Historic secrets
The past surrounds us, but some federal registry sites are restricted
Staff writer
Wherever you are in Marion County, you’re not far from history.
In all, 31 sites within the county are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Most are categorized as having primarily local significance, but six are considered significant statewide, and four are considered significant nationally.
You can’t visit with certainty some of the sites. Their specific addresses are secret, either for privacy or to preserve archeology.
Most mysterious site
The most mysterious of the secret sites is the 1,285-acre, or two-square-mile, Marion Archeological District, which predates by more than 500 years all other sites on the list.
Between 325 and 675 years ago, the confluence of rivers that in 1860 became home to Marion’s white settlers was home to a major settlement of an aboriginal tribe known as the ancestral Wichita.
The exact size of their settlement isn’t known, but it is thought to be similar to large settlements found in Rice County and near Arkansas City.
By the time white settlers arrived in Marion County, the Wichita had been replaced by the Kaw and the Osage. But before those tribes’ arrival, the Wichita had a surprisingly civilized settlement well before the days of cowboys and Indians.
The Wichita were farmers and hunters, according to the Kansas State Historical Society’s archeology office.
They grew corn and maize in sufficient quantities that they stored it over the winter in hand-dug pits. They also hunted bison, deer, and other small animals using triangular stone arrowheads about the size of a thumbnail with notches along the sides.
The Osage and Kaw used similar arrowheads later but without the notches, the historical society says.
The resourceful Wichita made hoes out of bison shoulder blades for farming and lived not in teepees but in circular grass-thatched lodges. Men hunted, often traveling annually on long trips away from their settlements, while women tended gardens of maize, beans, gourds, and tobacco.
Their social order in their society was largely matriarchal. Family units were identified by the maternal, not paternal, bloodlines.
The Wichita established trade routes. Among artifacts found in the Marion area are pieces of obsidian not native to Kansas.
X-ray fluorescence determined that the obsidian likely came from an area near present-day Taos, New Mexico, giving credence to reports that the Santa Fe Trail, charted hundreds of years later, followed traditional paths taken by aboriginal people.
Trade also was established with settlements in Texas. Agricultural goods frequently were exchanged for glazed pottery, obsidian, and turquoise pendants.
The Wichita called themselves the Kitikiti’sh, which means “the people,” or “raccoon eyes” because of distinctive tattoos many wore around their eyes.
They became known to early Spanish explorers as “the tattooed people” because of their extensive tattooing.
The Wichita encountered their first European visitors in the form of Spanish explorers in the 1500s. Pressure from explorers and other indigenous tribes, including the Apache and Osage, led most Wichita to abandon Kansas and relocate in the Red River Valley of Texas.
Eventually, the population of Wichita was severely reduced by epidemics of European diseases to which they had no immunity.
The Marion Archeological District was designated in 1976 after a series of artifacts were discovered by local residents.
Marion natives who as youths explored wooded areas near Luta Creek on the north edge of town often reported finding arrowheads when adjacent farm fields were terraced.
Similar finds, not only of native artifacts but of debris left from what once was an early-day trash dump, also were reported in what years ago was known as Billings Park, south of Main and Walnut Sts. along an old channel of the Cottonwood River.
The archeological district’s precise boundaries are kept secret, the state historical society says, to prevent casual explorers from disturbing additional artifacts.
Santa Fe Trail sites
Two of the secret national sites occur in the middle of private farm fields — a 30.7-acre tract that includes “French Frank’s” Santa Fe Trail segment near Lehigh and a 9-acre site that includes Donahue’s Santa Fe Trail segment near Durham.
“French Frank’s” generally is located five miles north of US-56 on Diamond Rd. then west on 250th Rd. to Chisholm Trail Rd,
Visible ruts can be seen from 250th Rd. south on Chisholm Trail Rd. to 245th Rd. In the trail’s heyday, this was the site of a midday watering hole.
Ruts were created by horses, mules, oxen, freight wagons, mail stages, and soldiers attempting to cross French Creek between 1821 and 1866.
The creek was named after Claude Francis Laloge (1831-1899), commonly known as “French Frank” because he was a Frenchman and the first settler on the creek. He operated the equivalent of a modern convenience store there from 1861 to 1866.
The Donahue ruts are located nearby, around 240th and Falcon Rd., and are considered associated with the trail’s Cottonwood Crossing just west of Durham.
The more famous Lost Spring Station, 2½ miles west of Lost Springs on 340th Rd., also makes the list as a site of national significance.
An important campsite and station offering water to trail travelers, it was named for a spring that sometimes would dry up or become “lost.”
Foursquare home
A third “secret” location is a dilapidated private residence, the historic P.F. Meehan home in Tampa. Although its address is restricted on the database, visitors have determined that it is at 401 N. Columbus St. in Tampa.
Designed by Kelso, Mann, and Gerow Architects of Hutchinson, the 2½-story, 2,688-square-foot house with full basement was built in 1910 and nominated as an excellent example of American Foursquare style, a common domestic adaptation of the Prairie style popular between 1900 and 1925.
Harvey House
The one remaining site regarded as having national significance is perhaps the best maintained.
Originally known as the Clifton Hotel, the Harvey House at 221 N. Marion St. in Florence has been restored by the Florence Historical Society to serve as a museum.
Acquired in 1876 as part of a network of hotels and restaurants along the Santa Fe railroad, the Harvey House was the first American chain restaurant and became known for bringing quality food and service to the American West, an area previously known for poor cuisine.
The building was located trackside until the early 1900s when it closed, was moved, and was separated into sections.
The chain was famous for its “Harvey Girls,” well-mannered, attractive young women hired as waitresses to provide excellent and efficient service.
Subject to strict rules and a 10 p.m. curfew, the Harvey Girls were seen as a wholesome influence who helped “civilize” the West.
Historic schools
Two schools make the list of historic sites of statewide significance in Marion County.
Hill Grade School at 601 E. Main St. in Marion, now home to Butler Community College and Marion High School classrooms, was built in 1872 and expanded in 1889.
It is the oldest building in Kansas in continuous use as an educational facility.
Its original design was influenced by the Roman-Tuscan mode of Renaissance revival style while the addition respects the building lines but was constructed with roughly finished stone and is less finely detailed.
Burns Union School at Ohio and Main Sts. in Burns is a Romanesque Revival brick building built in 1904 and now home to Burns Community Museum.
It was the first consolidated grade school and high school in Kansas and the first to use a school bus. The school closed in 1965 because of consolidation but was later converted into a museum.
Pioneer Adobe House
Also on the list as having statewide significance is the Pioneer Adobe House at Memorial Dr. and D St. in Hillsboro.
The Peter Paul Loewen family, Mennonite immigrants from Russia, built the house in 1876 from air-dried adobe bricks.
It was moved to town in 1958, furnished with articles used by early Mennonite settlers, and transformed into a museum.
Also at the museum complex is a replica using original materials and methods of a gristmill built by Jacob Friesen in Gnadenau village in 1876 and the one-room Kreutziger School, started in 1886 and operated until 1960. It was moved during construction of Marion Reservoir and is furnished as an 1890’s-era schoolhouse.
Downtown and library
The final entries listed with statewide significance are the Old Peabody Library at Division and Walnut Sts. and the Peabody Downtown Historic District along Walnut St. between Division and 1st Sts.
The library was the first free, tax-supported library in Kansas. The town’s namesake, a Santa Fe railway executive, paid for its construction and contents in 1875. Moved several times after a new library was opened in 1914, it was relocated to its present site and dedicated as a museum in 1961.
It along with its replacement — one of the few remaining Carnegie libraries in Kansas and also an entry on the list — is part of the Peabody Downtown Historic District, which includes 42 contributing structures recognized for well-preserved late 19th and early 20th century architecture, including limestone and brick buildings.
LOCALLY SIGNIFICANT sites ON NATIONAL REGISTRY
Antelope — Amelia Park bridge, half a mile west of US-56/77 on 260th Rd.
Burns — Keystone Ranch, 2910 47th Terr.
Florence — Bichet School, north of Bluestem Rd. and US-50, 4½ miles east of Florence. Doyle Place, southeast of US-77 and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe tracks. Florence Opera House, southwest corner of 5th and Main St. Florence water tower, 525 W. 5th St., east of US-50/77 roundabout.
Hillsboro — 1927 Hillsboro water tower, south of the Cooperative Grain and Supply elevator, one block west of the business district. William F. and Ida G. Schaeffler House, 312 E. Grand Ave.
Lincolnville — Bethel School, 5½ miles east of town on 290th Rd. Island Field ranch house, three miles south of town at US-56/77 and 250th Rd.
Marion — Bown-Corby School, 412 N. 2nd St. Donaldson and Hosmer Building, 318 E. Main St. Historic Elgin Hotel, 115 N. 3rd St. Marion County Courthouse, 200 S. 3rd St. Marion County Park and Lake, two miles south of K-256 on Upland Rd.
Peabody — W.H. Morgan house, 212 N. Walnut St. Peabody City Park, 2nd and Locust Sts. J.S. Schroeder Building, 111 N. Walnut St.