Caldwell County MO Archives History .....HAMILTON'S FIRST SALOON KEEPER, DAVID BUSTER 
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Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com September 8, 2008, 4:08 pm

HAMILTON'S FIRST SALOON KEEPER, DAVID BUSTER
	Narrators:  Dan Buster and Mrs. S. Richardson

     The Buster family is one of the oldest in this community, being ancestors 
of Mayor W.W. Buster of Hamilton.
     In the summer of 1857, a saloon was built in a boarded up shack on block 
29, not far from the latter J.N. Morton store of the 60s.  Hamilton having 
been started, a saloon was the next thing naturally in pioneer life.  The 
owner was David Buster or "Uncle Davy" to some.  He was generally respected, 
as indeed good saloon keepers were those days.  He was one of the rare 
sheriffs in the county (Caldwell) so he had a strict sense of town order.  He 
allowed no extra rowdyism in his place.  This is seen in a story which some of 
his later kin like to tell.  An early settler here, Henry Holmes, a brick 
maker, loved Buster's whiskey.  One night, he was such a nuisance that Uncle 
Davy put him out and locked the door and went to the Davis hotel, where he was 
staying.  Holmes in vain begged for another drink.  Uncle Davy would not 
yield.  Then Holmes went to the shack and kicked the door in.  Opening the 
spigot, he drew a quart cup of it.  Buster, seeing him enter the place, came 
to the door, and Holmes ran out, leaving the spigot open.  Buster saw the 
whiskey running out of the barrel, but being stout, he could not enter the 
hole in the door thru which Holmes had passed.  The door was locked so he had 
to waddle back to the hotel and get his padlock key before he could save his 
whiskey.
     This however was the first saloon which Buster built and it was of rather 
short life.  Few recall it; the Buster grocery-saloon which has come down in 
history is the one on the right of way south of the tracks on the west side of 
Broadway.  He built this about 1858 or 59.  At this time, he wished to bring 
on his family, so he built a house on the lot where stands the Davis Motor 
company, facing south; and on occasion, they kept boarders, hence a few of the 
oldest folks still talk of the Buster House.  Some say that this house, moved 
to the north side of the lot, made the nucleus of the Hamilton House.  His 
children went to school with the Davis children in the small subscription 
school kept by Miss Mary Gartland on the site of the present Caroline Thornton 
house.  This was of logs, a building moved in by Mr. Davis from his farm for 
this purpose.
     This old Buster saloon structure is described elsewhere in the series.  
David Buster accidentally shot himself in Oct. 1873 while cleaning his gun for 
a hunting trip.  His wife, Mrs. Nancy Buster, Nee Sanford, died Dec 30 1892 at 
the home of her daughter Mrs H.C. Hughes in Hamilton.  The Busters were 
formerly of Grant township Brown county Va. where David was born March 9 
1809.  David and Nancy were married Oct 28 1835 in Ky., she being 22 years 
old.  She owned at her death a farm one mile and half west of Hamilton, 
afterwards the Tinsley Brown farm.
     Interview  1933-1935.



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