the State Historical Society of Missouri
![The Ben Bolt Theatre. [Courtesy of Danny Knouse]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2020-07/Ben-Bolt-Theatre.jpg?h=c4576eea&itok=2PYOXnlz "The Ben Bolt Theatre. [Courtesy of Danny Knouse]")
The Ben Bolt Theatre was a spectacular building that stood for half a century as a notable…
![A 1911 State Highway Department map of the Boone’s Lick Road and Santa Fe Trail. [State Historical Society of Missouri Map Collection, 850 M691h 1911]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-05/1.-boones-lick-road.jpg?itok=KLOxhlwD "A 1911 State Highway Department map of the Boone’s Lick Road and Santa Fe Trail. [State Historical Society of Missouri Map Collection, 850 M691h 1911]")
The Boone’s Lick Road was the first major conduit to the trans-Mississippi West after the …
![Hooker Cut as it looked upon completion in 1945. This view is looking east on Route 66. [Courtesy of Missouri State Archives, Missouri Department of Transportation Collection]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2025-04/1.-hooker-cut.jpg?itok=dhAd3zbv "Hooker Cut as it looked upon completion in 1945. This view is looking east on Route 66. [Courtesy of Missouri State Archives, Missouri Department of Transportation Collection]")
By the middle of 1940, Europe was engulfed in war. On September 16, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed legislation…
![Jolly Mill circa 2022. [Photo by Ross Brown]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-03/1.-jolly-mill.jpg?h=7e5f5b54&itok=YZl1LG4V "Jolly Mill circa 2022. [Photo by Ross Brown]")
Jolly Mill, a grist mill and whiskey distillery, was built in the late 1840s on Capps Creek in…
![The Figure 8 roller coaster at Lakeside Park, added in 1907, was a “huge reversing spiral” in which cars rushed down a half-mile curving track with “three figure eights in a descent of 50 feet.” [Courtesy of the Joplin Historical & Mineral Museum]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-06/1.%20Figure%208%20Roller%20Coaster%20Lakeside%20Park%20Joplin%20Museum%20Complex.JPG?h=c36628e1&itok=hcrmvx97 "The Figure 8 roller coaster at Lakeside Park, added in 1907, was a “huge reversing spiral” in which cars rushed down a half-mile curving track with “three figure eights in a descent of 50 feet.” [Courtesy of the Joplin Historical & Mineral Museum]")
“Once the most important and popular play place of the Tri-State district,” Lakeside Park in Jasper…
![Log City, circa 1942. [State Historical Society of Missouri, John F. Bradbury Jr. Postcard Collection, R1551]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2025-02/1.-log-city.jpg?h=faa43f9b&itok=BH2xWmeN "Log City, circa 1942. [State Historical Society of Missouri, John F. Bradbury Jr. Postcard Collection, R1551]")
Located in the southwest corner of Missouri, McDonald County borders Arkansas and Oklahoma. Situated within the…
![Morrow’s Station. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Morrow and Skaggs Families Papers, R1520]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2025-01/1.-morrows-station.jpg?h=f58e211d&itok=EHHoTkhZ "Morrow’s Station. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Morrow and Skaggs Families Papers, R1520]")
In 1932, George B. Morrow, a merchant and farmer from Iberia, Missouri, purchased three and a half acres of land at…
![Red’s Giant Hamburg sometime after it closed in December 1984. [State Historical Society of Missouri, David Eslick Photograph Collection, SP0088, 1976-2001]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-03/1.-reds-giant-hamburg.jpg?h=cb1fa88b&itok=MzxABlva "Red’s Giant Hamburg sometime after it closed in December 1984. [State Historical Society of Missouri, David Eslick Photograph Collection, SP0088, 1976-2001]")
The original Red’s Giant Hamburg on Route 66 in Springfield, Missouri, was a legendary roadside spot for…