The Maple Hill Depot, Elevator, Stockyards and Associated Memories

This picture of the Maple Hill Depot, Elevator and Stockyards appears on a 1910 Bower's Postcard which I purchased from Ebay.   As a boy of 8 or 10, I remember this scene but it was not to remain so for long.   These three elements of Maple Hill commerce played important rolls in the town's development.  However, the decline of passenger train service, the advent of trucking grain, and ceasing of  shipping livestock via rail cars brought much change to the community.

By the time I was born in 1944, the era of steam engines was coming to an end.   The new diesel-powered engines were much more efficient and powerful.  My last memories of steam engines takes me back to 1951.  I had just finished the first grade at Maple Hill Grade School in mid-May.  My family was living in a rental house in the north end of Maple Hill that is currently the home of Frances Flannary.   It was located just to the north of the home of our cousins, Charles and Bonnie Mitchell.  My mother had driven with Bonnie Mitchell, to the home of my maternal grandparents, Robert and Mildred Corbin, on a Monday, July 9 to wash clothing.   Their home was located on a 20-acre farm on the north side of Mill Creek about 1.5 miles south of Maple Hill.

As usual, my mother, Lucille Clark, my brother Gary and I had helped pump water and had carried it from the well into the back porch of the Corbin home where there was a Maytag washing machine with an automatic ringer.  My mother didn't have a washing machine at the time so she and my grandmother, Bonnie Mitchell and Grandmother Corbin often washed together.    You had to put the cold water into the machine and the wash tubs used to rinse the clothes after washing.   Grandmother Corbin and Bonnie had sorted the clothes while we carried water.   Grandmother had an electric water heater which we used to heat the water in the washing machine.  We had just filled the washing machine and the rinse tubs and had started to heat the water.

Suddenly, there we all head a very frightening sound.   The wall telephone located just inside the kitchen door, began to issue forth continuous short rings.    That was the alarm signal and was given only when there was eminent danger in the area.   For instance if a tornado was reported on the ground in your area the danger alarm might be given.   If a child was lost and people were needed to help search, the danger signal was sounded.   If there was a fire in the neighborhood and people were needed to help fight it, the short rings would be heard.



My mother was closest to the wall phone and answered the alarm, which was given by my paternal grandmother, Mabel (Jones) Clark, who was the Central Office Operator in Maple Hill.    Her message went to all eight homes that were on our party lined:  "Leave your homes immediately.   The Rock Island Agent at McFarland reports an eight foot wall of water coming down Mill Creek that has just passed McFarland with much flooding.   I repeat, leave your homes and go to higher ground immediately."

I remember the shocked look on my mother's face and began to cry.   My mother said, "Leave everything we must get out immediately.   A wall of water is coming down Mill Creek."

That was hard to believe, because it was a beautiful sunny day.   However, in the weeks previous, many inches of rain had fallen.   It was reported that as much as 50" of rain had fallen during May, June and early July.    The Kansas River and Mill Creek had been nearly bank full several times.  The night before, 5" to 6" of rain had fallen throughout the Flint Hills to the southwest of Maple Hill. 

Without hesitation, we all climbed into Bonnie Mitchell's car and headed to Maple Hill, which was located on ground much higher than the Corbin Farm.  We didn't even unplug the water heater or close the door begin us.  I was sitting in the back seat with my brother Gary and Bonnie Mitchell.   My mother was driving and grandmother Corbin was riding in the front passenger seat.

We were headed east on the gravel road.   There were three frame homes in front of us, those of the Younts, Don and his sister Hattie McClelland, and Paul and Margaret McClelland.  The two McClelland homes were located right on the north bank of Mill Creek.   There was a sharp curve in front of their homes which made my mother slow to turn.

Just then, I saw Bonnie Mitchell look through the rear window.   "Lucille, floor board it!   The water is right behind us," was the report from Bonnie.  Mother did exactly that and gravel flew all over the road behind us but somehow, the elevation of the land was with us and the water did not over come us.  As we looked behind the car, we saw the wall of water swallow all of the land behind us and surround the the homes mentioned.   We stopped at the top of the hill, just before crossing the Rock Island tracks and continuing into Maple Hill.   The wall of water had inundated the entire Mill Creek Valley and was traveling on towards the juncture of the Kansas River and Mill Creek, about two miles to the north east of Maple Hill.

We drove on to the home of Bonnie and Charlie Mitchell where grandmother Corbin was to remain for nearly the next two weeks.    This was the beginning of the horrific 1951 Flood, a record devastation which was to ruin so many communities along the Kansas River and its tributaries and result in the building of Tuttle Creek Reservoir and other man-made lakes along it's course.

Herrington, Kansas and would stop in areas where the track could wash out.  The weight of the engines might keep the track from washing out but sometimes the track would be lost.

The engines soon became trapped as train tracks were flooded between Topeka and Maple Hill to the east and between Maple Hill and Alma to the west.    The engines were all brought to Maple Hill where for several days, the men came to the Maple Hill Cafe and ate their meals.  We children would go to the Maple Hill Depot and were allowed to climb on the engines and to pull the large gears to make them chug forward or backward for a very short distance.   It was a thrilling experience and I wish I had remembered to take my grandmother Clark's little Kodak Box Camera to record it.   I've never found anyone who took pictures of that scene.   They were simply too busy with flood needs to do so.

Tracks were washed out all along the Rock Island Railroad between Topeka and Herrington and the engines remained on sidings at Maple Hill for several weeks until tracks were repaired and they could be returned to storage.

During the worst of the flood, my father, John L. "Tim" Clark worked 24-hours a day to help save the railroad tracks near Willard.   He was a caterpillar heavy-equipment operator for Chuck Fauerbach at St. Marys.   He was expert at operating a D-9 Caterpillar bulldozer.   The Rock Island Railroad hired him to push rail cars filled with sand from the railroad tracks into the Kansas River.   The railroad brought the cars to the tracks at Willard, which paralleled the Kansas River.   My father would push the cars into the river as quickly as they could be delivered.   The hope was that the cars willed with sand might divert the current away from the bank which was near the railroad and save the tracks.   Nothing was more powerful than the raging Kansas River and the cars disappeared about as quickly as my father could push them into the river.    In fact, the sand currents buried the railroad cars which were never seen again and are still buried beneath the sand bars of the Kansas River.

My mother, who knew how to operate the telephone switchboard, helped my Grandmother Clark keep the United Telephone Office open in Maple Hill 24-hours daily to assist people trying to escape flood waters.   They were assisted by Mrs. Mabel Herron, relief operator and also by Irene Leeper Hoobler who had previously assisted my Grandmother and was again pressed into service.

During that two to three week period, Maple Hill was almost cut off from the outside world.  My maternal grandfather, Robert Corbin, was at work for the Kansas Highway Department when the wall of water went through the area and was able to return home only to traveling far to the west and taking back roads which were not flooded.   Late that evening, he waded through waist deep flood waters to the home of Don and Hattie McClelland.   There he borrowed a draft horse, mounted it and swam it to the Corbin home about 1/4 miles to the west.   He found the well had been ruined by flood waters, but the chickens were safe high on their roosts in the flooded chicken coop, and the milk cow was standing in tummy deep water in the barn.   The Corbin house was surrounded by about two feet of water but stood on a high foundation and the house proper did not sustain any flood damage.   The piles of clothing were still waiting on the back porch floor and were retrieved later.    Grandfather pulled the cow to higher ground, milked her, put the milk in a gallon jar and brought it back to town.  He did that for several days until the flood water retreated.

I believe that I also remember the last cars of cattle that were brought to Maple Hill.    I had seen Raymond and Ruth Brethour at church one Sunday in the spring of 1953.   I don't remember the exact date but usually cattle were not brought to pasture until the pastures were greening in late May.  I had just completed the third grade at Maple Hill.    Raymond and Ruth owned much of what had formerly been the Fowler-Todd Ranch southeast of Maple Hill.

Raymond told me that he was going to receive a load of ten boxcars filled with cattle the next day.   He had asked my great uncle, Edward Sutton Miller, to help him herd the cattle from the stockyards in town to the Brethour Ranch.   In addition, Robert Stockman, ranch foreman would also be assisting.  I told him I would love to participate and he said he would be happy to have some additional help and he would bring an extra horse for me to ride.

That night, we heard the train stop and pull the cars of cattle onto the stockyard siding.   I was so excited I hadn't been able to sleep all night.   I was at the stockyards at the crack of dawn, ready to help herd the cattle.    At that point in time,  all of the fields along the route between the stockyards and the Brethour Ranch were fenced, so there was really little chance of the cattle stampeding.   There were no homes located along the route so you didn't have to worry about the cattle getting into farm yards or destroying gardens.

None-the-less, I relished the opportunity to be a "cowboy" and help with the cattle drive.   Raymond did bring an extra horse and we enjoyed the 2.5 mile drive from the stockyards to the ranch.   Uncle Ed and Bob Stockman road at the front because the cattle were kind of wild from the long train ride.   They had come from Montana.  Raymond Brethour and I rode at the back of the herd to make sure no stragglers were left behind.   It took all morning to get the cattle from town out to the ranch, but it was a very exciting experience.

Uncle Ed Miller and his horse, Buttermilk.  This picture is taken on the town pasture owned by my Grandfather and Grandmother, James Peter and Mabel R. (Jones) Clark.  It was located at the south end of Maple Hill and the elevator is in the background.
My Uncle Ed Miller, was perhaps one of the last of the old-fashioned "cowboys" left in the area.  He had worked for many of the ranches and walked with bowed-legs as was common for those who rode horses every day.   He kept his horse in the barn located on my Grandfather and Grandmother Clark's property at the south end of Maple Hill.   At that time, our family was living in that house.   Uncle Ed and Aunt Belle Leeper Miller lived in a little three-room house just across the street east of the Methodist Church.   I remember them both well.    All of his life, I can remember Uncle Ed having his leather gloves in the back pocket of his jeans as most of the cowboys did.

The elevator shown in the photograph, is the original grain storage facility built by the Maple Hill Town Company when the town was founded in 1887.   The town company was principally owned by George A. Fowler, who was a Kansas City meat packing magnet and by William Tod, who was at that time his ranch manager at Maple Hill.   Tod soon purchased the interest of Fowler and the ranch continued for many years as the Tod Ranch.   No town along a main railroad line as complete without a grain elevator and the elevator shown in the photograph was state-of-the-art for that period.   The elevator was torn down in the last half of the 1990s, having provided nearly 100 years of  service.

The deport shown, is the second one build at Maple Hill.   The first depot was hastily built and was known as a "Type #3" depot.   During the squabble between William A. Pierce and George A Fowler over the location of the Maple Hill Townsite, the deport lumber was actually moved twice under the cover of darkness by ranch hands.   Finally Fowler won the location dispute by giving William A. Pierce stock in the town company.  The depot shown was a "Type #1" building, and was constructed in the late 1890s.   It had three rooms.   On the east end, there was a large waiting room with benches.  In the center section, there were three offices.   The south-most room had a big bay window which allowed the station agent to sit at his desk and see the track to the east and west of the depot.   The telegraph key was also located at the desk in that bay window.   The room on the west end of the depot was used for freight.   At the height of the passenger train era, there were 14 trains daily passing through Maple Hill.   The elevator was moved from its original location just to the west of the Maple Hill Elevator during the 1970s.   Bill Flesher purchased the depot and moved it onto the elevator property.   Both the elevator and the depot were dismantled in 1995-1996.

I cannot find any definitive information as to when the stockyards were taken down, but I believe that it was in 1953 or 1954.   The memory lingers that the cattle received by Raymond Brethour were the last that came to the stockyards at Maple Hill.

I'd love to hear from those who might have specific information about the depot, the elevator or the stockyards.    Happy trails!