Caldwell County MO Archives History .....A FOURTH OF JULY FIFTY YEARS AGO AND MORE 
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Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com September 4, 2008, 1:56 pm

A FOURTH OF JULY FIFTY YEARS AGO AND MORE
	Narrator:  Mrs. Mollie Davis, 68, of Hamilton

     Mrs. Davis recalls the Fourth of July of 1880 in Hamilton because 
she "was in it."  There was every thing that year that belonged in a time 
honored Fourth.  The day began at dawn with cannon.  Then when the morning 
train from the west pulled in, off got the Cameron Military Band the best in 
all this part  of the country, with their white plumes, just in time to lead 
the street procession which was always a part of a good fourth.  There was the 
band, carriages with speakers, and a big lumber wagon with girls representing 
the states, Mrs. Mollie Davis (then Mollie Doll) and her sister Ida were two 
states.  Some of those girls on that float have long been dead - as Mittie 
Partin, Tavia Penney (Mrs. Bishop), Flora Minger, Belle Holmes (Dudley), 
Mattie Howard (Story).  Then there were the two Brown girls Mamie and Blanche, 
Lillie and Fannie Graer, Alma and Lena Howard, Bina Murphy, and her sister 
Martie, while Kate Stone was the goddess of Liberty.  It was a regular bevy of 
society folks.
     There were advertising wagons by Hamilton firms, they did not call them 
floats then.  Jim Murrell, sort of a town clown, had his Calthumpian band, a 
crazy collection of clowns, and a crowd of boys on foot.  At the park, the 
Declaration of Independence was read (never had a Fourth without it).  Some 
one gave a stirring oration, and then people scattered over the park.  A 
dancing floor gave a place for the country jakes to dance the square dances, 
the rotary swings, as they said, or the "merry-go-round" as we say now were 
there, in fact Mollie's own father had a merry-go-round on the grounds.  A 
Hawker cried, "Ridy Ridy Ridy, round the world and half way back again."  Just 
anything to get attention.
     Lots of people took their dinner and ate on the grass and the three 
hotels were full.  People those days enjoyed their patriotism, and the way to 
show it was to go to some Fourth of July celebration.
     Interview  1934.


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