It was probably another cold winter day in February 1837 when
local tribes signed a treaty giving up their rights to land east of
the Missouri River in what is now northwestern Missouri.
Four years later, on a cold January day in 1841, Andrew County
was formally organized from part of this "Platte Purchase". And
before the end of that decade, Andrew County was just north of one
of the hot spots (St. Joseph, MO) for taking off on the Oregon Trail.
And Andrew Co. today? Drop in anytime to look around.
(This page was one of the stops of the USGenWeb Virtal Tour sometime between 1998 and 2002. )
My introduction to Andrew County, Missouri, came when I "discovered" where my grandfather's great-grandfather's brothers had moved when they left Butler County, OH in the mid 1840s. At first, the GEORGE brothers and their wives and children kept in touch with the Ohio relatives by letter, but eventually the distance and differences separated them enough that the Missouri GEORGE's were considered lost.
Come to think of it, I really didn't know much about Missouri. So I brushed off a history book or two. Centrally located on the continent, the area that became Missouri saw a lot of action as the population expanded west.
In 1803, what would become the state was a part of the Louisiana Purchase, and the next year Lewis and Clark began their explorations of the area. They traveled north on the Missouri River, along what would be the western border of Andrew County. The first practical steam locomotive was built ten years later, in 1814. In 1820, Missouri became a state, a slave state, but according to the Missouri Compromise, the rest of the Louisiana Purchase was to be divided into free states.
The next year, in 1821, Mexico declared independence from Spain. What timing! William Becknell (of Franklin, MO) left for the northern part of Mexico that year, establishing a trade route along what became known as the Santa Fe Trail. Three years later, Mexico became a republic.
Remember the Alamo? It was wiped out in 1836, but Texas gained its independence from Mexico.
In 1844, the telegraph was patented. Meanwhile, the United States annexed Texas, and acquired Oregon. War broke out with Mexico in 1846, the same year California and New Mexico were annexed into the United States. The Mormons were moving to Utah.
The Mexican/American War ended in 1848, and the United States included Texas, Arizona, California, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, and Oregon.
The California gold rush saw even faster westward expansion in 1849.
Watch for Missouri to appear, then change, on this animated map.
(Andrew County was part of the added land in the 1837 change.)
