Villages of Crawford County, Missouri - HUZZAH It is not de f inite ly known when the Huzzah post office was established by Donald McGinnis, but it was approximately 1897. In fact there have only been two postmasters in the history of Huzzah; the second and last one was Haskel McGinnis who served from the death of his father until the office was closed in 1970. The Huzzah Store building was once at Davisville and used as a store at that place. It was torn down and moved to Huzzah and rebuilt. The store was operated by the McGinnis family until it quit business in 1965. Huzzah never had a railroad but in the heyday of its existence it had a large tie yard. Ties, cordwood, and mine props were purchased and later delivered to the nearest railroad for shipment. For many years tie rafting from Huzzah to Pacific was an interesting and profitable venture. The trip down the Huzzah to Pacific, Missouri at the spring flood time was a feat that required strong and hardy men, and many are the tales of the trips still related by the descendants of those raftsmen. Huzzah, like other rural villages, had a good school and about 1933 a new rock building was built. This rural school, the last rural school operated in Crawford County, was closed in 1966. The last teacher, honored as the last rural schoolteacher in the county, was Hester Carpenter McGinnis, wife of Haskel McGinnis. Haskel McGinnis and wife have spent many years in the Huzzah community. They have continued to live in the old McGinnis home near the fringe of the hill overlooking the beautiful valley. The family consisted of four children, two sons and two daughters. Dick McGinnis manages his father's farm and plays in one of the popular orchestras at the Lake of the Ozarks; Don McGinnis, the older son, acquired a Doctor of Philosophy degree and is presently teaching at Southwest Missouri State College in Springfield, Missouri; Mary McGinnis has a position with the federal government in Washington, D. C.; Jean, the other daughter, has a teaching position in the Steelville Public Schools, a colleague of her mother. When the author held an interview with Haskel and Hester McGinnis the impression formed was that Huzzah was once a busy little hamlet with the usual wayside Church, a blacksmith shop, the large store, and down in the valley, the big barn used for storing the crops and housing the farm animals. Donald McGinnis, the paternal leader of the McGinnis clan was an enterprising and busy man. He bought and sold, he sowed and reaped. It is said that once he bought the same chicken three times. It occurred when a retarded boy sold him a chicken and Mr. McGinnis placed the live chicken in his chicken pen behind the store for future shipment. The boy caught the chicken and resold it to Mr. McGinnis again, and again. ------ CRAWFORD COUNTY AND CUBA MISSOURI ames Ira Breuer, 1972 p. 116-117 ==================================================================== USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or for presentation by other persons or organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for purposes other than stated above must obtain the written consent of the file contributor. This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by: Joe L. Miller ====================================================================