What ever happened to A.D. Hatten’s petrified corn?

A.D. Hatten, a major part of Webb City history, wore many hats. He was a banker, miner, gardener, philanthropist, father, grandfather, fisherman, mine owner, insurance agent and real estate developer.

The Hatten home property took up 12 lots on a whole block, between Sixth and Seventh streets and Ball and Roane streets. The house was built by Hatten in 1916. And that takes us to where this story begins.

When Hatten purchased the land to build his home, it was considered “out in the country.” Hatten always felt he was a farmer at heart, although he had a “Midas touch” in the mining field. His new home was referred to as a farmhouse by Hatten. He took the north side of the yard to put in a beautiful iris garden. He brought his first iris home from his mother’s home in 1887. A white, blue and yellow iris from West Virginia started the famed Hatten iris garden. He eventually had more than 350 varieties. He planted an orchard which was 29 years old by the time he decided to build the house in 1916.

The timing for starting the new house was perfect, as city water and sewer lines had just reached Hough Hill, where Hatten’s property was located. He was excited to get out of the city and enjoy his country life.

Of all his pursuits, his favorite claim to fame came when construction of his home began. The construction workers were digging the basement when they came upon a huge limestone slab that was not being agreeable about leaving its resting place of thousands of years. So they decided to blast the slab. A charge of dynamite was set.

After the explosion, Hatten caught site of an unusual looking rock. He picked it up and was surprised that the piece of rock looked like petrified grains of corn. A corncob was later uncovered and then another rock with a small ear of corn inside.

Hatten kept the corn on display in his office. It was quite a conversation piece. There were many opinions about the age of the ear of corn. It was stated that the corn must have been in the ground thousands of years to have become petrified so thoroughly. Hatten believed the specimen proved that maize was nothing new at the discovery of America. “Noah’s cornfield” is what Hatten dubbed Webb City.

Hatten cautioned the workers to proceed with caution, as more artifacts might be located in the diggings. Besides the petrified corn, the workers found many shells and reptile life. There were perfect fossils of starfish, lizards, and toads. In one rock was the winding trail of a serpent.

These findings were added to a collection of mineral specimens Hatten had been building since his youth. At first, Hatten said he was sure he had a treasure at least 2,000 years old, but he later said it may even be two million years old.

It was noted many years later that the mineral specimens and the petrified corn were donated to a mineral museum. But more than 100 years later, there is no trace of the petrified corn anywhere.

This area is rich with Indian artifacts. Many a young boy went searching in the woods for arrowheads and Indian tools. The history of our land was in those treasures.

But the biggest artifact of the past was the discovery of the mammoth remains in Carl Junction in 1892. That find brought plenty of notoriety to southwest Missouri. By the time the excavation was complete, they had uncovered two adult mammoths and two young ones.

After the many displays and a geological display at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, the owner of the property where the mammoths were discovered supposedly sold the bones. Confliting rumors had him selling the bones to a St. Louis museum or London collector.

But now, 122 years later, the story and the newspaper clippings are all that are left of one of the biggest events in southwest Missouri.