Everything you need to know about Kennett, MO
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1920 Kennett High School Yearbook
My friend John got his hands on a copy of the 1920 Kennett High School yearbook and took the time to copy every (?) page. Here are a few of the images that caught my eye. Click the thumbnails below for larger image.
Riggs Motor Company (1920)
From that same 1920 Kennett High School album. My favorite part: TELEPHONE No. 62. John liked: “We repair anything from a Motorcycle to an Airplane.”
Dodge Brothers Motor Cars was the name under which Horace and John Dodge began producing their own automobiles in 1914, after years of supplying parts to other Detroit automakers like Ford and Oldsmobile.
Founding and Rise – The Dodge brothers opened their first machine shop in Detroit in 1900, quickly gaining a reputation for precision-engineered components. They supplied Ford’s Model A with complete chassis assemblies and even held a 10% ownership stake in Ford Motor Company. In July 1914, they incorporated the Dodge Brothers Motor Company with $5 million in stock and introduced their first automobile—the Dodge Model 30–35 touring car—built in Hamtramck, Michigan.
Innovations – The 1914 Dodge car was marketed as a more advanced and durable alternative to the Ford Model T, featuring an all-steel body, 12‑volt electric system, and a 35‑horsepower four‑cylinder engine. These innovations helped the brand quickly achieve second place in U.S. sales by 1916.
Wartime and Growth – During World War I, the Dodge Brothers supplied commercial and military trucks as well as artillery recoil systems for the Allied forces. By 1919, production surpassed 400,000 vehicles annually, and the company introduced its first four‑door sedan.
Legacy and Ownership Changes – Both brothers died in 1920 due to complications from influenza, and without their leadership, the company struggled to maintain its early momentum. In 1925, their widows sold the firm to Dillon, Read & Co. for $146 million, and in 1928, Dodge was acquired by Walter P. Chrysler to become part of Chrysler Corporation.
Today, the Dodge brand remains part of Stellantis, continuing a legacy that began with the pioneering Dodge Brothers Motor Cars more than a century ago. (Perplexity)
Miss Rella J. Wells, my first grade teacher
I attended first grade in 1954 and my teacher was Miss Rella Wells. According to the newspaper clipping I found in my mom’s attic, she retired in 1955 after teaching for fifty years.
Miss Rella J. Wells was honored for her more than 54,000 classroom hours in the Kennett public schools Friday noon by the Kennett Lions Club. The Kennett teacher this year observes her 50th year in the Kennett school system.
Miss Wells, who started teaching the second grade in the Kennett grade school in 1905, is the first person ever to be signally honored by the service club, according to club officers. Presentation of a special certificate of appreciation to Miss Wells was made by Elmo Blakemore, Kennett Lions club member and a former student of the veteran local teacher.
Altogether the first grade instructor in the South school has been teaching for 52 years, starting her long professional career in 1903 in the old Thomas school, which is long known as the Hazel Grove school, located south of Kennett.
In 1905 she moved to Kennett and has been teaching in the elementary division ever since. Miss Wells estimates that she has missed less than a month of school because of sickness during the past 52 years.
Born at Marble Hill, she moved to Kennett when she was seven years old. Her parents were Jacob T. and Miriam Bullinger, whose family gave Bollinger county its name. Miss Wells attended Kennett grade school and was graduated from Kennett high school in 1903, the same year she started teaching.
In the early years of the 20th century, only two years of high school were offered here, but the Kennett teacher worked during the summer months on her bachelor of science degree. She attended both Southeast and Southwest State college, receiving her degree from the latter college in 1936.
Earlier today my friend John found the photo below in a 1920 Kennett High School yearbook. (Miss Wells is fourth from the left)
Willoughby: Black Pioneer Came to Kennett as a Slave
Willoughby: Black Pioneer Came to Kennett as a Slave
By DANA GREEN, Democrat Youth Co-Editor
Nelse Willoughby was the first black resident of Kennett, according to local tradition and family records.
Willoughby was born a slave in 1847, but the exact location of his birth is unknown. He and four other children born under the surname Owen were sold away from their mother at an early age. Willoughby was taken to Shelby County, Tenn., where his master gave him the surname of Willoughby.
Willoughby was brought to Kennett at approximately the age of nine by the grandfather Bill Ballard Bragg. He lived and worked on his master’s farm near Kennett. Continue reading
Dusty old scrapbooks
My friend John discovered a bunch of old scrapbooks in a dusty closet of the church he attends. As he poured over yellowed newspaper clippings, faded photos and church bulletins and directories, he became obsessed with the idea of preserving these. At some point he called me for advice because I had helped him make the transition from an ancient Windows PC to a Google Chromebook.
I suggested he use an app on his iPhone to scan the scrapbooks and save them as PDFs and then organize them in his iCloud account using the Files app. I explained how he could set up a folder structure put these in some sort of order. As the number of folders and files grew it became more and more difficult to do on his phone so I brought up the idea of moving this content to his Google Drive so he could manage it all on his laptop.
Somewhere along the way John asked ChatGPT for help and it mentioned Google Sites as a useful tool for making these files available. Over the years, I think I’ve used most of the better known website tools, going back to FrontPage and up through Blogger, Typepad, Posterous and, finally, WordPress. But I don’t think I was aware of Google Sites. So I started playing around and came up with this, mostly as a demo. The links on the website go to one of the folders or files in John’s Google Drive. Continue reading
Kennett, MO: Early Days
My friend John Robison has been going through old documents and newspaper clippings that have been gathering dust in the First Methodist Church in Kennett, Missouri (our home town). Below are two accounts of the early days of Kennett. This first one appears to have been written in 1976. Original typescript (page 1, page 2) The second account was written in 1966 Typescript (page 1, page 2) Continue reading
“No one voted to deport moms”
A Missouri Town Was Solidly Behind Trump. Then Carol Was Detained.
Published May 28, 2025 in the New York Times
The first sign of trouble came early this month when Carol didn’t show up for her shift at John’s Waffle and Pancake House.
She was as reliable as the sun rising over rice and melon fields in her adopted hometown, Kennett, Mo., a conservative farming hub of 10,000 people in the state’s southeastern boot heel, where “Missouri” becomes “Missour-uh.”
In the 20 years since she arrived from Hong Kong, she had built a life and family in Kennett, working two waitressing jobs and cleaning houses on the side. She began every morning at the bustling diner, serving pecan waffles, hugging customers and reading leftover newspapers to improve her English.
“Everyone knows Carol,” said Lisa Dry, a Kennett city councilwoman.
That all ended on April 30, when federal immigration officials summoned Carol, 45, whose legal name is Ming Li Hui, to their office in St. Louis, a three-hour drive from Kennett. Her partner, a Guatemalan immigrant, had voiced suspicion about the sudden call. But “I didn’t want to run,” Ms. Hui said in a jailhouse phone interview. “I just wanted to do the right thing.”
She was arrested and jailed to await deportation. Continue reading
Draining the Swamp
The floodway ditches. That’s what we called the series of small drainage ditches just outside of Kennett, Missouri. I think there were four or five of them. They have a rich history.
Bleak, Crime Infested Towns In the (Missouri) Bootheel
There is a seemingly endless variety of genres on YouTube, and one that has been showing up in my feed more frequently of late is what I call the “driving tour of small town America” videos. During my many years, on the road in the Midwest, I had occasion to drive through lots and lots of small rural towns, so I’ve found this series interesting.
The video above offers a rather depressing look at four towns in southeast Missouri: Caruthersville, Hayti, Kennett, and Cardwell. Some of the demographic statistics were almost as bleak and shocking as the images.