[St. Louis Star-Times, handwritten: November 1, 1940]
Preparing for the
Exodus
Gloom has
settled over the peaceful villages and the scenic hills of southeastern St.
Charles County. A hand of Mars has touched and blighted the whole section. The
towns of Hamburg, Mechanicsville, Howell and Toonerville, the farms and burial
grounds, are to be replaced with plants to manufacture T.N.T. and other
death-dealing explosives. Eighteen thousand acres are needed by the War
Department for the plants which will cost $10,000,000. Actual work will get
under way shortly. The 500 land-owning and tenant families, storekeepers, and
others, will soon be on the move, away from the land which in many instances
has been in the family for 150 years. Plans to resist the government’s move to
obtain the site have been abandoned.
Scenic
splendor within the tract. This view was taken from Highway 94 looking toward
the Missouri River. The map above shows the location of the [?] of land.
Miller
School, Consolidated District No. 2, a modern, four-room grammar school, on
Highway 94, will never have a pupil! This new structure, now being finished,
cost $20,000. Doubtless the building will be used for some purpose by the Atlas
Powder Co., which will operate the plants.
The
week-end home of George C. Willson, St. Louis attorney, at Hamburg, on the
palisades, high above the Missouri River. The house was built about sixty [?]
years ago. There is a possibility that some of the [?] old houses on the tract,
such as this one, may be preserved.
