would love to show you all of the murals, we don't have time for that, but I will show you a few more before we finish here. But, I picked this one from Newton County because it's a winter scene, which was unusual. And, this covers the period in the community from 1950 to 1979. This is what I call a parade of events -- historical events through the county beginning, as I said, with the settlement of the Native Americans on up to modern time. Let's go to the next slide, please?
In Clay County, they have a tremendous set of public art in their courthouse building and in their various public buildings. But, this one was unique, I think, because it portrays an individual historic time in the county. This is a separate panel and I wasn't aware of it, but some of you may remember the time when Clay County, Liberty, Missouri was home to a German POW Camp. These are prisoners of war from the Italy Campaign. To keep busy they grew potatoes.
In Jasper County, again this is a portion of a much larger panel; the panel is probably 25, 30 feet long and 8 feet high. But, this particular corner of the panel deals with Civil War events in Jasper County, a border county, they were part of the border that was between Kansas and Missouri. And, this shows the burning of the old courthouse. Belle Starr, who was a famous female outlaw who rode through the territory after the war, is immortalized. This -- the Jasper County mural, as many of the murals do, celebrates real people -- real personalities from the area in there in the paintings. But, it's a growing trend.
Let's take a look at the next slide where we talk a little bit about the factors that go into the design of the various courthouses.
Most of the designs migrated into Missouri from the East Coast. I would like to say we -- all of our courthouses are original and unique, but basically they're knock-offs of courthouse designs that were popular as people moved through the eastern counties from Virginia into Kentucky, and Tennessee, and on into Missouri. So, you'll see similarities between our courthouses and courthouses further east.
Budget constraints controlled many of the factors about building courthouses, as I mentioned earlier, people who -- courthouse construction committees who were assigned the task of building courthouses would at first blush say "yes, I'd like to have native stone for our building," until they got the estimate on the cost. And, then rethought their decision and chose cheaper alternatives.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: I would think native stone would be the cheapest.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: I'm sorry, what?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: I would think native stone would be the cheapest.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: You'd think so, wouldn't you? Actually, going out and chopping trees down was probably the cheapest that they had. But, native stone involved opening quarries. It involved stone cutting, bringing the stone out of the ground. A lot of up front investment was needed to establish a quarry. So, it was cheaper to buy stone from an already established quarry and just buy what you needed, because if you didn't have a market after you opened up a quarry the only alternative was to shut it back down again in which was not cost effective. So, you had -- once you opened a quarry you had to keep using it and marketing the material.
Over by Warrensburg there is a -- there were --Carthage -- there were quarries over there that produced the Carthage Stone, which was used throughout the world. They were successful not only in supplying stone for many of the courthouses in Missouri, but also supplied stone for buildings in New York City, the Pentagon used some of their stone. But, it was a very expensive upfront investment to open up a quarry and keep it going.
Budget, as I said, was a consideration. They raised money for courthouses, I mean, probably the citizens of the day were as tight with their money as we are in our allocation of funds for public buildings, maybe more so.
When the county wanted to build a courthouse the usual and customary way of raising money, was after they plotted the county seat, they would sell lots around the county courthouse, which were prime locations for business and commercial uses. So, those lots were sold with the idea of using that money to build the courthouse and the county jail. We'll get into that a little deeper in just a minute.
The courthouses that we have now in Missouri the designs basically reflect 19th and 20th Century sensibilities. I've kind of split them down the middle 50/50 but -- and some people would -- I'm sure many people would argue with that division, but we'll talk about that again too. Let's go to the next slide, please?
As I said, the design for the original courthouses came from the east. These structures -- the first two, this one and the one above, are based on a design that the Pennsylvania German's used as they moved westward. A lot of their buildings are very similar to these structures. The French building in Ste. Genevieve wasn't used as a courthouse, but it shows a little different cultural construction process, if you will. The Pennsylvania German's used the hewn log, squared off construction technique. The French used a vertical wood pole to create the sides of their building. So, these designs migrated into Missouri from the Kentucky, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, the eastern cultures, the French of course came up out of Louisiana, out of New Orleans. Let's go ahead.
When it came time to pay for a courthouse, as I said, you have the sale of lots around the square. You had the sale of federal land. This is from Clinton County 1939, 1839 rather, sale of federal land for the Homestead Act. The county was empowered to sale these lands on behalf of the federal government, which the federal government was the largest land holder in the --in Missouri at that time.
Other ways to raise funds included private subscriptions, which basically was a process of having people agree to pledge money toward the construction of a courthouse. Those of you, who have been involved in the pledge business, probably, recognize that this is not the most sound way of raising money. In smaller communities with the business and process of building courthouses, I'm sure the money came in on good order, but it was not the most secure method of raising money for construction of a courthouse.
Some of the buildings were damaged during the Civil War; the State reimbursed the county for construction of new courthouses in some cases. Especially where State Troops or Federal Troops acting on behalf of the State were instrumental in either damaging the building or, you know, fighting a battle in the town square or using the building as a hospital or for whatever purpose.
County also received donated land. Individuals would want to have the county seat located on land that they owned because that would make other land that they owned more valuable. So, Saline County for example, their county seat was donated to them by a gentleman named Odell. Mr. Odell was literate and was able to sign his name. His wife Elizabeth, however, could not read or write and so she made her mark, I don't know if you can see the little square there, she made her mark on the deed.
Other taxes for property and issuing bonds came fairly late in our history.
One of the more common ways to meet the need was to and also to help rid the county of nuisance varmint, they would pay or write-off money owed to the county in exchange for scalps on wolves or other animals that would do damage to the farm or the cattle in the area. So, they kept track of citizens who met their needs or obligations to the county by supplying scalps.
The Civil War was the big deal of the 19th Century. And, you see it in courthouses when you visit more than one courthouse, as I've done. You begin to notice that gee we have an awful lot of Civil War cannons and we have Civil War soldiers standing on guard, so to speak, this is the rather recognizable on guard pose that many of the memorials assumed. The vigilant soldier who never rests. The old tower with the tower clock rusticated stonework, positively no spitting on the floor. These are all 19th Century sensibilities. And, even though buildings were constructed after the turn of the century, as in Monroe County, it's a mixture but it still has a dome on the roof of the building; that's a 19th Century architectural flourish. This is the last domed courthouse in Missouri, by the way. But, in the 20th Century beginning probably with the Greene County Courthouse in Springfield, even though their original plan called for a dome on the building, which because again cost constraints was never added to the building. The interior building has a nice atrium, it has a three-story atrium going up to the ceiling, which I suppose, when it was designed was going to go on up into the dome, but now just ends with a nice skylight up there. It's a more clean-cut, clear, less ornamented structure. The WPA buildings again have the monolithic: no towers, no pillars, or heavy stonework. It's more a business like looking building, if you will. It was -- I guess this is true of every time a style changes you begin by rejecting the style it was just before. So, the builders, oh, 1910, 1920 rejected the towers and the domes and the ornaments from the 19th Century. So, we have a very distinct, abrupt, different look in the 20th Century courthouses then we had from the 19th Century. Again, this is a shift in sensibilities.
One of the fun things about doing a book like this is you get a chance to go into parts of the courthouse that the average person never has an opportunity to visit.
In the tower, this is the Andrew County building for example, the Seth Thomas Clock Company, which was a famous company. I'm sure they still produce clocks today, but they were the -- they were number one in tower clocks in their day, in the late 19th Century. And, the mechanism for operating the tower clock was this rather small pile of gears and wire ropes that you see here. If you look at this illustration this mechanism that you're seeing here is this same mechanism. The wire rope that spools around this spool is wound to a weight -- counter weight that would supply the power for running the clock. Modern tower clocks have -- rather than sending somebody up to the tower every three days to crank up the weight again they now use electric motors, but that's basically the only change that's been made. The assembly -- this is sort of a universal joint that extends upward. This runs up to the horizontal bars that reach out to the tower clock faces.
And, to give you an idea of the size of some of the clock faces in the Clay County vestibule they have the clock from their last courthouse that's been destroyed, but they saved the clock face from it. And, this young lady was kind enough to help me demonstrate the size of the clock face. It was operated by metal rods that ran horizontal to 1, 2, 3, 4, how many faces you had of clock -- if you wanted to know what time it was you just looked at the county courthouse. When the -- when it came time to ring the bell -- toll the bell or tell what time it was a mechanism in the clock gears would lift another wire rope that caused the hammer to raise.
Tower clocks were not rung by a clapper inside the bell, the bell was tolled by a hammer. Literally a metal hammer or some -- this is about a 3-foot diameter bell, and this metal hammer would raise up and on the hour fall and hit the bell. And, then depending on how many hours or what the time of day it was it would -- the clock mechanism with gearing would raise the hammer and let it fall again. So, it would toll the hour. One o'clock, two o'clock, three o'clock, what have you. Fascinating mechanism and fortunately we still have some of these working in Polk County and Andrew County.
Let's go onto the courthouse designs through the years.
We've talked about some of these before. First courthouses were your wooden structure. Another popular was the wood frame and then the simple brick. When Crawford County was first built -- this add-on -- this addition was added afterwards. In 1885, the original building ended at this junction, right here. But, simple brick and wood frame buildings pretty much controlled the design of the courthouse, in the first go around when people were building the first courthouse for the county. I might add at this point also, that almost every -- on the average every courthouse has had an average of three courthouses, at this point. So, some of them or I've had five or six. Some of them are still on their first. But, the average county has gone through three different courthouses.
The foursquare, which is an interesting design, was very popular. It was roughly 1830 to 1860 and again a lot of these designs were running at the same time. They -- you didn't stop one period and then start the next and then start the next. You had -- while the foursquare buildings were being built, you also had other types of courthouses being built at the same time. So, they're not the only kind of courthouses that were being built between 1830 and 1860. But, the foursquare was a very, very popular design. The courthouse -- the county circuit court would probably -- would usually hold forth on the first floor and the top floor was reserved for a few county officers and storage of the county records. These buildings called foursquare because the four equal sides. Some of them were -- the smaller ones were 20 to 40 feet around. Some of them had cupolas, some of them didn't. Heat, light, all of the -- well heating was provided by fireplaces or Franklin Stoves. Light was by whale oil, later kerosene. Very basic buildings; no indoor plumbing, again you went to the privy out in the square.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Does it say anything about the county of -- Stone County appears to only have had one entrance? Does it say anything about Stone County's access to the loft?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Stone County had one entrance. I've included the -- Stone County because I thought it was interesting that they had outside stairs.
In Johnson County, which by the way, is the only remaining example of the foursquare courthouse in Missouri. All the rest have been torn down. In Johnson County, it's maintained by the Johnson County Historical Society, by the way, and they do a fabulous -- they've done a fabulous job of reconstructing and renovating the building. It has all period furniture in it. And, it's maintained, as it was when it was built in 1838. They
25
have reenactments of famous court cases in the building, now. But, it had -- Johnson County has two entrances; the main entrance here and then they have another side entrance here. The back of -- the back wall is the county court; you have the judges bench against the back wall. There may have been an entrance on the other side too. My mind is a little cloudy about whether there was an entrance there or not. I imagine there probably was.
In Greene County -- this is a painting -- a reproduction. I don't have the specifications for the building as to how many entrances, but it was a little bit unusual because of the size of the cupola that they put on the top of the building it was very -- a little oversized for the building.
In Stone County because the county judge became a little disgruntled as people trampled in and out of his courtroom to go up to the second story -- in the other buildings, of course, the stairs to go to the second story were inside the building. So, in Stone County they built the stairway to the second floor on the exterior of the building and that was to keep the noise down in the courtroom. So, that the judge and the people who were involved in court cases were not inconvenienced by the noise of people climbing up and down the steps going about their other court business. Next please?
About the same time as the foursquare was being constructed we also had a neoclassical revival. Georgian designs -- this is added on later to the building. In Lincoln County this was the front of the building at that time. It had very balanced Georgian appearance.
Ray County, Ralls, Lafayette, had what's called a temple front, which is reminiscent of Greek temples. And, in Morgan and Dent County as you noticed from the mansard roofs they had what's called the Second Empire or the French influence -- French Architecture influence. These styles were not pure, by any means. The buildings adopted elements and if you were, I mean, for example, the temple front -- the only thing temple about the building is the front of the building itself; the appearance at the front, the rest of the building is pretty much your basic public building.
Beginning in the 1880's a man named H.H. Richardson who built the county courthouse in Pittsburgh set the -- set an example of what's called Romanesque Building. The Romanesque, again none of the Missouri Courthouses' are pure. We pick and chose various elements, but the Romanesque is basically consists of rusticated stonework, heavy towers with arches, short pillars, and sort of looks gothic, if you will. The Andrew County and the Carroll County examples -- Andrew County, I put the --, excuse me, the Adair County in this is the 1897 version. Since that time, this tower has been removed and Carroll County you can see the tower -- there used to be a tower up here, that's been removed. One of the problems with these buildings in many cases the tower leaks and requires maintenance to maintain it. So, there's the temptation to remove the tower in some cases. Modern Preservationists have been successful in many cases in stabilizing the building and to maintain the original appearance. So, this is the Jasper County Courthouse. It's probably the most successful example of the Romanesque style, again it's not pure Romanesque but it has many of the elements. The county -- Jasper County was able to combine with the City of Carthage to combine or pool their money to build a larger and more ornate building then some of the other counties were able to do. So, they got a very handsome and it's very well maintained -- it's a beautiful courthouse, I think, but it has the rusticated stonework, it has the corner towers, the arch, of course, the tower itself. And, the fellow who designed this building Maximillian Orlopp was from New Orleans and he was rather famously in an argument with the committee that was responsible for actually overseeing the construction of the building. And, one of the points that Orlopp made was they didn't need to build to bedrock -- they didn't need to dig down to bedrock to sink the foundation. The gentleman who was in charge of the construction argued vehemently, "yes, they will go to bedrock," and they did. All of other Orlopp's buildings have, I won't say failed or fallen, but they're no longer as pristine as this building is. And, some of the folks claim it's because the committee had the fortitude to demand that they dig down to the -- dig the foundation down to bedrock. But, part of the reason why Jasper County and the city were able to combine resources was through an 1887 bill that was passed by the legislature that allowed the incorporated county seat town to join with the county in constructing a courthouse and it turned out very successfully for them. They no longer share facilities, but it worked out for them at the time.
Let's go to the next, please? Let's go back to that last slide. Can you back up one? One point I forgot to make. Go back again, please? There you go.
The top four county courthouses were all designed by the same architect, George McDonald, as the bottom four buildings were designed by, Robert Kirsch, but the Andrew, Bates, Johnson, and Lawrence County Courthouses all share basically the same design. They are the same building. The main difference –They used brick instead of stone. Johnson County used a slightly different color of stone. But, those four buildings -- there are slight modifications, of course, mainly in the tower and in the cap of the four corner towers, but those are for all intentional purposes the same building. As, the bottom four are. So, sometimes as you visit one courthouse and then visit the next you say, "gee, this seems familiar, ah, deja vu, or I'm having some sort of a flashback," you're looking at a building that was designed and then that design was used a second, a third, a fourth time. And, this was not an unusual or uncommon event. When a county issued a bid or requested bids from architects when they were ready to build a new courthouse, of course, it was not cost effective to do design -- an entirely new building just on the spec that you may get the commission. So, architects would have a set design that they would send around to various competitions and if it was a popular design, if it was well built, if the building was appealing, then that design was used again and again and again. So, you have similarities in some of these older courthouses. The other thing architects used what's called pattern books, where they would have a set of different towers for example that the committee could look at a pattern book and say I want this tower and I want this kind of finish on the outside. They could mix and match various elements to come up with a building that they thought was unique to their community. And, one that they could afford based on how many dollars they'd actually spend on the building itself. Okay, let's go ahead, thanks.
In -- at the same time that the Romanesque buildings were sweeping the country -- there was a time when virtually almost every building that was built in late 19th Century had Romanesque touches to it. These are alternatives in Missouri; there are several others, but these two I picked because, I think, they're outstanding examples. Cass County that's what's referred to as the Italianate look. If you were to visit Italy, I'm told, you might see a tower similar to that as you walk around the town square.
In Nodaway County again the architect there created a much different look and Nodaway County was also the first court for Judge Charles Parker who was sometimes referred to as the "hanging judge". He was a City Attorney in St. Joseph and was elected to the Circuit Court, served in Nodaway County, then he went onto political office in Congress and then a long the way his -- he lost his following and was voted out of office, but before he left office, President Grant, assigned him to be the Federal Judge in Little Rock, Arkansas with the stipulation that he was to clean up the Oklahoma territory. So, if -- those of you who remember True Grit, the movie, John Wayne was Judge Parker's deputy. The deputies would ride out -- evidently Judge Parker had dozens of these deputies that he would send out to bring in outlaws. When they came to his court they got a rough justice. Before Judge Parker was the Federal Judge in that circuit for 22 years and he managed to hang 79 outlaws. He would have hung more, but he got some bad press and the federal people toned him down and started insisting that his judgments be reviewed by Appellate Courts, so a number of his -- would be -- he would've hung more, in other words, if he had a chance because he was a real zealot. But, his first court was in Nodaway County. Let's go ahead, please?
After, the Romanesque and the alternatives to the Romanesque style at the turn of the century 1910; do you remember the Greene County Courthouse with its plain roof? They didn't put the dome on it. Pettis County is probably one of the better examples of the return to classicism that was prevalent at the turn of the century. Again, you have no towers, no ornate fixtures, no heavy -- heavy stone arches to walk through, the buildings become cleaner, lighter, more business-like. Let's go on to the next one.
After, the early 20th Century the Depression hit in 1929, 1930 a lot of people were out of work. Missouri was particular hard hit, especially through southern Missouri where -- where more than 25 percent of the available men didn't have jobs -- couldn't get work. FDR established the Works Progress Administration, Works Program Administration it was later called and that agency was designed to create jobs for people. A number of our parks were built with WPA grants. Nineteen county courthouses were built with WPA money. Most of -- well all of our courthouses in Missouri were the modern style, however, WPA didn't insist. A number of courthouses in Georgia and the southern states that were built at the same time followed the Georgian or temple front look. In Missouri, however, we tend -- we used the modern approach in all of the WPA buildings have a similar modern look to them. The Jackson County was built at the same time, but it -- they used their own funding with by passing a 10 million dollar bond levy to construct their courthouse. Go on now.
After, the -- after World War II, of course no buildings were constructed during the war or initiated during the war, but several were finished during the war. Chariton County still has some of the touches of the 19th Century; you see the old cupola there, the same thing in Schuyler County. Some of the buildings are just straight forward modern; Clinton County is probably the most modern looking, in my opinion. Wright is an all glass front building. Holt County is a simple one-floor structure. Very form follows function type of buildings. Some folks have criticized the appearance of the buildings because they don't look like courthouses, they look like libraries, they look like schools, but they don't resonate with us the way the early 20th Century -- late 19th Century courthouses just say courthouse (unintelligible). If you look at some of these modern courthouses they're doing -- they're providing the same services, performing the same functions but they just don't look like a courthouse in some people's estimation.
Let's go ahead one more, please?
These are some of the most recent buildings that have been constructed. Phelps County, of course, in 1994. Miller County is our most recent courthouse in 2002, and this is just down the road from us in Tuscumbia. In Christian County they maintained the old courthouse, but across the street from it they have constructed a new criminal justice center. Let's go on one more, please?
This is a growing trend in courthouse construction, today. We maintain the old building, I think, we're beginning to appreciate those buildings more and more, but we've -- but we need more services, we need more space for county government. St. Louis is the example -- the prime example of courthouse complexes. They have a juvenile detention center, they have a court building, they have a building for administrative services, the county police have their own building, and then, you can't see it, because the administration building blocks, but there's a mall, kind of a greenbelt area on the other side here. And, all of this is the county offices. More and more we are building annexes, we're building secondary buildings adjacent to our existing courthouses. So, even though these building are eclectic in design and appearance, they are preferable to tearing down the old courthouse and starting from scratch.
Let's go ahead one more?
The thing that -- that I like, as much as the courthouse themselves, was the opportunity to meet some of the people who work in these buildings. Deanna Beck (ph.), Clerk in Atchison County was demonstrating how one of the modern ballots would not fit in the old-fashioned ballot box. Molly Livingston, the Circuit Clerk in Clinton County showed me the jury selection system. They put the numbers in the tumbler, turn that, they pull out a number and that would determine in turn the jury selection. Bob Ravenscraft in Marion County -- this is in the lobby of the present courthouse -- that ball -- that silver ball was a top the old courthouse. And, in the Civil War, during the time when the rebels -- the Confederate Soldiers were in control of Palmyra they gathered on the street outside of a tavern, I'm told, and proceeded to use that ball as target practice. So, the holes that you see are holes that were shot in the ball by Confederate sharpshooters from the green down on the street below. Some pretty good shooting, actually, considering some of those muzzleloaders were using a round ball. Union Troops mainly had the spiral type weapons. Let's go on to the next one, please?
This is the last picture in my book. And, I just get a kick every time I see these two ladies. Phyllis and Annie, Annie's on the left and Phyllis is on the right, but they are volunteers for the County Historical and Genealogical Society, and they maintain a museum across the square from the new courthouse. And, they have -- they help people check their family records, they maintain a little museum that has artifacts from the county. But, mainly, I'm just tickled by the way that they meet and greet people. They make every person that comes into the building feel welcome and at home and they're very helpful. But, they represent the people in the county and the people I came to know as I -- as I worked and produced the book Missouri Courthouses. And, that concludes my presentation. I thank you for your attention. And, if you have any questions I'll try to answer them for you.
(Applause.)
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Thank you.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Roughly how many turn of the century buildings are still existing?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: I'm sorry?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Roughly how many turn of the century buildings are still existing?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: About 40. You're talking about the Romanesque in Lafayette.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Right.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Yeah, about 40 of those are still used active -- actively used as courthouses.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Lafayette County has a cannonball from the Civil War in it?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Lafayette County, yes. Yes, and they're very proud of it. It's embedded in the column --
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Yeah.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: In the front of the temple front building. The view I showed was the opposite from where the cannon balls at. The -- as near as we can tell, I think, it was a Union cannon ball, because the Confederates had their headquarters just across the street from the courthouse, and I think, they would have loved to blown the Confederate General away, so I think, they were shooting at him when they hit that courthouse.
Yes, sir?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: What's the St. Charles County Courthouse used for now?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Which one?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: What does St. Charles County -- the one with the dome?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: St. Charles, yeah, and that's a complex now. Most of the -- most of the county courts and the administration have been moved to other locations. The old St. Charles Courthouse, which is a beautiful courthouse by the way, the county executive has his office there, the County Legal Staff has an office there. There are few county officers in that building still, but most of the work a day county business has been moved down to the new one.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: (Unintelligible.)
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Yeah.
Yes, sir.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Did you notice any Statue of Liberties at any of the courthouses? I know, Boy Scouts of America --
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Boy Scouts of America put up about 400 of those in 1950, yes. There's one outside Lafayette County Courthouse. There's one outside the State Capital here in Jeff City. You find them sprinkled around from various places, but all total, I think, there were about 400 of those put out in 1950 by the Boy Scouts. They cost like $390.00 at that time, the replicas of the Statue of Liberty.
Yes, sir?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Palmyra courthouse in Marion County Courthouse, what period is that?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: The one that's up now?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Yeah.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Okay, well in Marion County they have two courthouses, by the way, but the -- the current courthouse was built right about the turn of the century, 1896, 1898, somewhere a long in there. The courthouse that's in Hannibal was built in 1900, I believe, 1901 somewhere a long in there. But, they -- that's a county that has two courthouses. Going back to the Marion County Courthouse, one of the famous incidents from the Civil War had to do with an arbitrary execution of ten Confederate Soldiers, because -- not to make too long a story of it -- but the Confederate Troops kidnapped a local citizen. As soon as the Confederate Commander realized that he was a citizen and not a combatant he sent the man back to the Union side, but the troops that were assigned to send -- to escort him murdered him while in route. The Union General unaware -- everybody was unaware that this murder had taken place arbitrarily picked ten Confederate prisoners of war to be executed if this gentleman was not returned within a ten-day period. Of course, the ten days came and went and the ten soldiers were executed. There's a nice memorial of that incident. It was a notorious event in its day. It kept Lincoln's Cabinet on pins and needles for about three days because it was -- it was not the thing to do when you were trying to pacify a group of Missourians that wanted to join the southern side.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Do you have a favorite?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Oh golly, I sure like the Jasper County Courthouse. You could probably tell when I was talking about it. Inside the courthouse there's an old open cage elevator that they still use and -- and, I think, a lot of the folks in this room are old enough to remember when you had to use -- had to have an elevator operator to take you up and down to the various floors. That still has that quality. But, I think, that's one of the best preserved and it's got a nice museum inside and it's just a gorgeous building. But, different folks would prefer other buildings, I'm sure.
Yes, sir?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Of the 114 counties this state has; how many courthouses were built on a court square? Like in Cole County, it was just part of the regular building blocks, but like Morgan County has got a court --courthouse sits in the middle of the square and there are streets around, and a couple, I mean, I've been in other places that are the same way. Is that -- was that a popular thing?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: I really don't -- I'll tell you a little bit that I know, which isn't very much. There were various styles of courthouse or county seat layouts. Some were called the Lancaster Square, some were -- which basically was a square with streets going in from all -- well it was a square in the middle of the town. There were half squares -- just there were various layouts of squares, and I can't really talk to which town or which county square used this layout for their county seat and which used another, but there were variations on those.
So, it's probably not unusual for you to -- for you to drive into a community like -- well like Jeff City and see, you know, we basically just a lot along a street intersected by a side street where you drive into another small community and the county courthouse might be in the middle of the town square with open road all the way around it. Just a difference in the way the square was laid out originally. And, possibly the county judges have decided in the wisdom of time to sell off or use part of the county square for other purposes.
In some communities 30 years would pass between a disruption such as a fire or the courthouse burned the county offices were disbursed to rental property around the square or in other parts of the town and the site of the old county courthouse became the city park, if you will. And, then 30 years later when they decided to build another county courthouse well the park may or may not be available. If it wasn't available they would purchase another parcel of land to build the new courthouse, which is off -- is not -- is no longer in the center of the town, if you will.
In Cape Girardeau, they moved their courthouse basically to escape the river flooding, you know, every four or five years they had to move the courthouse back another 100 yards or two to avoid the flooding. Now, it's the last courthouse -- the present courthouse was actually built outside the city limits at the time it was built. The city has caught up with it, but when it was first built, it was actually outside the city limits.
Yes, sir?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Several counties have two courthouses. Were there various reasons for that?
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Well yeah, -- yes. One example, Hartsburg -- Hartsville -- what's -- what's -- what was the name?
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Huntsville.
UNKNOWN SPEAKER: Oh, Huntsville.
MR. DENNIS WEISER: Moberly is -- Randolph County has a town of Moberly that's much larger in population. They wanted to be the county seat, well they -- it never happened but they now have a small satellite courthouse in Moberly.
In Hannibal, the courthouse was usually placed in the center of the county so that as many people as possible could have access to the county seat.
In Palmyra, that's where the county seat is at. It's in basically the middle of the county.
In Hannibal, they had problems or cases coming up associated with river traffic. They had river -- naval problems -- or naval cases that had to be adjudicated. So, they situated a courthouse -- a court and they used -- started off they used an old church for that purpose and then went on and, like I said, 19 or 1901 they ended up building a new courthouse, but its -- and since then it has come to be used for municipal trials and some civil cases besides, but it was basically established to handle maritime cases. In Cape Girardeau, their county seat is in Jackson. They have the county seat there and then they have another county building, which is used for courts in Cape Girardeau itself, which goes way back to a story -- when the land was first donated -- the title to the land was not clear so they decided to build the county seat in Jackson instead. But, of course, the major population center is in Cape Girardeau.
So, there are a number of reasons why it happens, but throughout the history of the State you never really knew what was going to be the most prominent or populous city. You aimed, in many cases, we're talking about carving a community out of the wilderness.
When Rolla was established, there was nothing there but woods and small clearing. The first major task of the county court was to build roads just so the folks could get in and out of the county seat so they can interact with the rest of the State. As it turns out that has grown to become a prosperous and well-populated city.
In other instances the county seat choice didn't work out. Anyway, okay, thank you very much for your attendance. Thank you.
(Applause.)
(Musical interlude.)
ROBIN CARNAHAN: Hi, this is Missouri Secretary of State, Robin Carnahan, again. I hope that you enjoyed our program. For more information about Friends of the Archives or to find out more about other online programs and upcoming presentations, please visit our website at www.sos.mo.gov.