Monticello Community
Historical Society
OUR SITES
TOUR STOPS REFER TO THE HISTORIC MONTICELLO DRIVING AND BIKING TOUR.
SEE OUR FACEBOOK SITE FOR MORE INFORMATION.
Site is on Federal Historic Register. (Virginia School)
Site is on Local Register
This modest building is a telling example of the
courage and dedication of American volunteer fire
departments. Until 1973, Monticello had agreements
with the largely-volunteer Delaware Township,
Wyandotte County, and the Shawnee Township Fire
Departments that stated if they were able to service
a call in the area they would. After a home burnt to
the ground because it took a brigade 25 minutes to
respond, the case for a local fire department
became urgent. In 1972, Floyd Cline vowed that if he
were elected to the Monticello Township board he
would work toward establishing a fire department.
He fulfilled his promise to get the station built and a
volunteer fire department established. A bond issue
equipped the department and built this hall that
also housed the township offices and meeting area.
The fire department operated here until 1988 when
the township was divided and annexed by Shawnee,
Lenexa, Bonner Springs and Olathe.
In 1884, the Union Cemetery Company purchased
five acres from F. L. and Mary C. Kueker for $275.
Yet, with the oldest grave dating to 1860, these
grounds were already known locally as a cemetery.
In 1895, citizens built a Civil War monument at the
center of the cemetery with mounds of four cannon
balls marking each of its corners and a cannon
pointed west. On Memorial Days, there were
programs with prayers, music, and speeches by local
dignitaries, recitation of the Gettysburg Address, and
firing the cannon. People would bring flowers from
their yards and gardens to tidy up their family
graves.
Unfortunately, the cannon was stolen along with the
pipe, fence and the cannon balls—and the weekend
of memorial events slowly faded away. Today Union
Cemetery is still an active burial location and a
telling vestige of generations of life and memorial
traditions.
Currently United Methodist Church
In about 1850, a new Methodist Indian School, built
about one half mile north of today’s church site,
began to teach both Indian and White children.
Methodist preachers conducted Sunday School and
Camp meetings there on a regular basis. In 1880,
the growing numbers of German and American
Methodists joined forces to build a new church that
later burned from a lightening strike in 1894. With
the help of insurance money, the determined
parishioners quickly rebuilt the Gothic Revival
structure that stands today.
The Monticello Methodist Episcopal Church
occupied a central place in the life of the community
but did not receive a full-time pastor appointment
until the mid 1950’s.
Original Site of Virginia School, 1878. 71st & Clare,
Shawnee.
Opened for class in January 1878, this schoolhouse
soon became a center for culture and community
for people of all ages. Besides being a home for
grades 1-8, the little building housed religious
services and a Sunday school. Louis A. Gleason
conducted a writing school and the building was
home to a Lyceum—a popular 19th century
institution where the community enjoyed debates
and programs.
Around 1900, when school districts were upgrading
their one-room schoolhouses, Virginia added a
vestibule to buffer outdoor winds and a place where
students could hang their coats, leave their lunches,
use the wash basin, and find drinking water. The
school operated until 1962. The Virginia School
building was placed on the National Register of
Historic Places in February 2004 and moved a year
later to its current location on the grounds of the
Mize Elementary School.
James Butler Hickok. Kansas State Historical Society
James Butler Hickok became one of Monticello’s first
town constable in 1858 and later led a life of
western adventures romanticized in print and
Hollywood movies. “Wild Bill” Hickok was a slight
man with long wavy hair and a bushy mustache. He
was known as a staunch abolitionist during the
turbulent Boarder War era; and his log cabin on this
site was destroyed twice under suspicious
circumstances, possibly by marauding
Bushwhackers. Hickok left Monticello after only two
years as constable, possibly because of his love for a
half Shawnee woman named Mary Jane Owen and
family objections on both sides. On July 21, 1865, in
Springfield, Missouri, Hickok killed David Tutt in a
“quick draw duel”— the first of its kind. In 1876,
Hickok was shot in a poker game in Deadwood,
Dakota Territory while holding a pair of aces and a
pair of eights—since immortalized as, “The Dead
Man’s Hand.”
Monticello Cemetery Established 1899
First owned by John P. Campbell who received it as
bounty land given to soldiers in 1855, this historic
landscape reflects the public need for cemeteries on
the frontier. In 1859, Campbell sold this parcel to
Monticello Township for use as a pubic cemetery.
The oldest surviving legible marker stone is for 13-
year old Clara B. McFadden who died in 1866. In
1898, the Monticello Cemetery Association was
organized to maintain the somewhat deteriorated
cemetery “in creditable condition and keeping it so.”
In 1925, with the advent of the automobile, the
hitching rails were taken down; and in 1934, the
road and parking were added. The cemetery has 262
internments. Some stones have been repaired,
those for veterans are all marked with medals, and
most stones are decorated.
Solomon Coker General Merchandise Store. Jo.Co. Library
Zarah Townsite, 1878.
Monticello was established in 1857 at the crossroads
of the Midland Trail running from Westport,
Missouri to Lawrence, Kansas and the Territorial
Road linking Ft. Leavenworth and Paola. During the
tumultuous “Bleeding Kansas” years, Monticello was
home to sympathizers on both sides of the slavery
question and became a flashpoint where houses
were burnt, horses stolen and fights broke out.
James Butler Hickok, (later known as “Wild Bill”)
wrote to his mother, “there is no common law here
now at all…a man can do what he pleases without
fear of the law or anything else.” The town
eventually grew from its frontier roughness to thrive
with a blacksmith shop, land office, stores, a post
office, a stagecoach hotel and saloons before being
bypassed by the new railroad in 1878 when the
town of Zarah developed as a railroad stop.
Plaque located along sidewalk east of residence.
Samuel Garrett House, 1874 Jo.Co. Library
Samuel Garrett was an English stonemason who
immigrated to the Monticello are in 1849. Four years
later he married Betsey Captain, a Shawnee Indian.
By 1858, three of Samuel’s brothers, along with their
parents, immigrated to Monticello area. The three
brothers, stone mason by trade, built homes for
themselves while Samuel continued to farm. They
built a second a second stone house for Samuel in
1876. Their self-sufficient farm and contributions to
the township are typical of community building on
the frontier.
The Garrett brothers built a schoolhouse in 1865
along with a new family home and growing farm.
Part of the former Samuel Garrett farm and one of
its stone buildings can now be seen in today’s
Garrett Park. Samuel Garrett died in 1891.
Frederick Chouteau. Used with permission by the
Kansas State Historical Society
Sketch of Dog Trot Cabin. J.A. Garrett, 2013
In the early 19th century, the famous Chouteau
Family Agency of St. Louis operated trading posts
along the Kaw River. Frederick Chouteau operated
this ferry and trading post for trade with the
Shawnee and Delaware tribes. He married a
Shawnee woman, Nancy Logan, and was later
adopted into the Shawnee Tribe. Three of their sons
continued to reside on farms near their birthplace
and operate the ferry until 1870 when the Shawnee
were removed from Kansas to the Cherokee Nation
in present day Oklahoma.
In 1877, on land above the ferry crossing, Peter
Keroher established Chouteau Station as a stop on
the Kansas City, Topeka and Western Railroad that
became an essential regional transfer point for
commerce and agriculture. Later, a rail spur was
added where cars could be stationed for loading of
potatoes and wheat. Farmers drove cattle down the
country roads to holding pens for shipment by
railroad to Kansas City.
Frisbie Rd and W 43rd St., Shawnee, KS
Grinter Ferry Crossing at the Grinter House
The Tiblow Ferry served as a critical link on the trail
between Fort Leavenworth, Paola and Fort Scott.
Henry Tiblow, was a Delaware Indian whose
education and life say much about Indian
“assimilation” and entrepreneurship in the 1860s.
He received his education at the Shawnee Mission
Indian School in present day Fairway, Kansas and
later served as a Delaware and Shawnee interpreter.
In 1863, the ferry was chartered by the Monticello
Ferry Company and was operated on the Kaw River
for many years by Henry Tiblow Jr.— Tiblow’s son.
Two other ferries also served the national trail
system that linked Kansas with the Oregon and
Santa Fe Trails and ultimately, the Pacific coast. The
Chouteau Ferry (see Site 10) was chartered in 1863
to cross the Kaw at present day Edwardsville and the
Parrish Ferry (also chartered in 1863) operated
south of the Tiblow Ferry.
Wilder Depot. Wichita State University Library
Wilder came to life in 1875 on land owned by Peter
D. Cook. The new town promised great advantages
including groves of trees, an excellent spring, a
location two miles from the Tiblow Ferry, and a new
train line connecting Kansas City and Topeka. Peter
Cook stood to benefit the most from the new Kansas
City, Topeka, and Western Railroad. As one of its first
directors, he ensured that the railroad be built
through Wilder and Johnson County where he
happened to own land.
As a result, another railroad bypassed
Monticello—thus effectively ending its chances of
becoming a big town. Yet, it turned out that Wilder,
with its floodplain location, was also doomed to
eventual abandonment. Even though few traces of
Wilder remain, its history says much about the
power of railroads, “insider” trading, and unforeseen
natural disasters in shaping the fates of
communities in Monticello Township.
Reverend Charles Boles. Jo.Co. Library
In 1860, the Reverend Charles L. Boles acquired 160-
acres from the federal government. In 1863, with the
death of Elizabeth Boles, he set aside one-half acre
in the southeast corner of his land for burial
purposes. Reverend Boles was born January 2, 1819.
He entered the ministry of the Methodist Church in
1847 and served as a missionary to the Shawnee
Indians from 1852 until 1858. From 1858 until 1862,
he worked as a missionary to the Delaware Indians.
Charles King, who came from England to Monticello
in 1870, is typical of the settlers whose families and
their struggles are remembered here. Beginning in
1871, at least six King children died and were buried
at the Boles Cemetery. Due to vandalism of the
grave markers, only a few remain of known burials
between 1863 and 1929.
(913) 667-3706
Site is on Federal Historic Register.
Site is on Local Register
This modest building is a telling
example of the courage and dedication
of American volunteer fire
departments. Until 1973, Monticello
had agreements with the largely-
volunteer Delaware Township,
Wyandotte County, and the Shawnee
Township Fire Departments that stated
if they were able to service a call in the
area they would. After a home burnt to
the ground because it took a brigade 25
minutes to respond, the case for a local
fire department became urgent. In
1972, Floyd Cline vowed that if he were
elected to the Monticello Township
board he would work toward
establishing a fire department. He
fulfilled his promise to get the station
built and a volunteer fire department
established. A bond issue equipped the
department and built this hall that also
housed the township offices and
meeting area. The fire department
operated here until 1988 when the
township was divided and annexed by
Shawnee, Lenexa, Bonner Springs and
Olathe.
1975 Monticello Township Hall and Fire
Department
MONTICELLO HISTORICAL
STATION AND MUSEUM
(MONTICELLO) UNION
CEMETERY
In 1884, the Union Cemetery Company
purchased five acres from F. L. and
Mary C. Kueker for $275. Yet, with the
oldest grave dating to 1860, these
grounds were already known locally as
a cemetery. In 1895, citizens built a Civil
War monument at the center of the
cemetery with mounds of four cannon
balls marking each of its corners and a
cannon pointed west. On Memorial
Days, there were programs with
prayers, music, and speeches by local
dignitaries, recitation of the Gettysburg
Address, and firing the cannon. People
would bring flowers from their yards
and gardens to tidy up their family
graves.
Unfortunately, the cannon was stolen
along with the pipe, fence and the
cannon balls—and the weekend of
memorial events slowly faded away.
Today Union Cemetery is still an active
burial location and a telling vestige of
generations of life and memorial
traditions.
Monument dedicated to Union Soldiers who
died in the Confederate Prisons
MONTICELLO METHODIST
EPISCOPAL CHURCH
Monticello Methodist Episcopal Church, 1894
Currently United Methodist Church
In about 1850, a new Methodist Indian
School, built about one half mile north
of today’s church site, began to teach
both Indian and White children.
Methodist preachers conducted Sunday
School and Camp meetings there on a
regular basis. In 1880, the growing
numbers of German and American
Methodists joined forces to build a new
church that later burned from a
lightening strike in 1894. With the help
of insurance money, the determined
parishioners quickly rebuilt the Gothic
Revival structure that stands today.
The Monticello Methodist Episcopal
Church occupied a central place in the
life of the community but did not
receive a full-time pastor appointment
until the mid 1950’s.
VIRGINIA SCHOOL HOUSE
(RELOCATED)
Virginia School Class 1931-1932
Original Site of Virginia School, 1878.
71st & Clare, Shawnee.
Opened for class in January 1878, this
schoolhouse soon became a center for
culture and community for people of all
ages. Besides being a home for grades
1-8, the little building housed religious
services and a Sunday school. Louis A.
Gleason conducted a writing school and
the building was home to a Lyceum—a
popular 19th century institution where
the community enjoyed debates and
programs.
Around 1900, when school districts
were upgrading their one-room
schoolhouses, Virginia added a
vestibule to buffer outdoor winds and a
place where students could hang their
coats, leave their lunches, use the wash
basin, and find drinking water. The
school operated until 1962. The Virginia
School building was placed on the
National Register of Historic Places in
February 2004 and moved a year later
to its current location on the grounds of
the Mize Elementary School.
“WILD BILL” HICKOK LAND
CLAIM
James Butler Hickok. Kansas State Historical
Society
James Butler Hickok became one of
Monticello’s first town constable in
1858 and later led a life of western
adventures romanticized in print and
Hollywood movies. “Wild Bill” Hickok
was a slight man with long wavy hair
and a bushy mustache. He was known
as a staunch abolitionist during the
turbulent Boarder War era; and his log
cabin on this site was destroyed twice
under suspicious circumstances,
possibly by marauding Bushwhackers.
Hickok left Monticello after only two
years as constable, possibly because of
his love for a half Shawnee woman
named Mary Jane Owen and family
objections on both sides. On July 21,
1865, in Springfield, Missouri, Hickok
killed David Tutt in a “quick draw
duel”— the first of its kind. In 1876,
Hickok was shot in a poker game in
Deadwood, Dakota Territory while
holding a pair of aces and a pair of
eights—since immortalized as, “The
Dead Man’s Hand.”
MONTICELLO CEMETERY
Monticello Cemetery Established 1899
First owned by John P. Campbell who
received it as bounty land given to
soldiers in 1855, this historic landscape
reflects the public need for cemeteries
on the frontier. In 1859, Campbell sold
this parcel to Monticello Township for
use as a pubic cemetery. The oldest
surviving legible marker stone is for
13-year old Clara B. McFadden who
died in 1866. In 1898, the Monticello
Cemetery Association was organized to
maintain the somewhat deteriorated
cemetery “in creditable condition and
keeping it so.” In 1925, with the advent
of the automobile, the hitching rails
were taken down; and in 1934, the
road and parking were added. The
cemetery has 262 internments. Some
stones have been repaired, those for
veterans are all marked with medals,
and most stones are decorated.
MONTICELLO TOWNSITE
TOWNSHIP HALL
Solomon Coker General Merchandise Store.
Jo.Co. Library
Zarah Townsite, 1878.
Monticello was established in 1857 at
the crossroads of the Midland Trail
running from Westport, Missouri to
Lawrence, Kansas and the Territorial
Road linking Ft. Leavenworth and Paola.
During the tumultuous “Bleeding
Kansas” years, Monticello was home to
sympathizers on both sides of the
slavery question and became a
flashpoint where houses were burnt,
horses stolen and fights broke out.
James Butler Hickok, (later known as
“Wild Bill”) wrote to his mother, “there is
no common law here now at all…a man
can do what he pleases without fear of
the law or anything else.” The town
eventually grew from its frontier
roughness to thrive with a blacksmith
shop, land office, stores, a post office, a
stagecoach hotel and saloons before
being bypassed by the new railroad in
1878 when the town of Zarah
developed as a railroad stop.
ROUND PRAIRIE SCHOOL
(1879-1962)
Plaque located along sidewalk east of
residence.
GARRETT FARM AND PARK
Samuel Garrett House, 1874 Jo.Co. Library
Samuel Garrett was an English
stonemason who immigrated to the
Monticello are in 1849. Four years later
he married Betsey Captain, a Shawnee
Indian. By 1858, three of Samuel’s
brothers, along with their parents,
immigrated to Monticello area. The
three brothers, stone mason by trade,
built homes for themselves while
Samuel continued to farm. They built a
second a second stone house for
Samuel in 1876. Their self-sufficient
farm and contributions to the
township are typical of community
building on the frontier.
The Garrett brothers built a
schoolhouse in 1865 along with a new
family home and growing farm. Part of
the former Samuel Garrett farm and
one of its stone buildings can now be
seen in today’s Garrett Park. Samuel
Garrett died in 1891.
CHOUTEAU FERRY
/RAILROAD STATION
Frederick Chouteau. Used with permission by
the Kansas State Historical Society
Sketch of Dog Trot Cabin. J.A. Garrett, 2013
In the early 19th century, the famous
Chouteau Family Agency of St. Louis
operated trading posts along the Kaw
River. Frederick Chouteau operated this
ferry and trading post for trade with
the Shawnee and Delaware tribes. He
married a Shawnee woman, Nancy
Logan, and was later adopted into the
Shawnee Tribe. Three of their sons
continued to reside on farms near their
birthplace and operate the ferry until
1870 when the Shawnee were removed
from Kansas to the Cherokee Nation in
present day Oklahoma.
In 1877, on land above the ferry
crossing, Peter Keroher established
Chouteau Station as a stop on the
Kansas City, Topeka and Western
Railroad that became an essential
regional transfer point for commerce
and agriculture. Later, a rail spur was
added where cars could be stationed
for loading of potatoes and wheat.
Farmers drove cattle down the country
roads to holding pens for shipment by
railroad to Kansas City.
TIBLOW FERRY CROSSING
Frisbie Rd and W 43rd St., Shawnee, KS
Grinter Ferry Crossing at the Grinter House
The Tiblow Ferry served as a critical link
on the trail between Fort Leavenworth,
Paola and Fort Scott. Henry Tiblow, was
a Delaware Indian whose education
and life say much about Indian
“assimilation” and entrepreneurship in
the 1860s. He received his education at
the Shawnee Mission Indian School in
present day Fairway, Kansas and later
served as a Delaware and Shawnee
interpreter.
In 1863, the ferry was chartered by the
Monticello Ferry Company and was
operated on the Kaw River for many
years by Henry Tiblow Jr.— Tiblow’s
son.
Two other ferries also served the
national trail system that linked Kansas
with the Oregon and Santa Fe Trails
and ultimately, the Pacific coast. The
Chouteau Ferry (see Site 10) was
chartered in 1863 to cross the Kaw at
present day Edwardsville and the
Parrish Ferry (also chartered in 1863)
operated south of the Tiblow Ferry.
TOWN OF WILDER,
KANSAS
Wilder Depot. Wichita State
University Library
Wilder came to life in 1875 on land
owned by Peter D. Cook. The new
town promised great advantages
including groves of trees, an excellent
spring, a location two miles from the
Tiblow Ferry, and a new train line
connecting Kansas City and Topeka.
Peter Cook stood to benefit the most
from the new Kansas City, Topeka, and
Western Railroad. As one of its first
directors, he ensured that the railroad
be built through Wilder and Johnson
County where he happened to own
land.
As a result, another railroad bypassed
Monticello—thus effectively ending its
chances of becoming a big town. Yet, it
turned out that Wilder, with its
floodplain location, was also doomed
to eventual abandonment. Even
though few traces of Wilder remain, its
history says much about the power of
railroads, “insider” trading, and
unforeseen natural disasters in
shaping the fates of communities in
Monticello Township.
BOLES CEMETERY
Reverend Charles Boles. Jo.Co. Library
In 1860, the Reverend Charles L. Boles
acquired 160-acres from the federal
government. In 1863, with the death of
Elizabeth Boles, he set aside one-half
acre in the southeast corner of his land
for burial purposes. Reverend Boles
was born January 2, 1819. He entered
the ministry of the Methodist Church
in 1847 and served as a missionary to
the Shawnee Indians from 1852 until
1858. From 1858 until 1862, he worked
as a missionary to the Delaware
Indians.
Charles King, who came from England
to Monticello in 1870, is typical of the
settlers whose families and their
struggles are remembered here.
Beginning in 1871, at least six King
children died and were buried at the
Boles Cemetery. Due to vandalism of
the grave markers, only a few remain
of known burials between 1863 and
1929.
See our Facebook site for more information.
TOUR STOPS REFER TO THE HISTORIC
MONTICELLO DRIVING AND BIKING TOUR.
SEE OUR FACEBOOK SITE FOR MORE
INFORMATION.
