Webb City timeline: 1937 until the 1951 tornado

We resume Jeanne’s timeline of Webb City from 1937 to 1951.

1937 – The Webb City Rotary Club was established.

1937 – Carthage Municipal Park was dedicated on July 4. It started with 177 acres and expanded to 200.

1938 – Dr. M.S. Slaughter, began two terms as mayor.

1938 – Pineville was selected as the film location for the movie “Jesse James,” starring Tyrone Power in the title role.

1938 – Joplin Little Theatre was organized during a September meeting held in the Connor Hotel.

1938 – The new Webster School was completed.

1939 – The new Franklin School was under construction.

1939 – The streetcar era came to an end on June 2 with the sale of the Southwest Missouri Railroad Co. to Joplin Public Service Co. The final purchase involved the Joplin-Carthage line for $2,000.

1939 – Thomas J. Roney passed away on April 16.

1939 – The largest hail stones ever known pelted the city late in the afternoon on Aug. 24. They were described as almost square chunks of ice large enough to fill pint measures. Some the size of eggs left gaping holes in the roofs of homes in Joplin, Carthage, Webb City and other nearby towns.

1940 – Nance Furniture opened in the Masonic building at 9 S. Webb Street.

1940 – A cave-in occurred between Webb City and Carterville, just a mile north of the Missouri Pacific Railroad depot. The hole was estimated to be between 500 and 600 feet in diameter. It was just in the chats, no danger… except the ground under the railroad track sagged as much as 5 feet and maybe deeper. A train had just passed through, coming from Newport, Ark.

1941 – Huey’s Department Store opened.

1941 – K & H Steak House, opened at Broadway and Madison, was advertised as being located at Wreck Corner.

1941 – The Newland Hotel was condemned in October.

1941 – Pearl Harbor was bombed on Dec. 7.

1942 – A grove of maple trees south of the Joplin Airport, which had originally graced the farm home of W.A. Daugherty, one of the early pioneer settlers, was declared a hazard to heavy aircraft and sentenced for removal. Those trees had been in the Daugherty family for more than 75 years.

1942 – Don O. Adamson was the first mayor elected for a four-year term.

1942 – Purchases of sugar and gasoline were rationed as part of the war effort.

1942 – The Webb City & Carterville Foundry & Machine Works shortened its name to The Webb Corp.

1943 – George Washington Carver died in January in Tuskegee, Ala. He was never sure of his birthday, but it was estimated to be in 1864, which would have made him 79. Six months later, the site of his boyhood near Diamond was declared a place to be used as a national memorial.

1943 – January temperatures reached 10 degrees below zero.

1943 – Webb City had floods in May.

1943 – Cases of Scarlet Fever were reported here in November.

1944 – Harry S. Truman, was elected vice president. He became president the next year and won a tight race for re-election in 1948.

1944 – Webb City Wholesale Grocery Co. was destroyed by fire. It was relocated the next year to the old Southwest Missouri Electric Railway powerhouse (Skateland today).

1945 – Sam Kallas moved his Coney Island from the southwest corner of Main and Broadway to the Civic Drive-In Café on Route 66, where Broadway runs into Webb Street from the east.

1945 – August – President Harry S. Truman announced the end of World War II.

1946 – April – Fred R. Nelson, Mayor 1946 to 1950 (one term).

1946 – June – Free Band Concerts began weekly in Memorial Park.

1946 – August – The Joplin Jalopy a B24 bomber was put on display at the Joplin Airport. Eventually sold for scrap. Sat in the Swapper Salvage yard, 517 E. Broadway, just east of Webb Corp.

1947 – Webb City’s first operating traffic signal lights were installed in the intersections of Main & Broadway and at Main & Daugherty. They did not last long. Don’t know why!

1948 – The pumps were shut down at the Oronogo Circle and the mine began to fill with water.

1948 – April – Hal Wise Sr., owner of the Webb City Sentinel passed away.

1948 – Myers Baker Rife and Denham established and located at 927 W. Daugherty St.

1949 – Jan. 11, The worst ice storm in the history of Webb City to this date. Loss of power. City wells operated by electricity, no water. Wires were down all over town. Beautiful half-century trees were down blocking traffic. Gas pumps couldn’t operate without electricity. The hospital was without power. But the Sentinel was published by hand power.

1949 – The new Route 66 Drive-In Theater by Carthage opened for business.

1950 – April – Robert J. Cummings, Mayor April 1950 to November 1951.

1950 – Feb. 8 – A.D. Hatten – Prominent pioneer of Webb City, passed away at the age of 90.

1950 – Sept. 1 – The beginning of a new company, Cardinal Scales by W.H. Perry Jr.

1951 – It snowed in April

1951 – July 3 – Tornado hits Webb City’s West End.