Moline, 1912

[W. Gray]

Photo in Moline, 1912, provided by Jarhead.

[Roma Jean Turner]

Jarhead...Do you have any old photos of Moline that shows the name Elting, Dunlap or Turner on any businesses?  They were my ancestors.  I guess one of the Turner brothers owned a business in Howard as well.  Thanks

[jarhead]

Roma Jean,
My nephew still has two more photo's of Moline, that i know of but he hasn't sent them yet so don't know what they are. They are on the wall of his cafe but i never take my "specs " to the cafe so don't know what they are of.Was the Dunlap's north of Longton part of your clan ? They is a big WPA built pond  they call the Dunlap lake. Seems like I was told a child drowned in that lake way back when---or did I dream that ?

[Roma Jean Turner]

My Dunlap relatives were not, to my knowledge a part of that group.  My great grandfather Edwin Elting married Lenore Dunlap, I believe in 1887.  They owned a Mercantile in Moline as well as other property and businesses.  When you mention a child that drowned in those days, you may have the answer to a family mystery for me.  I was told that my Greatgrandmother's sister, Hattie Dunlap Hutchings Randall.  Was a teacher in the Moline area.  According to the story there was some kind of gathering and a child drowned.  People in the community blamed her for it. Evidently they felt she wasn't being watchful enough.  She left Elk Co and never returned.  My Dad said that the last time he saw her he was about 10 years old.  They met her at a train station in Coffeyville or somewhere because she would never come back.  I would love to find the newspaper articles about this but haven't taken the time to try to narrow down what years this might have happened. I think it would have been late 1880's or early 1890's perhaps.  I'm excited to see the other pictures.  Thanks Jarhead.

[jarhead]

Roma Jean, If a child did drown in the Dunlap lake I dobt it would have been back in the 1800's because the Dulap lake (pond) was a WPA project and I think that was during the great depression---but I aint sure. There was a child that drowned in Hitchins creek back in the 1800's and almost seems like it was 2 little girls that drowned at the same time, but again, I might be wrong. Maybe Waldo knows.

[W. Gray]

This is the only information I have from some old notes:

The first known accidental deaths in Howard County occurred near the future site of Longton along Hitchen Creek. The creek was named for W. C. Hitchen the first known settler on the banks and the only citizen to have a Howard County stream named after him. The creek severely flooded in July 1869 and several people lost their lives. The water reportedly rose an incredible forty feet before subsiding.

The figure of forty feet came from the Elk County history book, I believe.

[Roma Jean Turner]

I don't believe these events would be the ones.  I thought this happened in Moline.  Of course it has been decades since anyone was alive to tell this story to me and they probably heard a handed down version of it.  Maybe some day I will stumble across it.

[W. Gray]

Here is more on the Longton drowning incident.

The deaths occurred on July 11, 1869, to the John Butcher family.

Butcher had a claim near Hitchen Creek but had built on ground that he thought high enough to avoid any flooding.

The family awoke in the middle of the night to water coming into the cabin and it was rising fast.

The family decided they could not make it to higher ground because the water was rising so fast so they decided to make for some trees some distance away. The father carried two of the older children and the mother carried the two youngest children. No information as to whether the children were boys or girls.

The father made it to the trees with the two older children, but the mother was not tall enough, nor could she hold the two younger children above the water. All three drowned.

From the Elk County history book.

Did not see anything concerning drownings in Moline.