Andrew County

The first woman governor the plaque claims for Andrew County never campaigned for the job. Nellie Tayloe Ross's husband, Wyoming governor William B. Ross, died on October 2, 1924. Democrats named her for the special election, and she won it on November 4 with 55 percent of the vote while refusing to campaign. Sworn in on January 5, 1925, she was the first woman to serve as governor of a state. She lost narrowly in 1926, and in 1933 became the first woman to direct the U.S. Mint, serving into 1953. She died in Washington in 1977, aged 101.

What the plaque says

Andrew County Andrew County, organized 1841, is one of 6 counties in the Indian Platte Purchase Territory annexed to Missouri, 1837. Named for Andrew Jackson Davis, St. Louis editor, the county was first settled in the middle 1830's. Pioneers were from Ohio, Ind., Tenn., Ky., Va., and other parts of Missouri. Savannah, the county seat, was laid out in 1841. First briefly called Union, it was renamed for Savannah, Ga. The Platte Co. R. R. (C. B. & Q.) reached there in 1860, and today's Chicago, Great Western in late 1880's. In the post Civil War years, the town grew as shipping point and trading center. A divided county during the Civil War, Andrew sent troops to both sides. In Aug., 1861, some 1500 from Andrew and other counties joined the pro-Southern Mo. State Guard at Camp Highly in eastern Andrew County while others joined a large Union camp in adjacent Gentry County. In 1861, Union troops seized "Northwest Democrat," a pro-Southern newspaper, in Savannah and troops from Camp Highly seized the "Plain Dealer," Union newspaper. Raiding guerrilla bands overran the county through 1863. (See other side) Erected by State Historical Society of Missouri and State Highway Commission, 1960 Andrew County (Continued from other side) Andrew County's glacial plains support fertile livestock, grain, and fruit farms. In the county are One Hundred and Two and Platte rivers and forming its west border are the Nodaway and Missouri. In 1804 the Lewis and Clark Expedition camped on an island at mouth of Nodaway and members of fur trader Wilson P. Hunt's 1811 Astorian expedition wintered near the river's mouth. Among county towns are Amazonia, once on the Missouri River, now inland, laid out in 1857 near site of Nodaway City, early river port; Fillmore, 1845; Whitesville, 1846; Rochester, 1848; Bolckow, 1868; Rosendale, 1869; Rea, 1877; Helena, 1878; and Cosby, 1882. Andrew County is birthplace of Nellie Tayloe Ross, the first woman Gov. of Wyo., 1925-27, first woman Dir. U. S. Mint; Joseph K. Toole (1851-1929) first Gov. of Mont.; W. Elmer Holt, Gov. Mont., 1935; Edwin W. Toole (1839-1905) noted Mont. lawyer; Eugene W. Caldwell (1870-1918) noted roentgenologist. In Savannah lived John P. Altgeld, Gov. of Ill., 1893-97; Henry S. Kelley (1832-1911) legal textbook writer; James P. Somerville, one of founders of Sertoma Clubs International. Erected by State Historical Society of Missouri and State Highway Commission, 1960

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Glore Psychiatric Museum — 12 mi
  The history of State Lunatic Asylum No. 2 and of mental health treatment, told in the old hospital's surgery building beside a prison, with the Black Archives Museum under the same roof.
• Patee House Museum and Jesse James Home — 13 mi
  An 1858 St. Joseph hotel that held the Pony Express office, a Union provost marshal and two women's colleges, with the house where Jesse James was killed moved onto its lot.
• Pony Express National Museum — 13 mi
  The St. Joseph stables where the Pony Express began on April 3, 1860, now a museum that also tells how the venture was paid for and why it lasted eighteen months.
• Iowa and Sac & Fox Mission Museum — 22 mi
  The surviving part of an 1846 Presbyterian mission school near Highland, built largely with the tribes' own annuity money and returned to the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska in 2021. Closed during remodeling.

More markers nearby

• Saint Joseph — 13 mi
• Elwood — 13 mi
• Troy — 16 mi
• Holt County — 17 mi