Caldwell County MO Archives History .....THE TROSPERS OF BRECKENRIDGE 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com August 30, 2008, 4:11 pm

THE TROSPERS OF BRECKENRIDGE
	Narrator:  Wm. B. Trosper, 75, of Breckenridge, Missouri

	Home Work
	Kerosene and Whiskey
	Navigating Grand River

     Mr. Trosper was born July 14, 1859 on a farm a mile north of 
Breckenridge.  His parents were Robert B. Trosper and Mary Rice Comer.  He was 
one of a family of eight children.  His parents came into Caldwell County from 
Knox County Kentucky arriving June 29 1837 in a wagon.  His grandfather Nick 
Trosper settled north of the present Excelsior Springs Missouri 1826.  
Originally they had come from Brunswick County North Carolina, moving to 
Kentucky on horse back.  His grandmother's maiden name was Rachel Brank.  
Family tradition says that her father was killed in the Revolutionary War by 
General Tarleton.
     Mr. Trosper was born in a log house, two rooms below and one up.  He 
first attended the public school in Breckenridge and later a private school 
here.  His first and last public speech was given by him, when he was four 
years old, in a log school in the west part of town next door to the broom 
factory.  Sally Napier was the teacher (She was the ardent Southern supporter 
who at the beginning of the Civil War at a public meeting urged the men to 
drive off the Unionists.)  
     They used ox-teams to break up the ground for farming and then laid off 
the corn rows with single shovel plows drawn by horses.
     His Mother did her own carding, spinning, weaving and dyeing for their 
clothes.  They grew their own cotton and kept sheep.  They lived near the 
river and took their sheep there to wash them before clipping the wool.  She 
dyed the wood with walnut and white oak bark.
     He lived in the day when kerosene cost 75 cents a gallon.  His older 
brother Nick worked in Ollie McWilliams store in Breckenridge and while they 
sold kerosene at 75 cents a gallon they sold whiskey at 35 cents a gallon.  At 
one country school attended by his brother Nick, the teacher brought a gallon 
jug of whiskey for the last day and treated patrons and pupils with it.
     After the family moved a mile further north, then they were living in 
Daviess County where many of the Trospers now live.  At that time, Grand River 
was navigable part of the year.  During the winter they built a large flat and 
all co-operated in loading it in the spring with dried fruit, furs and 
anything they could sell.  When the river rose to flood, they floated it down 
to St. Louis.  When they came back, they could only bring the raft to 
Brunswick and then travel overland to Breckenridge.  They brought back flour, 
coffee, brown sugar and like necessities which they could not raise.
     Interviewed  November 1933.


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