Webb City royalty

This wonderful photo was taken at the well-known Spracklen Photography studio, but the location was noted as 163 N. Allen (Main) Street. Most of us remember Spracklen’s as being located on the northwest corner of Daugherty and Webb streets.

The cute little girl in the photo is Mae Ashcraft Hardy. She is a combination of two great families in Webb City history. Mae’s father, Granville Ashcraft, is the one who came to the rescue when W.A.Daugherty and John C. Webb were attempting to mine for the first time and their mine kept filling with “devil” water.

Ashcraft had just purchased the Oronogo Circle Mines but had a quarrel with some businessmen and left Oronogo, taking a loss on his purchase. Being the man with the golden touch, though, he stepped right into a situation in which he had the answer. He stopped the water flow and managed to mine 15,000 pounds of lead the first week.

When the town of Webb City was established in 1876, Ashcraft built the first wooden house, located where the Webb City Senior Citizen’s Center parking lot is now at Pennsylvania and Daugherty streets. His first daughter, Bernice, was the first child born in the newly established town.

The cutie in the picture was Ashcraft’s second daughter, born in 1877. She married Allen Hardy Jr., son of Joseph Allen Hardy, Sr., who had moved to Jasper County in 1873 and settled in Webb City in 1882, living at 122 N. Ball St. They had 10 children, six girls and four boys.

Allen Hardy Jr. was really Joseph Allen Hardy Jr. He and his father went by the name Allen Hardy. Allen Jr. and Mae lived in a two-story home on the west side of South Madison Street, at a time when the area was rural. Some of us will remember the distinctive house as the home of Steve and Becky Walker, which was moved along with several others to new neighborhood on Cedar Street south of Broadway.

Mae, the little girl in the photo, lived until 1946. She died in Los Angeles, Calif., at the age of 69. This picture is a wonderful piece of history captured by E.E. Spracklen about 1885 and the photo has held up well for about 128 years.

Photos are priceless treasures, as they preserve history and memories. We know quite a bit about Webb City’s history through photos. The Third Floor of the library, The Webb City Genealogical Society has some wonderful photos on display. Stop by and check them out! If you are working on your family genealogy, that is the place to visit!