NIGHT HAWKS TAVERN in Camdenton

 Uncategorized  No Responses »
Jan 272026
 

Trophy bass came from the new lake, but not as humongous as the one shown in this 1935 largemouth parade float (right). It was made by Lake of the Ozarks Post 193 of the American Legion.

Toots and Jack Stotler operated this thriving business from 1933 until selling to Buford and Anna May Foster in 1945. The Fosters changed the name to Night Hawk Café. A stunning large neon sign with a flying night hawk whose neon wings flapped hung over the sidewalk. The parents of Leland Payton, senior author of Damming the Osage (and James Fork of the White), went on dates to the Night Hawks, driving in from Versailles. Highway engineer Louis Payton rented a room in Versailles and met Ann Lewis Daniels at the Baptist Church. (From See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image). Their Saturday night dates usually included a stop at the Night Hawk Cafe. Continue reading »

HA HA TONKA – A Phony Indian Name And A Natural Wonder With A Tragic History

 Beautiful Ozarks, See The Ozarks, Tourism, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Aug 072025
 

Ha Ha Tonka castle (upper right corner) seen from the banks of the spring branch. Photograph likely pre-1910.

The fanciful Indian name of the spring below the bluff is attributed to Col. R. G. Scott who came from Iowa to the Ozarks in the 1890s and partnered with R. D. Kelly to acquire the land around Gunter Spring. Col. Scott published the first article extolling Ha Ha Tonka’s natural wonders in an 1898 issue of Carter’s Magazine. In it he claimed the name is Osage for “Laughing Water.”

We don’t know the name of the photographer of this arty picture of the spring branch at Ha Ha Tonka with the young man (or possibly a young woman – what do you think?) gazing across the spring branch below the castle on the bluff, but we’re guessing its builder, Robert M. Snyder, commissioned the shot. (Snyder acquired the spring and lands from Col. Scott). If that’s so, we can date it before October 1906 when the Kansas City millionaire died in a freak car accident. “Robert M. Snyder has brains dashed out against an iron trolley pole,” wrote the Springfield News-Leader. (When did that kind of descriptive writing disappear from journalism?)

Most accounts of his death mention his “boodling” (bribery) problems. At trial he had been sentenced to five years. On appeal the court ordered a new trial, but prosecutors failed to pursue it. Surviving him were his widow and three sons. Not long before, another son had been murdered in Oregon where he was a suspect in a bank robbery. That son had already done time for highway robbery.

The spectacle of the unfinished castle inspired The Kansas City Journal to wax poetic in a 1907 article entitled, “HIS BARONIAL ESTATE: Wrecking of R. M. Snyder’s Ambition to Live in Splendor as a Feudal Lord.” It begins: “A pathetic monument to one man’s unachieved ambition is an unfinished baronial castle on the north slope of the Ozarks.”

Lake of the Ozarks backed up into the trout-stocked spring branch below the castle. The three sons unsuccessfully sued Union Electric, the builder of Bagnell Dam, for damages for their lost trout lake. Snyder’s boys finally finished the great stone mansion, and it functioned for a short time as a hotel before being destroyed by fire in 1942.

Five thousand acres of wild, undeveloped land the castle sits on was purchased by the state of Missouri in 1978 and made a state park. It’s an extreme example of karst topography, which includes the great spring, caves, sinkholes and a natural bridge, making it popular with hikers. The ruins of Snyder’s castle are now a tourist draw. An attempt to architecturally stabilize the gaunt walls was made in the 1980s, but access is limited now due to continued deterioration. Signage tells the tragic tale of the unlucky “boodler” at an observation point near the park’s office.

Vintage Images is a column we provide to River Hills Traveler, a monthly publication on the Missouri outdoors.  Lens & Pen Press publishes all-color books on the Ozarks. Our book, “See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image,” showcases many of the primary tourist destinations across the Ozarks. It is available for $22.50 (10% off retail), postage paid. Click on Buy our Books

Keith McCanse Linked Conservation with Tourism

 Beautiful Ozarks, Lens & Pen Press, See The Ozarks, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Jun 062025
 

1931 issue of Where to go in the Ozarks by Keith McCanse, subtitled “The Book of the Ozarks.” 138 pages chock full of ads. Includes establishments on the new Lake of the Ozarks. Also includes excellent maps. “Outside the realm of ordinary vacation literature, this publication … serves you with actual, definite facts without exaggeration.”

Keith McCanse’s Scotch-Irish family settled in the Ozarks in the 1840s. His father, George, co-founded a bank and was a true believer in Republican politics. He took his son numerous times on the legendary Galena-to-Branson float trip.

After a stint as a stockbroker in Kansas City, Keith moved his family to Taney County due to touchy health issues. He fished and hunted and became active in organizations like the Isaac Walton League dedicated to the preservation of natural resources. In 1921 he became a game warden and gave talks on the value of protecting wildlife. In 1925, Governor Sam A. Baker appointed him commissioner of Missouri’s Game and Fish Department.

Having expertise in accounting and banking he remade the department, appointing more than 100 deputies, and producing movies and appearing on radio advancing the “gospel of conservation.” McCanse transformed the good-ole-boy political sinecure into a meritocracy, staffed by trained biologists. He increased revenue, grew the state park system from four to fourteen, and fish hatcheries from two to seven. Missouri Game & Fish News was expanded and improved. It became the template for the exemplary Missouri Conservationist magazine.

In 1929, lured by an offer that doubled his salary, he took a job with KMDX, St. Louis. He promoted tourism for the Ozarks, linking it to valuing the native landscape and its fauna. He worked with the Ozark Playgrounds Association and began producing a similar travel guide to theirs listing more than 1,000 places to “fish, camp, tour, play, and rest.” The guides cost fifty cents. Even with the support of the Sinclair Automobile Service Corporation and ads from every resort, town, and village in the region or near to it, given the work involved, Where to Go in the Ozarks probably wasn’t profitable.

Like many, McCanse invested in land near Sunrise Beach on the shores of the new Lake of the Ozarks. The crash of 1929 and the Depression caused the tourism industry to go flat for more than a decade.

Keith McCanse ran unsuccessfully for Lieutenant Governor in 1932. He moved to Texas soon after and became involved in real estate promotion and Republican politics. We don’t know the extent of his involvement with conservation after he left Missouri. His role in the creation of a natural image of the Ozarks was significant. He died in 1964.

Vintage Images is a column we provide to River Hills Traveler, a monthly publication.  Lens & Pen Press publishes all-color books on the Ozarks. Our book, “See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image,” showcases many of the primary tourist destinations across the Ozarks. It is available for $22.50 (10% off retail), postage paid. Click on Buy our Books

CAN YOU TOP THESE? Moving ads for Lake of the Ozarks Recreation

 Lens & Pen Press, See The Ozarks, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Nov 012023
 

Painted aluminum license plate topper, 1940s. Aluminum replaced steel in almost everything due to the World War 2 war effort. As aluminum didn’t rust it continued to be used post war. Below it is a less detailed image of the icon of Lake of the Ozarks, Bagnell Dam. Painted steel. Possibly in the late 1930s.

When Americans took to the highways for family vacations, license plate toppers were affixed to their automobile’s back plate. They advertised a place or business. A few identified the vehicle owner’s profession. They were in vogue before cars were required to have two plates and before automobile designs that don’t have space around the plate for the advertising message. Most are from the 1930s to 1980s. Occasionally one sees a descendant of the topper—a license plate holder advertising a sports team, car dealer, or organization. Bumper stickers advertising “Cowboy Bob’s Reptile Ranch” were a topper’s low-class relative slapped on by a teenage lad as you gawked at diamondbacks as fat as a truck tire.

The motif of license toppers of tourist regions, like souvenirs, usually conveyed what was thought to attract visitors or sometimes dramatic architecture or an unusual landscape feature. When Bagnell Dam closed in 1931, Union Electric of St. Louis, its builder, was bursting with pride about the multi-million-dollar hydroelectric project which backed up the Osage River creating 1,100 miles of shoreline. Images of this marvel of modern technology became the region’s icon. Union Electric would be forced to sell these developable properties before a tourism boom. While the public did take tours of the powerhouse, it doesn’t seem likely that very many planned their vacation around witnessing the creation of electricity from running water.

Lazy Days Resort, Lake of the Ozarks license plate topper, marked Vernon Co. Newton, IA. Possibly 1950s. “Fishin’s good” (below) Lake of the Ozarks license plate topper. 1950s? Its graphic style is reminiscent of Jazz Age cartoonist John Held Jr. but there weren’t many promotional artifacts from Lake of the Ozarks during Held’s heyday. No specific business is promoted so it’s unclear what its origins were.

Lake of the Ozarks tourist advertising rarely featured any version of the indigenous population compared to Branson and the Shepherd of the Hills country. This reclining country bumpkin is not accessorized with a jug of corn whiskey or a floppy eared hound. He’s rural, but not a stereotypical hillbilly.

The Vernon Company is still going strong. Founded in 1902, today they employ 500 people producing products branded for promotion. Through the years their design work has been eye-catching. One of their 1950s license toppers of a roller-skating girl with “God Bless America” advertises a Philadelphia Roller Rink. It was on eBay for $395.

Lake of the Ozarks attractions have always been somewhat generic compared to Branson’s specifically regional reasons to visit—float fishing, country music, and frontier history theme parks. Branson’s symbol was Old Matt’s Cabin, domicile of the god-fearing hill folk in Harold Bell Wright’s romantic The Shepherd of the Hills. This bestseller identified the upper White River Hills as a region that had preserved old time ways. Curiously, we’re not aware of license plate toppers with a log cabin or any representation of the anachronistic culture of the place. The two tourist venues have very different beginnings and pitches to vacationers with different promotional strategies.

Our 5,000-piece collection of Ozark memorabilia and souvenirs contains license plate toppers from Lake of the Ozarks but none from Branson. The collection is now owned by Missouri State University Libraries-Ozarks Studies Institute.

Lazy Days Resort seems to have gone out of business around the year 2000. There is a Lazy Dayz Resort and RV Park at Lake of the Ozarks which opened three years ago. Their advertising used a man sipping a drink in a hammock. The reclining hillbilly of the Lazy Days license plate topper has evolved into a lazy tourist.

 

Most Lens & Pen titles are on sale on our website for half price, postage paid.  See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, where you can find many more examples of this contrasting branding, is now $12.50, postage paid.

COMPETING OZARK TOURISM ICONS: Old Matt’s Cabin vs. Bagnell Dam

 Lens & Pen Press, See The Ozarks  No Responses »
Oct 292023
 

The two biggest tourist centers of the Ozarks are Branson and Lake of the Ozarks. While graphics used to promote travel do not necessarily accurately or honestly represent those places, they can betray the character and history of places. Such is the case with the imagery used to advertise and decorate souvenirs of these two attractions.

Souvenirs from the Shepherd of the Hills Country (Branson). Its dominant motif is Old Matt’s Cabin from Harold Bell Wright’s “The Shepherd of the Hills.” Tourism and recreation were not add-ons to a dam and reservoir project here. They long preceded the building of artificial reservoirs and featured fishing and outdoor recreation with the bucolic locals playing a role.

Branson, near the Missouri-Arkansas line in southwest Missouri, began attracting travelers in the early 190s. Harold Bell Wright’s bucolic novel, Shepherd of the Hills, drew attention to the upper White River hills and their rustic inhabitants. Wright portrayed the inhabitants as colorful primitives and locals claimed to be the inspiration for various characters. The Ross house, known as Old Matt’s Cabin, became a symbol of for the area. It decorated brochures and gifts communicating that a vacation in the Shepherd of the Hills country was trip to the trouble-free past.

Lake of the Ozarks, on the northern flank of the Ozarks was created in 1931 by the closing of Bagnell Dam. This blockage of the Osage River was built by Union Electric (now AmerenUE) to supply electricity. Lacking any comparable settler mythos, pictures of the dam represented the new lake. This wonder of technology was plastered on tourist promotions and souvenirs. From the beginning, its recreational attractions have been hedonistic pleasure, boating, and fishing in the 54,000-acre reservoir. Perhaps the difficulty of picturing the artificial lake led to the inappropriate use of an industrial structure.

 

 

 

 

Lake of the Ozarks souvenirs feature Bagnell Dam, which created the reservoir for hydro-electric power, not recreation or flood control.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Most Lens & Pen titles are on sale on our website for half price, postage paid.  See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, where you can find many more examples of this contrasting branding, is now $12.50, postage paid.

 

OZARKS TOURISM OF THE 1940S CAPTURED ON CLOTH

 James Fork of the White  No Responses »
Apr 052023
 

Souvenir cotton card table cover designed and printed by Steve Miller, 1940s.

Artist Steve Miller created most of Jim Owen’s advertising. He also designed the logo for an Owen dairy milk bottle which is today a pricey collector’s item. Miller was from Kirksville and after teaching in Mexico and Columbia, Missouri, became enamored with the Ozarks, setting up shop in Branson in 1941. Probably the card table sized cloth map, depicting the rustic recreational attractions of the Shepherd of the Hills Country, is from the ‘40s. We’ve found it printed in both red and blue.

Miller’s hillbilly motifs are rendered with the graphic sophistication of a New Yorker cartoonist. More than any artifact in our collection it this textile illustrates the connectivity of the various country attractions of early Branson. The place’s rusticity is artfully depicted. Miller was a fan of days and ways gone by but had a modern design flare. Cartooning gave the old-time attractions a pop culture, post-War look. “Nostalgia Heightens Interest in Ozarks” was the headline of a 1972 Springfield News-Leader article about a speech given by Miller, then the artist-in-residence at the School of the Ozarks.

Miller was mindful of the region’s traditional image. In 1949, he created the giant Nativity scene still used at Christmas on the bluff across Lake Taneycomo from downtown Branson. He joined the staff at the School (now College) of the Ozarks in 1962 where he taught, and curated the Ralph Foster collection of Ozarks artifacts and firearms. His works permeate print media of the region. He died in 1972, survived by wife, a son, and a daughter.

The tablecloth illustration is from See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, an all color book of advertisements and souvenirs depicting early Ozarks tourism promotions and the image it created for the region. The book provides rich images and a unique aspect of history of Shepherd of the Hills Country, Eureka Springs, the Big Springs Country, Lake of the Ozarks, and more recent developments in this unique region – to answer the question: “What lured generations of travelers to the Ozarks?”

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image, is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $12.50 (half the original price of $24.95), postage paid. See the Ozarks: The Touristic Image is a  96-page all color, hardbound book.

 

CAUGHT AT OSCEOLA MO – Spoonbill / Paddlefish

 Damming the Osage  No Responses »
Mar 042023
 

Paddlefish grow big and photogenic. This late real photo postcard was not mailed, so there’s no postmark—possibly 1950s?

On the back of the low-contrast, rather unfocused postcard is a discussion of the edibility of the “spoonbill catfish,” written in blue ballpoint: “Most people eat them and say they are as good as any other fish—but some say they aren’t fit to eat and give them away. We never eat any so don’t know.” The writer explained, “the bill is about the size of a boat paddle.”

In fact, the more common name for these large plankton filter feeders is paddlefish. Their flesh is quite good, and their eggs are a decent substitute for caviar from sturgeon. In Missouri it’s illegal to transport or sell paddlefish eggs, however. Regulations vary from state to state. There is a legal commercial fishery for paddlefish on the Mississippi River.

Once a low hydroelectric dam at Osceola concentrated the spawning run of paddlefish. Before Truman Dam, the best spawning riffles for the paddlefish were between Osceola and Lake of the Ozarks. Truman Dam now thwarts the spawning run and has covered their opportunity for natural reproduction in Missouri. The Conservation Department maintains the population by raising them in hatcheries. Today artificially raised paddlefish are released into the reservoirs for the benefit of snaggers. Snagging with big treble hooks is the only way they can be taken. You can’t bait a hook with tiny zooplankton.

As beluga sturgeon are now a threatened species, an illegal trade in paddlefish eggs has developed. Poachers with Russian names have been arrested for smuggling paddlefish eggs and the caviar made from them. Their caviar sells for about $250 a pound. Mature females often carry 20 pounds of eggs (roe).

 

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. Damming the Osage is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $17.50 (half the original price of $35), postage paid. Damming the Osage: The Conflicted Story of Lake of the Ozarks and Truman Reservoir, a 304-page color-illustrated book, tells the dramatic saga of human ambition pitted against natural limitations and forces beyond man’s control.

CHARLEY BARNES, famed James River fishing guide, with brothers John and Herbert

 James Fork of the White, Lens & Pen Press  No Responses »
May 122022
 

Robert Page Lincoln profiled Charley Barnes, James River guide and john boat builder, in a long article titled “Floating Down the River” in the March 1948 issue of Fur-Fish-Game magazine.

The caption from the 1948 article reads, “This photo of Charley Barnes and his two brothers, Herbert and John, was taken in 1909 about the time that the Barnes float trip business at Galena, Mo., was at the height of its success. Barnes told Lincoln that the bass shown in this photo are the same average size as those taken now. Reading left to right are Herbert, John, and Charley Barnes.”

Charley later developed a distaste for trophy photos. Fishermen would keep more fish than they could eat to take an impressive picture. All the early river guides were supporters of the conservation movement and fish and game laws as they viewed the protection of natural resources to be in their business interests and encouraged an early form of catch-and-release.

Barnes was born near Mount Vernon in 1878. The family moved to a farm near the James three miles from Galena when he was eight. He and his brothers spent much time fishing this historic river and their catches were such that Barnes conceived of the idea of making boats and taking out fishing parties. At the age of 26, in 1904 Barnes started taking out his first parties.

Though his big city customers may have considered Barnes a “hillbilly” – he not only built the john boats they floated in, but with his brother he also owned the Galena Ford agency.

 

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. James Fork of the White, Damming the Osage, Mystery of the Irish Wilderness and other titles– all are now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for half the original price, postage paid.

WHAT A COMBINATION—PHOTO GALLERY AND BUTCHER SHOP!

 Damming the Osage, Lens & Pen Press, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Apr 032022
 

Cabinet card, Linn Creek, Missouri, circa 1890. F. Lloyd, photographer.

Young Sam Clemens grew up in a bigger Missouri river town than Linn Creek, but this photograph preserves a scene not unlike those Mark Twain described of his Hannibal childhood. Linn Creek on the Osage River would be drowned by Lake of the Ozarks in 1931 but this insane image—three Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn types on a steer in front of The Combination Meat Market and Picture Gallery, suggests it was not unlike the great writer’s hometown, a place populated by high-spirited folks with a sense of humor.

Once the county seat of Camden County, Linn Creek was a lively steamboat landing 31 miles upstream from where Bagnell Dam would be built in 1929. A merchant advertised in 1848 three steamships had delivered “One Thousand Sacks G. A. Salt, 150 Bags Rio Coffee and 70 Barrels of Rectified Whiskey.”  That confirms what everyone knows—frontier Ozarkers drank a lot of whiskey. It also challenges several other assumptions. Everyone in the Ozarks wasn’t a moonshiner making their own booze.  And the region wasn’t as isolated as is often assumed. Goods were coming in from far away.

Wish we had acquired this image some years ago when we published Damming the Osage: The Conflicted Story of Lake of the Ozarks and Truman Reservoir, which had extensive coverage of the drowned town. Leland’s grandmother (whom he never knew) was born in old Linn Creek. Perhaps she bought some pork chops at the combination establishment after having her portrait taken by F. Lloyd, about whom we could find no information.

 

Lens & Pen Press is having a half-price sale for all titles. Damming the Osage is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $17.50 (half the original price of $35), postage paid.

A Kansas City Capitalist Discovers The Ozarks

 Damming the Osage, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Jan 062022
 

Robert M. Snyder was a Kansas City businessman, capitalist, and lover of the outdoors.  R.M Snyder’s triumphs had come in the natural gas, oil, real estate, and banking businesses, and he was the organizer of what became the Kansas City Life Insurance Company.

While staying at a hotel in Lebanon owned by Major Kellogg, Robert McClure Snyder Sr. was told about fabulous Ha Ha Tonka by Colonel R. G. Scott. The Kansas City capitalist was an active sportsman. His great-grandson, Bob Snyder, reported he had considered buying Roaring River. In 1904, he purchased Ha Ha Tonka spring and lake from Col. Scott and added sixty tracts.

According to Scott, Snyder’s holdings amounted to 5,300 acres “of Camden county’s most beautiful hills and streams.” In an extensive interview (The Springfield Press, Oct. 19, 1929), he recounted the beginnings of Snyder’s Ozarks retreat:

“Mr. Snyder’s advent in the Ozarks gave me (Col. Scott) new hope. It brought development to the county I believe to be Missouri’s greatest asset. Twenty-four years ago we started building the Snyder castle and tower at Ha Ha Tonka. But death intervened to prevent Snyder seeing his dream castle completed.”

When his big new green Royal Tourist motorcar skidded on the freshly oiled street, Snyder was fifty-four. He had come far since arriving in Kansas City around 1880 to engage in the wholesale fancy grocery business. The paper mentions his ambitious project in the Ozarks:

Two years ago Mr. Snyder acquired, under a mortgage foreclosure, Ha-Ha-Tonka Lake and a tract of 2,700 acres surrounding it, a famous natural park in southeast Missouri. Ha-Ha-Tonka Lake, a beautiful sheet of water seventy acres in extent, includes an island, precipitous, picturesque and honeycombed with onyx caves. On the topmost crest of this island Mr. Snyder set about the erection of a summer home of such proportions as to astound the residents of that remote district. The structure had an appearance of a hotel rather than of a private residence, and was to cost, it is said, $50,000 or more.

“Here I will spend my leisure—secure from the worries of business, and the excitement of city life,” the owner said. “I will fish and loaf and explore the eaves in these hills, with no fear of intrusion.

“At the time of his death,” speculated the Star, “It was generally understood he was making money rapidly. He was a man who understood big things and made them win by keeping up the fight when other men might have been ready to give up.”

From Damming the Osage: The Conflicted Story of Lake of the Ozarks and Truman Reservoir. Lens & Pen Press is having a half price sale for all titles. Damming the Osage is now available on our website at www.dammingtheosage.com for $17.50 (half the original price of $35), postage paid.

 Older Entries