Yesterday I drove to the place I called home for a short time in my youth. A place where scores of relatives were born and died.
In fact yesterday we laid to rest my Aunt Mary Ann. She was the last of my mother's generation... now gone.
I think "Coming Home" is a feeling we can all relate to. That phrase probably conjures up a specific moment or memory in our mind.
For some it's maybe coming home from college. Or maybe it's coming home from military service overseas. Or maybe it’s just coming home after being away for a while.
Regardless of what it is, the fact of the matter is coming home can be dual sided, associated with joy as well as sorrow.
The road home is often a familiar one. Landmarks we pass, others may ignore because they don’t call this town home. Familiar sites and sounds give you that feeling of “almost there” as you inch closer to the familiar front doors.
(Ton of memories of Grandma's house where many years spent visiting on holidays & weekends. Although in this picture the house appears to have grown an extra addition and changed color)
(The park just at the end of the block where I played on some of those visits)
(The house my family lived in for a year while residing in Sedalia, MO but the house now has the garage enclosed, a new chimney plus new paint color of the house.
The school I walked to 5 blocks away)⬇️
Sedalia, Missouri has held a colorful history. It is the county seat of Pettis County, & got it's start in 1857 when the first plat for the town was filed in hopes of attracting a railroad.
Indeed, Sedalia’s early prosperity was directly related to the railroad industry. Many jobs (including my ancestors) involved men maintaining tracks and operating large and varied machine shops.
Another driving force was the trade to the southwest along the Santa Fe Trail. At that time, most supplies made their way to New Mexico, which was years away from having a railroad.
Sedalia was soon crowded with wagons with goods brought there by the railroad and taken by wagon trains to the west and southwest.
Large stores from Otterville, Syracuse, and Tipton were moved to Sedalia, which included their stock and, in many cases, the buildings or portions of them.
As soon as the railroad reached Sedalia, it also became the headquarters of the great Overland Stage Line.
Sedalia had a very colorful past with good and the bad of growth and industry, Civil War and distinctions.
While Sedalia had not been successful in it's attempts of luring the state capital, it was selected as the site of the Missouri State Fair, having competed with five other cities. The first fair was held in 1901, with more than 17,000 paying visitors attending. Several buildings were built in the early part of the 20th century, many of which are listed on the National Register of Historic Places today.
One historical memory for me was the 1974, Missouri State Fair where Sedalia hosted The Ozark Music Festival, one of the largest but least remembered major music festivals of the 1970s.
While the plan was for the pop/ rock/ bluegrass festival to sell about 50,000 tickets, an influx of about 184,000 fans and many rock bands strained the capacity of the fairgrounds and the city of Sedalia. Some estimates put the crowd count at 350,000, not far from the 400,000 spectators who attended the famous Woodstock music event in New York in 1969. Sedalia's Festival counted as one of the largest Rock Festivals in history and was hosted by well-known radio personality Wolfman Jack.
Today, Sedalia is a thriving community of almost 22,000 with numerous businesses, including several manufacturing companies, a two-year college, and numerous historic buildings that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Also, The Missouri State Fair continues to welcome nearly 400,000 visitors every August.
Sedalia also, hosts the annual Scott Joplin Festival in early June and other events throughout the year.
Yesterday was definitely a "Coming Home" to my family's and mine old stomping ground through the years.
Nana
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