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The Kaw Mission 1854-1951 |
In addition to the
school for the Kaws, Thomas and Eliza Huffaker
operated a school for white children in the Kaw Mission
in the early and mid-1850s. The burgeoning Huffaker
family lived in the Kaw Mission until 1863, when Thomas,
Eliza, and their five children moved one-quarter mile
northeast to a new fourteen-room house. Here the
Huffakers had six more children; the youngest boy, Carl,
was born in 1880.
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During the Huffakers’
occupancy of the Kaw Mission, the building served as a
church and Sunday School for the Methodist Episcopal
Church South and as a meeting place for the community.
During the "Indian scares" of 1859 and 1868
the Kaw Mission was a safe refuge for Council Grove
women and children.
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Huffaker Reunion
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For
a short time in 1866 the Kaw Mission was a hotel called
the "Neosho House." In an advertisement in the
April 20, 1866 edition of the Council Grove Democrat,
proprietor John F. Schmidt promised the very best
accommodations:
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"The undersigned has just fitted up
the Mission House for a first-class Hotel. The table
will be furnished with the best the market affords. The
rooms are large and comfortably furnished. The utmost
attention will be shown to guests and strangers who may
favor the Neosho House, to make their stay as pleasant
as possible."
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From the
late 1870s until 1903 the Kaw Mission was the residence
of one of Council Grove’s most educated and prominent
citizens, Oliver S. Munsell. This versatile Illinois
native was an attorney, Doctor of Divinity, author of a
college psychology textbook, president of Illinois
Wesleyan Seminary, banker, Kansas state legislator,
publisher and editor of the Council Grove Republican,
and judge.
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From
1903 until 1907 Thomas and Anna Johnson and their two
teen-age children lived in the Kaw Mission. Johnson, who
was the probate judge of Morris County during this time,
paid fifteen dollars a month rent. He conducted court
in the Kaw Mission and performed many marriage services
here.
Later, the Johnson’s granddaughter, Helen Torgeson Jaecke,
described a dramatic incident in the Kaw Mission: |
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"During
the 1903 flood the water was three feet and four inches
deep in the house. Grandma had baked bread the day
before the water came up. She had put it in a wash
boiler with the lid on top. They had moved to the
upstairs rooms and when the boiler came floating by the
stairway, they were able to catch the boiler and so had
fresh bread."
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The
1903 flood was the first of five floods that inundated
the Kaw Mission, which also flooded in 1928, 1938, 1941,
and 1951. Since the Council Grove Reservoir was
completed one mile upstream in 1964, flooding has not
been a problem at the mission.
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In 1907
Thomas and Eliza Huffaker moved back into the Kaw
Mission. There the elderly couple resided with the new
owners of the historic building, their daughter Anna
Huffaker Carpenter and her husband Homer. Thomas died in
his old mission in 1910. In 1920 Eliza died in the same
room in which she and Thomas had been married
sixty-eight years before. One year later Anna, who was
then a widow, passed away.
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Anna Huffaker |
Marjorie Huffaker |
In
1926 Carl Huffaker, his wife Bertha, and their
three-year-old daughter, Marjorie, moved to Council
Grove from Oklahoma and took up residence in the Kaw
Mission.
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In that same year the Huffakers spent
thirty-seven thousand dollars to remodel the building.
Today visitors to the Kaw Mission can view many of these
1926 alterations including the oak floors, luxurious
rosewood woodwork, steam heat system, light fixtures,
and porches. In the mid-1930s the Huffakers constructed
a large stone garage to the north of the mission
building.
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Marjorie
graduated from Council Grove High School in 1941 and
moved away. Bertha died in the mission in 1949. In 1951,
a century after his father Thomas started to teach at
the Kaw Mission, Carl Huffaker sold the property to the
Kansas Historical Society for $23,500.
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