August 28, 2018: I just posted an update on the Plains Cemetery database. After Alma proofed my work she came up with some other updates... I think we can say this is a good as it gets until some of you correct us. There is still a lot of blanks in there... let us know if you have updates to your family information. You would be amazed at the people who have found "Old Meade County" while tracing their roots.

August 15, 2018: Just thought I would touch base. I have been working on cemetery files... now I have moved on to Graceland Cemetery in Meade, and Alma has taken my updated Plains Cemetery file and is proofing my work and adding her two cents worth where needed. We get a lot of hits to the website by people looking for their people and these files are very good information about those who lived and died in Meade County. Once we get them filled out as well as we can, new "arrivals" will be easy! LOL

The Dalton Gang Hideout was awarded a Heritage Trust Fund Grant to repair and restore the J.N. & Eva Whipple house and we finally have the plans in place and are receiving bids for the work. We hope local contractors, painters, ect. will bid, this is a very exciting project!

July 20, 2018: Oh my! Has it really been two months since I've posted? How time flies when you're having fun. I have spent a LOT of time revamping the Plains Cemetery database and I have finally posted it today. I was just going to fix the dates into my favorite format, but as I went down the list I found a lot of empty spaces where "father-mother-spouse" was supposed to be recorded so I started looking them up. Man I love this stuff! Anyway... got it a little more complete. If you look at it and find missing information on your family... please let us know at the Meade County Museum.

May 22, 20198: Still working on Rural Schools... I just posted Dist. #37. Western Gem, as well what we know of Dist. #38... one of those districts that didn't last very long. My next one will be the East and West Glendale schools. I am anxious to get that story straight in my head!

April 25, 2018: I just finished the page for Boyer School Dist. #35. What an interesting story... we did have the name "Boyer" associated with a different school where the most recent generation of Boyer students went, but going through this file clarified that for me. This is one of those early schools that was merged into another district so it didn't last long. Check it out.

April 10, 2018: I've been pretty busy the last couple of weeks... I started on the Mertilla School, but then got side-tracked by doing the town of Mertilla in our ghost town section... then back to Mertilla School, Dist. #34. Anyway... got them both done and now posted. Wow... I'm now more than half-way done with the rural schools...whew! Enjoy!

March 27, 2018: I just completed another rural school, Dist. #33, Pleasant View or Merkle School. I sure couldn't find much on this school... if anyone out there can help let me know.

March 23, 2018: Just posted another "ghost town" story about the town of Carthage. I don't know why I got off on this, but it's nice to have it documented on the website. I think I'll go on to do the next rural school now. So much to write... so little time!

March 13, 2018: Whew! Just got done with the Plains Cemetery database. What a job... I got all the dates in a consistent format and while I was at it, I looked up a bunch of mothers, fathers, spouses that were missing. I can't tell you how helpful these cemetery files are when researching history. It's just one big ol' puzzle that you put together! What fun.

February 25, 2018: Just updated the Fowler Cemetery database. I have been working on the cemetery databases for Meade and Fowler because we are helping both cemeteries come up with new directories. They are both going to use our databases to keep current directories at the Cemetery so people can find the graves. As soon as we get some welding done we will be putting the new ones in place. Whew! quite a job.

February 7, 2018: Wow! Where did January go? It's been busy, busy, busy around the Museum... we had our annual banquet on February 3, and it always takes lots of planning and "organizing." The annual meeting was at Fowler this year and it went off without a hitch... good food by Smoke Hoss, good music by Celtic Knot... our Heritage Award went to the Dewell family and they gave a good talk. We had Jim Hoy as a speaker thanks to a grant from the Kansas Humanities... all in all a great evening.

I guess it was having the meeting there that got me to researching Fowler... I finally got the Fowler schools posted. I'm going at this as an "outsider" so if any of my readers see any misinformation, please let me know. Hey that schools page is staring to look better! Now if I could just get all those rural schools done... so much history so little time!

December 13, 2017: Added a story on the Meade Schools today. It's going to really take some time to get this all together and in the same place. We still have school pictures under the "index of pictures" tab, but I plan to get all the school stuff together eventually.

December 12, 2017: Worked on the "Schools" page again today. I had a link to Kirk Coats' web page where he wrote a good Plains High School story, so I went ahead and made a Plains Schools page. Kirk is a 1959 graduate of PHS, and boy are they lucky to have him! He's quite an historian. Anyway.... I rearranged the page a little and put the "town schools" under the rural schools. I hope to get back to those rural schools soon. Stay tuned.

October 31, 2017: Just added our Meade County Historical Society 2017 Newsletter to the website. If you don't get it in the mail... you can read it HERE!

October 22, 2017: I finally got my page written about the Irish Flats. We have the best story on it from a 1948 Meade Globe News. Check it out.

October 21, 2017: After answering an inquiry about "where to go" to update the Meade High School Alumni database, I got to thinking... we really need to have the schools in their own section and offer contact information about the different alumni associations. Boy! This could become a career! LOL I changed the banner above to include a "Schools" tab and started the process... this could take awhile. Still planning on getting every rural school a page... stay tuned!

November 15, 2017: Did a little housekeeping today... updated three cemetery databases, Meade, Plains & Fowler. It's amazing how soon these can become out of date! I'm excited about a new directory at Graceland. The Museum has offered to keep it up and they will soon implement a new system where our database will be available at the entrance instead of the old rolodex. I think it will help people find graves so much easier.

October 4, 2017: Updated the site a little today.... I made a few changes to my Jones & Plummer Trail page. I had a guy come in the museum and inquire if we had any maps of the trail and I couldn't believe I hadn't put any maps on that page! Well... I fixed that. I've been researching a story on the Irish Flats in the southern part of the county and should have an article on that soon. I've been busy... just not on the website. Sorry.

Years ago we marked the Jones & Plummer Trail through the county with trail markers and interpretive signs... we just got our signs redone this summer and that prompted us to make a map showing where the markers are. If you ever want a fun excursion stop by the Museum and pick up a trail map and find our markers. It would be a fun and informative day!!

July 26, 2017: Today I finished revising the page on the Lone Tree Massacre. This is such a famous part of our history... we sure want to get it right. Larry had been looking in our storage building for some paintings and ran across an old map and letter that had been pressed between two pieces of Plexiglas with taped edges. It was an original letter from Harold Short that told the story, from his perspective, about the demise of his father and his crew. Wow.. it was back there covered in dirt! I carefully took it apart, scanned the old map, cleaned the glass and put it back together with new tape. Then all this got me started and I've been consumed for days working on the Lone Tree incident, our file, our story, our web page and photos. Whew! What fun!

June 13, 2017: Well... Glenn Lauppe came in the Museum today and I asked him about the Evergreen School. After talking to Glenn I went back and fixed the page on District #31... I was a lot clearer after our visit. Come to find out the school that was on Section 9 was the school built in 1916, and was dubbed "Evergreen West" while the old original rock building was dubbed "Evergreen East." I guess you will have to read the story to see what I mean. One thing nice about doing this on the website... we can always fix things easily... I have revised several of the schools along the way. LOL

May 24, 2017: I actually got back to working on rural schools this week... just finished Evergreen... also known as the Cole School. We only have sketchy information on this school, but I still managed to come up with an interesting page. I just counted the school districts we have on our map and they number 51 so I'm not quite half way... but still lovin' the work!

May 9, 2017: Updated the site today. I updated all three of the main cemetery database files, Graceland, Plains, and Fowler. Also had made some changes to Bell Meade and Highland schools... can't remember what now, but watched as my program uploaded new info. We are right in the middle of SCHOOL TOURS at the Museum so... busy, busy, busy. Hope to get back to my school pages soon.

March 28, 2017: Looks like I haven't posted for awhile, but I have been busy on the rural schools. I have added Dist 27, Lakeview, Dist 29 and Prosperity witch is Dist 30... I must be about half-way through! It's been a lot of fun working on the schools and I have learned a LOT! We are still looking for pictures and school souvenirs from all the rural schools, so let us know if you have something we don't have.

February 21, 2017: Hi History Lovers! I'm back in the swing of things and hoping I can pay a little bit more attention to the website. I just made some changes to the Belle Meade School page. Larry is going through all the Meade County obits one by one looking for veterans information. He left me a copy of the obit from Iva Grim Stalder who had attended, and later taught at, Belle Meade. It was a great little story and clarified some facts about the school... mainly pinpointing it's two different locations and the fact that it disappeared for a little while. So... I changed the map... changed the page... and added Iva's story at the bottom. Time to get to work on the next school!

January 21, 2017: Wow... it's been awhile since I posted. We have been busy planning the Annual Meeting and Banquet for the Historical Society to be held February 4th in Plains. This is always an exciting time... be sure and join us!

October 25, 2016: Ever forward... I just finished Sunny Dale School, District #26. Whew! This was a big one... this school was one of the last ones to close in Meade County and has quite a history. Enjoy.

October 11, 2016: Greetings history lovers! If you haven't gotten your fill of the old country schools, I have a new one for you... the Black School, District #25. I also tweaked some of the other school district files with information from the sale bills when they were sold out. Larry had been in the newspaper microfilm and printed a bunch of the ads out as well as some news articles that told who got some of the buildings. These include Fairview, Five Mile, Longview & Stone.

September 27, 2016: I found another school district that didn't have a common name, but apparently existed for awhile. This school was two miles north of the town of Pearlette in Fowler Township. Don't have much but check it out.

September 21, 2016:Been working on rural schools again. This time I posted Century School, District #23. Alma found one of Arlie Friesen's articles from the 1990"s... Arlie was a student at Century and wrote a delightful little story about his days there.

September 15, 2016: Working on still more country schools. Just posted Valley Grove or Minerva School, District #22. Check it out!

September 7, 2016: I've been working on the next rural school... District #21, Stone Shool. This was fun for me for the German Lutheran people that settled what was known as the "Irish Flats" were my people. This original little building is still there... I guess when these folks built a school they built it to last!

August 30: Been adding to the school file... our dear friend, Alma Regier, was the teacher at Fairview in 1956-57, and she shared two more great photos with us... check them out at the bottom of the page.

August 27: I just posted another school, this one is the Blair-Graham School, District #14. This school eventually turned into the Plains grade school, but operated as a rural school until they started busing students to Plains in the early 1920's. The history is somewhat short, be do have one on this little school. I also finished with the Angell School, District #15. I hope you're enjoying the school stories... sure is fun!

August 23, 2016: Hello history lovers... I have a great new post for you! David Todd, who is the husband of Linda Cheney, is the Cheney family's "historian." He just sent us a great story on the Blizzard of 1948. The two girls who met their fate in that blizzard were Linda's aunts, and David used several family stories and newspaper accounts to create a very touching story of that chilling event. Well worth the read.

August 16, 2016: My how time flies! Looks like I haven't posted for awhile. I just got through updating the cemetery files for the three major Meade County cemeteries: Meade, Plains and Fowler. I've been working on the Angell School, but I'm not quite done. Stay tuned.

July 27, 2016: I just read a great article that Larry had typed up for us by E.E. Innis. I have put this story in the family files. This really cleared up some things for me on the schools... especially the school called the Randloph or "Lickskillet" school. I had them as Grandview, but they were actually names associated with the Highland school. I had to make some changes to those school's pages. This new-found knowledge also gave me a photo for the Highland school. I highly recommend the Innis story... great history!

July 6, 2016:I've been working on schools again. I just posted Grandview, Dist. !2. This school was about 4 miles south and 1 mile west of Fowler. I also posted District 13, a school district that only lasted a few years.

June 15, 2016:Wow... don't know where May went! I added the Highland rural school today. Highland was about 5 miles south of Fowler. We don't have any photos of this school... if anyone out there does, we would sure appreciate getting one. :)

April 12, 2016: I just added a cute old clipping from the Meade newspaper in 1945. It pictures all the rural school teachers of that year. Katherine Borger gave the clipping to Alma Regier who gave it to the Museum. Katherine (Blehm) Borger is one of the teachers.

April 6, 2016: I added another school today, Atwater... District #8. This school (and town) was a coupe of miles south of the lake... right on the west side of Hwy 23. This school ran right up to 1946, but we only have one old photo of it. Sure would like to find more.

March 22, 2016: I just posted Longview School... District #7. This school is really a mystery... it was Longview, Clearlake and Seminary... does anyone know what the difference was?

March 8, 2016: Well I just posted another rural school. This is District #5, Five Mile School. We don't know much about this school and if we have a photo, we don't have it identified. In doing this story I find that Vashti Painter (Seybert) went there... wish I would have known that earlier... I'm sure she could have identified the photo!

February 16, 2016: Wow.. I've been a.o.l. for awhile from the website. I spent some of January in the hospital so that's my excuse! I just posted some photos on the Fowler Hospital page. Merle Cheney brought these to me last year and I just never got them posted. Would love to see some photos of this house "back in the day."