BUTTERFIELD STAGE ROUTE

Darla Stated: To find this marker, you leave Cassville on Y Highway but go to Crystal Springs and on out that road, it would be North and slightly East of Cassville on Flat Creek. I think the Sturgell's now own that large farm where the marker is.

The Crouch family ran the station or stage stop starting in 1858. The Crouch family married into the Marbut family so that is what made me interested in taking the photo.

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Taken from a booklet, Butterfield Run Through the Ozarks, by Phillip W. Steele: "The fare at the beginning was $200 for west bound passengers, $100 for east bound and ten cents per mile for way fare, either direction."

It took 25 days to go from Tipton, MO to San Francisco, California.

Phillips traces each station and names them. "Sixteen miles south of Springfield the first major stop was made at the station operated by John C. Ashmore. From there the route continued in a southwesterly direction to the station operated by John J. Smith, seven miles west of the city of Crane, Missouri. The road then followed Flat Creek fifteen miles south to John D. Crouch's station. Through Cassville the route led to the last Missouri station operated by John H. Harbin, which was located one mile south of Washburn, MO and sixteen miles from the former stop. The route would then entered Arkansas six miles south of the Harbin station."

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Donna's Note:  The stage stopped at the Harbin place then ran on past Rock Springs and down the road going west and then south crossing several creeks and coming out at where the bottom of Seligman hill [DD HWY] - and then went on south toward Arkansas past where the Potts place was. It either came out at the Elkhorn Tavern or near where the present day Semester's Museum is located, I don't know which -  but I think that it went to the Elkhorn.

Dec 22, 2006, Emory Melton gave a speech at the Kiwanians Meeting in Monett about the Butterfield Stage. He included a lot of the information that Darla has talked about here. He said he didn't know how the stage coaches made it because the roads were so primitive then.

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Here is the link for the Harbin stop.

http://www.rootsweb.com/~mobarry/rocksprings/harbin.htm

Submitted by: Darla Marbut

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