The year that I taught my first school was 1869, and soon after my school ended and just before Christmas I went to Hickory County to visit my friend, John P. Andrews, who had attended Pro. Carper's School with me at the White Schoolhouse near Buffalo, the previous year. I had heard that he intended going to Iowa to attend college and I wished to see him before his departure. His mother Mrs. Mark Andrews, with whom he resided near Urbana, a village near the Hickory County line but in Dallas County. I found on arriving at the Andrews' home, that Mr. Andrews had already gone to Iowa and I was greatly disappointed in failing to see him. Mrs. Andrews and family having heard John speak of me, as a schoolmate, expressed their regrets anent John’s departure before I came and cordially invited me to accept their hospitality over the weekend. It was then Friday afternoon. I did so and enjoyed the visit very much. On Sunday I accompanied John’s sister, Miss Hattie, to church at Dallas Schoolhouse near Urbana. A Baptist minister, Rev. Shepherd Starnes, was the preacher.

On Saturday, I had gone to Urbana and made the acquaintance of several of its citizens and heard some of them say that there was a good opening for a private school at Dallas Schoolhouse. On my return to Urbana Monday morning on my way home, some young people whom I had met the previous Saturday, and who had learned that I was a teacher, again referred to the need of a school there that winter and very earnestly requested me to become the teacher. After investigating the matter I decided to do so and made arrangements to open school at Dallas Schoolhouse the first Morday in January 1870. (It was, as I said, then iust before Christmas) and I secured a boarding place at the home of Dr. James E. Loafman, the village physician.

In the meantime a paper had been circulated among the people of the town and vicinity and a large number had obligated themselves to patronize the proposed school, specifying opposite their respective names the number of pupils they would send to the school. I returned home in a day or two, and on Sunday following, my brother-in-law, John H. Price, brought me to Urbana and according to arrangements I began my second term of school on the first Monday in January 1870. When I opened school that morning I was agreeably surprised and very much pleased to observe that there was a large number of pupils in attendance and I found on investigation that some of them were the children of persons who had not obligated themselves to become patrons of the school, and others who were young women and young men outside of that neighborhood. I also observed that a number of them appeared to be fully grown and evidently some of them were older than I.

I effected an organization of various classes that day and found that none of the pupils would require instruction in anything higher than the common school branches of study. I observed though, that some of the older pupils had as a text book, Brook’s Normal Mental Arithmetic, a book I had never studied and on examination, I ascertained that it was an advanced work and the problems much more difficult of solution than those in Ray’s Elementary Arithmetic, which I had studied and taught. However, in a few days I obtained a copy of the book and by devoting many evenings and nights to hard study of its difficult problems, I succeeded in being well prepared to instruct the class, as none of them could solve some of the "hard questions" and, before the end of the term, the class had successfully completed the study of the book. The other classes too, made good progress and on finishing the term I was pleased to know that the school had really been a success.

A few days before the close of the school, three young men from Hickory County visited me and solicited me to teach a term of school that spring at their schoolhouse near Preston. But having already made arrangements to attend a private school to begin soon in Buffalo and to be taught by Professor Baker, an excellent instructor, I thanked the young men for their offer of a position as teacher of a proposed school, which under the circumstances I had to decline and invited them to Professor Baker's school too. Soon after I returned home, the school began in the public school building in Buffalo, and I was pleased to find that the young men from Hickory County were in attendance. They were John T. Pendleton, F. Marion Wilson and Amos Lindsey.

Though not far advanced, they were all good students and made good progress in their studies. This school was one of the most successful ever taught in Buffalo up to that time. Of the young men from Hickory County, John F. Pendleton in after years was clerk of the County Court, and also collector of the Revenue of Dallas County. F. Marion studied law, was admitted to the bar, and became a prominent lawyer of Hickory County and was prosecuting attorney and clerk of the County Court of that county. Mr. Lindsey was a successful teacher and later went to the state of Louisiana and engaged in farming.

I think it was in the fall of 1870, that in company with Mr. William Benton Coon I went to Springfield and spent a week there and in the vicinity of the city visiting Grandfather Rountree and other relatives. While there I attended the Greene County Fair held near Springfield. In addition to Mr. Coon and myself there were a number of other persons from Buffalo and other sections in Dallas County in attendance at the Fair, among whom were Misses Nancy Olinger, Julia, Mary Jane and Tabitha Morrow and Mr. Sidney French.

In the fall after Professor Baker’s school in Buffalo closed, I taught school at the White Schoolhouse in our home school district. Many of my pupils in this term of school were formerly my schoolmates and frequently some of them and I had been members of the same classes, but by teaching and attendance at school I had become a much better scholar than any of them, and was fairly well qualified to give them needed instruction. At the end of that term many of the patrons expressed their approval of my teaching and desired me to teach their school the next year. However, I did not teach the next year.

I accepted a position as a salesman in the general mercantile store of Mr. William L. Morrow in Buffalo, and I worked in Mr. Morrow’s store until the end of that year. Then I accepted a like position in the store of Mr. I. N.. Morrow, a brother and rival in business of my former employer, and I worked in this store during the year 1872. Many things about clerking in a store I liked, but one thing I disliked very much I was required to sleep in the store of nights which was annoying to me. Accordingly, I resigned my position in Mr. I. N. Morrow’s at the end of a year’s service, and returned home..

That spring and summer, I again tilled the farm, and after being confined in a store for two years I enjoyed the outdoor work and was feeling fine, when I began teaching school again. I taught another term at the White Schoolhouse that year and had a number of pupils who had become of school age since I last taught there and some of my former pupils were not in attendance being over age and some of them having married.

Some time that fall occurred the attempted assassination in Buffalo of Mr. Albert Stanley, who at that time was clerk of the County court of Dallas County. One night Mr. Stanley was at work in his office in the courthouse and some would be murderer crept up to a window in the room in which he was working and shot him, inflicting a very serious wound in his back near the spine. It was thought by the physician in attendance upon him, at first, that the wound would prove fatal, and he was in a very critical. condition for some tine, but finally he began to improver and eventually recovered.

Mr. Stanley was a cousin of Brother Dolph’s wife, and was a very outspoken temperance man and had bitterly denounced the sale of intoxicating liquor by the "whiskey" drug store as it was often called in Buffalo. It was not Brother DoIph's drug store. One of the proprietor’s of this dispenser of inebriating liquid who sold whiskey on prescription, ostensibly as medicine but really known to be used as a beverage, had made threats an Mr. Stanley’s life, it was reported, and many believed that he was the party who wounded Mr. Stanley. There was an effort made, it was thought by many persons, to indict this suspected person for the comission of the atrocious crime. But as it was done under cover of the darkness of a moonless night when there were but few people in or near the court house. There was not sufficient proof to justify the finding of an indictment. Public sentiment, however, was strong in the belief of his guilt and knowing this he finally sold his interest in the drug store and left Buffalo.

During the time I taught school near Buffalo in 1873, I belonged to the second nine of the Buffalo Baseball Club, and on Saturdays we frequently played a game of ball. I think it was in October of that year, our nine received a challenge from the second nine of the Lebanon Basebal Club to play a match game of ball at Lebanon, Missouri. We accepted the challenge and that week after my school closed on Friday afternoon we started in wagons for Lebanon, arriving there late that night to be in readiness for the game to be played on Saturday.. My throat was slightly sore when we left Buffalo, and when we arrived at Lebanon the soreness had increased. I got some treatment for it and retired but slept little that night. We stayed at Attaway’s Hotel, the chief hostelry of the town and my roommate was Harry Mitchell. The next day, in the afternoon the game was called. I was one of the catchers for our nine and although my throat was quite sore and painful I played through the first inning. Then I became so ill I had to quit playing. I do not now remember what the result of the game was. Late that afternoon we started home, arriving in Buffalo the next morning. I was a sick boy, but I soon got treatment for the throat trouble and soon got better.

In the early winter of 1872 while I was working in Mr. I. N.. Morris’s store, I got a few day’s vacation and went with Mrs. I. N. Morrow and my sister-in-law, Mrs. Irene Z. Slavens in a buggy to Springfield and vicinity. Mrs. Morrow visited some friends in the town and Irene and I visited at Grandfather’s and other relatives in the country not far from town. On the way to Springfield it was quite cold. Mrs. Morrow wore a set of furs around her neck and shoulders. Toward noon the weather became warner and she allowed the furs to slip off her shoulders and afterward when it began to get a little colder she looked for her furs and discovered that they had fallen out of the buggy. We at once went back several miles and made diligent search and inquiry for them, but failed to find them, and in this way we were belated in arriving at our destination. On our return to Buffalo from Springfield, we again searched and inquired of several persons along the road, but failed to find the furs.

In the fall of 1873, I think, we had a fair at Buffalo. It was held on the fairground about mile west of Buffalo, and there was a fine display of agricultural, products, and fine stock of various kinds. There were running, trotting and pacing races, and some fancy riding by men and women. Among the latter was Miss Margaret Hollis of Webster County, one of Sister’s sister-in-laws. She had a fine riding horse and was a superb equestrian but her spirited steed became frightened, I think at the playing of the band, and started to run, became unmanageable and threw Miss Hollis, but fortunately did not injure her seriously. I had not seen Margaret for several years and she had changed in appearance very much. She was fully grown and was a fine looking young lady. I owned at that time a very fine riding animal, a pretty chestnut sorrel mare about four years old and had her on exhibition at the fair. There were several other horses that were competing for the prize in this entry. A beautiful bay horse won the first prize and my mare won the second. I was somewhat disappointed, thinking, as is often the case, that mine was the best, but Father admonished me to remember that "many men have many minds." I understood his meaning and felt better satisfied.

I had learned during the winter of 1873-1874 that a term of Select School had been established and was in progress at Urbana, 15 miles north of Buffalo, the teachers of which were John P. Andrews and William Benton Coon. I was well acquainted with both of them and knew they were men of good ability and well qualified to give instruction, not only in the common school branches but in some of the higher branches of study. I was informed that the fall and winter term of this school would close at a certain time and I decided to attend the closing exercises and in company with my Brother Dolph’s wife who was a very efficient teacher, and had recently closed a term of school in Buffalo. I went to Urbana the day before the closing of the school. We were entertained that night at the home of Dr. James E. Loafman, where I had boarded when I taught school at Dallas Schoolhouse during the winter of 1873, and I was glad to meet the genial doctor and his amiable wife again.

On the closing day there was a large attendance at the school and the rendering of a fine program consisting of declamations, essays and orations, interspersed with excellent vocal music, the principal singers being a quartet composed of Professor Andrews, Misses Rintha and Ella Hightshoe and their brother David Hightshoe. A few songs were also rendered by the entire school. Among those who had essays was Miss Josephine Lindsey, a stranger to me then, but who later became the dearest person on earth to me. While there I learned that the spring term of the school would begin soon and I made arrangements to attend, securing board at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Davis. Mrs. Davis, before her marriage, was Miss Rosetta White, who with her sister, Miss Rowena, were two of my pupils when I taught school at Dallas Schoolhouse as previously stated, and I had seen Mr. and Mrs. Davis at a church not far from Buffalo before their marriage.

The spring term of the Urbana Select School was attended by a large number of young ladies and young men, principally from Urbana and vicinity, and other sections of Dallas and Hickory counties. There were also a few from adjoining counties. This school was especially for advanced pupils, but there was also a primary department attended by many of the children of the neighborhood. Many of the advanced students in that school in after years became leading citizens, county officials, professional and businessmen of the localities where they resided. In the opening exercises the first morning and, in fact every morning during the school, there was excellent vocal music led by the splendid quartet I had heard with delight at the closing of the previous term of school, the whole school joining in the singing. They used the Text Book, specially adapted to schools.

In addition to the common school branches a number of the higher branches of study were taught in this school. My studies were algebra, geometry, mental philosophy and grammar. Attending that school from near Buffalo were Misses Mary Jane and Tabitha Morrow; and a day or two before the first day of May, Miss Irene Lindsey of Hickory County, also a pupil in school accompanied the Morrow girls to their homes for a visit and to attend a May Day picnic near Buffalo. Leaving Miss Lindsey at the Morrow home, I went to my home south of town.

On the morning of May first, Miss Irene and I started in a buggy for the picnic which was to be held at Corkery’s Mill, about four miles from Buffalo, on the Niangua Creek. Soon after we started, our buggy horse became frightened at a newspaper blown across the road, and although he was usually a very gentle animal, he ran away. Fortunately it was on a long stretch of smooth road and I succeeded in holding him in the road until his furious speed became slower and I had him fully under control, and we arrived at the picnic ground without any further mishap.

We had been there only a short time when a terrible accident occurred in which Mr. Milton Windes, a clerk in a drugstore in Buffalo, was seriously injured by the explosion of a blunderbus, a kind of brass firearrn. We all rushed to the scene of the disaster and found that young Windes was in the act of shooting at some birds when the blunderbus exploded, terribly mangling his left hand with which he was holding the band of the firearm, tearing off all but the forefinger and thumb of that hand. Dr. A. O. Hollenbeck, a physician of Buffalo, was In attendance at the picnic and treated the young man’s wounded hand. As he was beginning treatment, I was standing near, and the doctor asked me to hold the patient’s arm. I did so, and he had only been operating a few minutes when suddenly the doctor fainted and fell over on the ground. He recovered, however, presently and proceeded with the dressing of the wounded hand,

The accident cast a spell of gloom over the assembly of young folks, materially spoiling the pleasure of the occasion. But, after considerable delay all who had not left the grounds after the disaster happened, partook of a bountiful picnic dinner. After dinner there were various games, participated in by many of those who were still present, and then the affair expected to be a gala occasion tamely ended and the picnicers wended their ways homeward.

The next day our party returned to Buffalo, and after our few days outing, began our school work again with renewed energy. That term of school ended about the first of June, 1874, and we had an entertainment at the old Rock Creek Campground about two miles from Urbana. There were numerous essays, declamations and orations and several well rendered dialogues. The exercises were enlivened by some good selections rendered by the Andrews-Heighshoe quartet which always elicited generous applause, and at the close, I delivered the valedictory address. Then our greatly enjoyed term of school was a thing of the past and we parted from our schoolmates, some of whom I never saw again. Father had attended the closing exercises of the school and that night I accompanied him home to Buffalo.

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