by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
Few people in the Ozarks know his name. But he helped build this nation. Jacob Blickensderfer came to the Ozarks to retire. He planted an orchard, built a mansion with an astronomical dome, and put down roots the way a man does when he intends to stay. But before the...
by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
By six in the evening, the whole town was gone. Sunday, April 18, 1880. Marshfield, Missouri. It was a clear spring day. The cyclone came through in less than a minute. Nearly a hundred people were killed. All but 15 buildings were leveled. The courthouse became a...
by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
By the time he was fourteen, Richard Parks Bland was completely alone in the world. His father died when he was seven. His mother died when he was fourteen. No family to fall back on. No one to smooth the road ahead. Just a boy on his own in a world that didn’t slow...
by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
Growing up in the Ozarks teaches you something about what truly matters. Nearly a century ago, a boy from Neosho, Missouri, grew up watching the people of the Ozarks. The farmer down the road turning his field. The preacher raising his voice to a crowd. The men in...
by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
The Ozarks has always had its own way of taking care of people. More than a century ago, a minister living in Lebanon wrote a novel about a town like ours. The hills were our hills. The streets were our streets. And the people — well — they were us. The book was The...
by sarah | Apr 28, 2026 | This is the Ozarks
In late December 1909, twelve children stepped off the Frisco and onto a platform they had never seen before. They had traveled from New York. Some still had living parents. Some had known more loss than most adults ever will. All of them were stepping into the...
