Holt County

The road drag the plaque credits to David Ward King came off his farm in Holt Township near Maitland. Two split logs, set three feet apart with their cut faces forward and pulled by two horses, broke the clods and then smoothed a wet dirt road into a crown that shed water. King filed for a patent in July 1907 and received it in April 1908, but never enforced it. The Department of Agriculture published his method in Farmers' Bulletin 321 in 1908, some states required the drag by law, and King toured the country teaching it.

What the plaque says

Holt County One of 6 counties formed in the Indian Platte Purchase Territory, annexed to the State 1837, Holt County was organized in 1841 and named for State legislator David Rice Holt. The county's 456 square miles, bounded west and south by the Missouri, east by the Nodaway, include Missouri River flood plain, steep river bluffs, high glacial prairie. The Lewis and Clark Expedition, in 1804, camped near mouth of the Nodaway. Oregon, the county seat, lying 1093 feet above sea level, laid out 1841, by John A. Williams, Edward Smith, and Travis Finley, was first called Finley. The courthouse is located in a handsome 2½ acre plot. No railroad reached Oregon until a short line, now abandoned, was built in 1908. A divided county during the Civil War, Holt was subjected to brutal guerrilla raids. Modern growth came with the building of what is now the C. B. & Q. Railroad in the county, north to south, 1869; and northeast to west central, 1879. The county grew as livestock and grain producer and various towns developed as marketing, trading, food processing and shipping centers. (See other side) Erected by State Historical Society of Missouri and State Highway Commission, 1961 Holt County (Continued from other side) Holt County's first settlers were Peter and Blank Stephenson, 1838. Pioneers were from Va., Ky., Tenn., Ind., and a large number of Germans located near Craig and Corning in 1839-41. In the 1840's, Whig Valley, near Maitland, was settled and Jackson's Point (for A. P. Jackson), near Mound City, was a stage stop on St. Joseph to Council Bluffs route. Mormons, immigrants, gold seekers of '49 trekked through the county. Towns platted in 1857 were Mound City, largest town in the county, and Forest City, once a noted Missouri River port. Bigelow, Corning, Craig were laid out, 1868; New Point, Forbes, 1869; Maitland, 1880; Fortescue, 1890. Holt County State Representative John W. Kelly (1800-58) introduced the resolution leading to 1853 School Law providing first State tax money for public schools. He was one of authors of the law often called the Kelly Act. Inventor of Split-log Road Drag, David Ward King (1857-1920) lived in Holt County. Charles C. Moore, a native, served as Lt. Gov., of Idaho, 1919-22, and Gov., 1923-26. In the county are Big Lake State Park and Squaw Creek National Wild Life Refuge. Erected by State Historical Society of Missouri and State Highway Commission, 1961

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Loess Bluffs National Wildlife Refuge — 7.2 mi
  A 7,440-acre Missouri River marsh below the loess hills near Mound City, where up to a million snow geese stop in a typical year and 661 bald eagles were counted in December 2020.
• Iowa and Sac & Fox Mission Museum — 9.6 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.
• Pony Express National Museum — 22 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.
• Patee House Museum and Jesse James Home — 23 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.

More markers nearby

• Point of Beginning of the Public Land Surveys of Sixth Principal Meridian — 9.9 mi
• Troy — 14 mi
• Lewis and Clark Camp Site: July 13, 1804 — 16 mi
• Missouri River — 16 mi