Sand Creek Dam: A Photo Album

by Kristine Schmucker, HCHM Curator

About a week ago, a follower on facebook asked about photos of the Sand Creek Dam.  We do have several in our Photograph Collection dating from 1910 to the 1960s. This post is a selection of those photographs.   I would also note that we need photographs from more modern times as well.  Someday, people will be interested what the area looked like in the 1970s, 80s and 90s.  If you have photos, we can scan them into our collection, and you could keep the original if you like.  This is true for any photographs of a more recent history, we would love to see them. 

Enjoy this Photo Album of the Sand Creek Dam near Athletic Park.

One of our oldest pictures of the Sand Creek Dam at Athletic Park, Newton, is an enlargement of a picture postcard from 1910.

Several views of the Sand Creek Dam 
near Athletic Park, Newton, Ks in 1915.

A view of the wooden pier at Sand Creek in 1915

from the Lucile Mitchell Miller Collection.

Swimming in Sand Creek in 1915

  from the Lucile Mitchell Miller Collection.

Sand Creek Dam, 1920s

This photo is labeled "the old dam".

Sand Creek Dam, 1930s

Sand Creek Dam, 1961

Sand Creek Dam, October 1963

All photographs are courtesy the Harvey County Historical Museum & Archives, Newton, Ks.

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A Fire Station and a Hotel: The Buildings in the 100 Block of North Main

by Kristine Schmucker, HCHM Curator

One of the great things about working at a museum is hearing the stories that can be triggered by an object, photograph or story.  When we post a story on the blog, facebook or include in an exhibit, we never know what new stories will come as a result.  The blog post on Newton's Peter Pan Ice Cream Stores was quite popular. We recently revised to include some of the facebook comments and printed the article in out Summer 2013 Newsletter.  Now, another chapter of the story has come to light.  Two longtime museum supporters and Harvey County natives read the newsletter article and shared their memories of the 100 block of North Main. 

Hotel Meridian and Sinclair Filling Station
2nd & Main, Newton
15 August 1968
HCHM Photo Archives

Thank you to John Wiebe, who took the time to write a letter describing his memories and to Tom Rose who called and visited with me.  The old ways of communication still work just fine.

"In the picture, you can see a garage door on the south side of the building." (Wiebe letter)

In his letter, Mr. Wiebe noted that the south side fire department was located at that location in the south part of the brick building.  The firemen may have lived above.  Wiebe recalled that "when the door was open you could see the fire engine."  Tom Rose shared his memory of the building as well.  When he was a young boy, the firemen would sit in front of the station on metal chairs.  Rose and his friends would ride bikes past and sometimes stop to visit with the crew.  And sometimes, the firemen would allow the boys to go inside and slide down the pole. 

A directory search revealed that Fire Station No 2 was located at 119 N. Main from approximately 1926 until 1948.  Between the 1948 and 1952 Directories, the new Fire Station was built at 200 East Third, Newton.

Fire Station No. 2, 200 East 3rd, Newton, 1953
HCHM Photo Archives

The Hotel Meridian/Cafe first appears in the directories in 1923 at 119-123 N. Main.  After 1926, the Hotel is listed as occupying 123 N. Main, with the Cafe at 121 N. Main, Newton.  The hotel was first managed by Lucia B. Oakes Millner and later by her daughter-in-law Winona Linville Millner Sloan.

Peter Pan Ice Cream Store appears at the 123 N. Main address from 1956 to 1966.

The buildings at 119-123 N. Main (seen in the 1968 photo) were torn down in approximately 1970. Today, Auto Parts is at this  location.  A new bank is also under construction on the lot where the Dairy Queen was located (for a history on the Dairy Queen building click here).

View of 100 Block of N. Main, June 2013
HCHM Photos

Sources:

• Wiebe, John E. letter to Kris Schmucker, HCHM Curator, 29 May 2013.
• Rose, Tom phone conversation with Kris Schmucker, HCHM Curator, 6 June 2013.
• Newton City Directories 1919-1956
• For a history of the Newton Fire Department before 1922 see Warhurst, Elvin E., "Early Fire Protection in Newton, Kansas, 1872-1922, compiled in 1995. HCHM Archives.

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"An Untimely Death"

by Kristine Schmucker, HCHM Curator

On May 18, 1904 the Newton Evening Kansan Republican reported the sad news of the "untimely demise" of a local businessman's pet alligator.  The seventeen year old alligator was six feet long and "had just begun to waken from his winter lethargy", when he suddenly became ill, rolling "around in a very turbulent fashion". He died later that evening.

Seventeen years before, Anson B. Conrad jokingly asked Alex Lupfer, a friend who was leaving for Florida, to send him an alligator.  Soon, a package arrived in the mail with two alligators.  One measured twelve inches and the other thirteen.  The larger reptile died a week later, but with careful nursing and frequent baths of hot water, Conrad was able to keep the smaller one alive. The alligator flourished in Newton. During the winter months Conrad kept the alligator in the basement of his home at 209 W Broadway, Newton. He fashioned a pen in his yard for for the summer months.  The reptile also spent time in the window of Conrad's Main Street Store.

Conrad's Drugs & Jewelry, 1901
501 Main, Newton
Western Journal of Commerce, p. 11
HCHM Photo Archives

Hundred of Newtonians have seen the 'gator in the show windows of the Conrad store, where it was placed every summer until it got so large and powerful it could not be trusted outside of its pen."

Interior Conrad's Drugs & Jewelry, 1901
501 Main, Newton
Western Journal of Commerce, p. 11
HCHM Photo Archives

The newspaper article concluded by noting; 

"Mr. Conrad is not grieving very deeply over the death of his pet, for it was becoming quite a burden.  During the summer he feeds it a mess of kidneys every day."

Anson Conrad was a successful jeweler and watch inspector for the Santa Fe Railroad.  He arrived in Newton with his father, Dr. J.D. Conrad and two brothers, Elmer E. and Weir C.* in 1882.  Anson apprenticed with jeweler Charles Mum for three years.  Beginning in 1885, he worked as a jeweler in   his brother's store, Conrad Bros & Dutcher located at 505 Main, Newton.  By 1905, two of the  Conrad brothers, Anson and Elmer E., had moved to their own establishment, Conrad's Drug's & Jewelry, at 515 Main, Newton.

500 Main Block, Newton, 1917
West Side
515 Conrad's Drug's & Jewelry
HCHM Photo Archives

On November 20, 1920, Conrad sold the jewelry business to N.R. Daugherty.  Anson B. Conrad, "a highly respected citizen of Newton"  died January 6, 1926 at the age of 58 years.

*Weir C. Conrad  owned Conrad Bros & Dutcher Dry Goods & Millinery and served as Newton mayor.

Sources

• Newton Evening Kansan Republican, "Death of Mr. Alligator", 18 May 1904, p. 1
• Newton Evening Kansan Republican, "A.B. Conrad", 6 January 1926, p. 5
• "Western Journal of Commerce", Newton, Kansas 1901
• "Newton, Kansas, Past and Present, Progress and Prosperity", 1911
• "Newton Kansan 50th Anniversary Edition", 22 August 1922
• Newton City Directories, 1885-1919
• HCHM Photo Archives

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Trained!

By Kristine Schmucker

You are on your way across town, sitting at the stop light at 5th and Main, and you notice the railroad crossing lights start to flash, the arms come down and you hear the sound of a train whistle. If you have spent any time trying to get from one end of Newton to the other on Main Street, you are familiar with this situation.  You have been "trained!"  Trains are a fact of life in Newton, Kansas.  They are the reason for a town at this location, and throughout Harvey County history, a major employer.

Despite the importance of the railroad to the town and county, when you are stopped by a train at the west 1st Street, Main, and/or Broadway crossing, it can get frustrating.  The train crossings and what to do about them is not a new problem. 

Newton, Main Street Crossing, ca. 1910
Clark Hotel in the background
Courtesy HCHM Photo Archives

In May 1904, Newton city councilmen, members of the Commercial Club, and officials from the Santa Fe Railroad recognized "the importance of having one place at which a sure and safe crossing of the Santa Fe right-of-way at any and all times could be depended upon."

The dangers of the crossing situation in Newton were well known.  Santa Fe officials regarded the crossings at Broadway and Main in Newton "as the most dangerous on their line between Chicago and San Francisco."

In 1904, the city leaders and railroad officials discussed the idea of "a subway under the Santa Fe tracks between the alley back of the Santa Fe offices and some point back of Nicholson's coal office, and the directing of all Main street traffic into this tunnel."  The majority of the businessmen involved in the discussions "were strongly opposed to any solution of the problem that carried with it the closing of the Main street crossing."

Discussions continued and a committee was formed consisting of D.W. Wilcox, C.M. Glover and John C. Nicholson.  They were to work with H.U. Mudge, general manager of the Santa Fe Railroad, to find a solution to this "old question."

Evening Kansan Republican,  3 June 1904

But, a subway was never constructed.

Newton, Main Street Crossing, 1950
Courtesy HCHM Photo Archives

The train crossings at Broadway, Main, and West First continue to block traffic regularly, 

as they have since the early 1900s.

Newton, Main Street Crossing, 1988
Courtesy HCHM Photo Archives

Sources:
Thanks to Linda Koppes, who discovered the June 3, 1904 clipping.
Evening Kansan Republican, 24 May 1904.
Evening Kansan Republican,  3 June 1904.

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She Hath Done What She Could

by Kristine Schmucker, HCHM Curator

The next few months will be very busy at Harvey County Historical Museum & Archives.  We will finally be seeing the results of a lot of behind the scenes work with the opening of the new exhibit, The Way We Worked: Serving Harvey County in the renovated Schroeder Gallery on September 8.  As I write this, the empty cases stand ready for artifacts, photos and stories.

In preparation for this exhibit, a great deal of research has been completed to  find stories of how people worked serving Harvey County in the past 100+ years.  One of the first people that caught my eye was Miss Lizzie Coult.

In the 1887 Newton City Directory, she heavily advertised her business, the Bee Hive Bookstore at 520 Main.  "Lizzie Coult keeps all kinds of books from the nickle novel to the finest edition of the classic poets and historians!"  and "Buy your blanks, Opera Glasses, plain and fancy papeteries and standard books at the Bee Hive Book Store."  Then, in the 1902 directory, there is nothing.

This made me curious.  She appeared to be a single woman that owned a business in the late 1880s. Who was Miss Lizzie Coult? and what happened to her?

First, I checked the Greenwood Cemetery index that is in Archives, and got lucky.  Lizzie Coult died August 7, 1899 and was buried in Greenwood Cemetery.  With that information, I could go to the microfilm and look for an obituary. There on the front page, with a picture, the headline read, "Miss Lizzie Coult is Dead."  

Picture from Weekly Kansan Republican, August 11, 1899

The sub-headline of the article paid her high praise.

"A Christian, Business Woman Whose Life Was Full of Earnest, Devoted, Self-Sacrificing Labor for Others Has Passed to Her Reward."

So, who was this women that received such high praise from those that knew her?

Lizzie Coult was born November 15, 1852 in Sussex County, New Jersey.The Coult family moved to Kansas in 1878 and settled near Neosho Rapids. By 1880, Miss Coult was teaching school near Emporia in the Garfield School.  In 1885, Miss Lizzie Coult arrived in Newton with her mother, Jane, and purchased the Bee Hive Bookstore.  

Bookmark from the Bee Hive Book Store

According to the 1887 directory she had two employees; Miss Jennie White held the position of saleslady and Charles Coult worked as a clerk. She sold the Bee Hive Bookstore to H.F. Toews in 1894.  Miss Coult continued to work for Toews as a bookkeeper until her death. 

Between 1894 and her death in 1899, she focused on her work in the Presbyterian Church and was a leader in the Kansas Christian Endeavor Union.  She, with Rev. W.L. Garges, published the Kansas Endeavor, a newsletter for the Kansas Christian Endeavor Union. She was also known state-wide for her work with young people through the related organization, Junior Christian Endeavor.  She contributed articles to the Presbyterian publication, The Church at Home and Abroad, Vol 21 (1897).

Lizzie Coult died unexpectedly August 7, 1899, at the age of 47 of "quick consumption."  In tribute to her years of dedication to the youth of the Presbyterian Church, children placed little bouquets of flowers under the casket and the Junior Choir sang. 

She was buried in Greenwood Cemetery, Newton with the inscription "She hath done what she could."

Greenwood Cemetery
Photo by Julian Wall

Information from The Weekly Kansan Republican, August 11, 1899, p.1.