Photo Gallery

(Taken from the 125th Anniversary of Lincoln History book, 1995, written by Florence Ransdell)

Lincoln, Missouri is a small town located in the central part of Benton County. Lincoln was an outgrowth of an older settlement that developed around Wiley Vincent's tavern on the Springfield road. A well-traveled stage route etched its way through the territory at that time and Vincent selected the present site of Lincoln as the location for a tavern pause for travelers on their lengthy trip between towns.

Lincoln was incorporated in the year of 1869. August Jaekel and McLahman became the first merchants. Matt West followed later with the settlement's first hotel.

Close on the heels of the merchants came the first was of families. Many Germans newly arrived from Europe were the first to settle. Mr. Fred Boehmer started a general merchandise store in the early 1880's. At that time the town was divided into north and south Lincoln, the southern portion being almost entirely German. The first Lutheran church stood where the present church stands today.

Martin V. Athey moved to Lincoln in 1867 and opened a drug store.

Bill Simons had a blacksmith shop across the road from the Lutheran Cemetery.

In 1871, the south and west part of Lincoln had been surveyed by a James A. Harvey, then in 1881, the north and the east part of Lincoln was surveyed and the construction of the Warsaw Branch of the Missouri Pacific Railroad took place, this changed the town's layout. Southern Lincoln moved eastward in order to border the narrow gage railroad and Lincoln was then split into east and west. This plan of the city still remains. Early Lincoln was well noted for the manufacture of saddle trees, another product turned out by the Grsit Mills, a weekly newspaper, "The Plain Dealer" was published in Lincoln for many years.

Where Mrs. Minnie Schenewark Balke's house now stands was the Nichelson Hotel, the old drug store stood on the corner where Dr. H.B. Lynch's home now is, the town well for west Lincoln was west of the drug store. The well for the east par of town was close to the railroad track. Those wells furnished water for many of the residents. The old jail house was down next to the town branch. The doctors in Lincoln at that time were Dr. Rhoades, Dr. Hill, Dr. McGill and Dr. Noll.

There was only one church in Lincoln at this time and it was the North Methodist. The church stood just north of Ed Kullman's present home and the parsonage stood where Ed Kullman's house now stands.

In 1886, the Rotermund and Hoehns addition was surveyed, then Mr. Orr built a drug store in this addition and this is now occupied by Bill Chambers Pool Hall. Sam Hoehns put a blacksmith shop where the M.F.A. Groceries and poultry now stand.

The first school was built in 1889. It was a one room affair in which a woman was paid $18.00 a month to teach all grades in 1894. The town raised $4,000.00 in a bond drive for a new school in 1917. This building was destroyed by fire and the rest of the school term was finished out in the lodge hall and other buildings in town.