County Seat Elections

Old Settler’s Corner 

by A.G. Patrick, the Oskaloosa Times, Fri., June 13, 1902

In the early elections of the county we failed to mention our county seat contests, of which we have had five, and all exciting, and fought bitterly to the finish.

First cabin at Osawkee

Ozawkie* was the first county seat, being located by act of the first territorial legislature, and the officers all appointed by the governor. During the land sales of the summer of 1857 Ozawkie was the liveliest town in the county and many buildings were put up, including a large two story hotel, besides a number of business houses and private residences. It was the oldest town in the county, and being the county seat, the town grew rapidly, and town lots went at a round figure, many being sold at auction at the time of the land sales.

The first free state territorial legislature in the winter of 1858, enacted a law giving the voters of Jefferson county an opportunity to vote on the county seat question. The bill was framed in the interest of Valley Falls under the impression she could cast a larger vote for herself than any town in the county, and if so, would become the seat of justice. The election came off sometime in the spring of 1858. The county commissioners at Ozawkie made no record of the event, and we give the result only from memory. There were five competing points, and the following is the vote of each precinct: Oskaloosa, 177; Grasshopper [Valley] Falls, 173; Ozawkie, 94; Hickory Point, 50; Fairfield, 10. Grasshopper Falls was over confident of winning and failed to make a proper effort. Seven or eight of her citizens did not vote, whereas Oskaloosa made a desperate fight, and spent some money, winning by a close shave of 4 votes. But that was enough, and the citizens fairly run wild, and when it come to a removal from Ozawkie to Oskaloosa, “Uncle” Jesse Newell was on hand with a cart and two yoke of oxen, to render service in hauling the county seat over, and actually had Joe Speer and Judge J.W. Day as passengers, and the three made the welcome ring, “Uncle” Jess forcibly shouting out his favorite “world’s without end!”

Grasshopper Falls

The writer of these lines was a member of the territorial council, and as many were not satisfied with the result, a petition was gotten up for a new vote, so the next winter, that of 1859, we opened up the county seat question anew, but this time requiring a majority of all the votes cast to elect, and in the event [of] no place receiving a majority of all the votes, a second election to be held one month thereafter, confining the vote to the two places having the largest vote. This election came off early in the spring of 1859. There was no choice at the first election, and the conflict was now between Grasshopper Falls and Oskaloosa. Each town had money to spend, and emissaries with plenty of the needful were sent to every precinct in the county. The writer of this and John Beland, in the interest of the Falls, were at Rising Sun, opposite Lecompton, and with the assistance of Louis Lutt and his partner, we got 40 odd votes. “Uncle Billie” Meredith and Henry Owens was there to combat us, and whisky was free on either side, and by the time we left in order to go home and vote, we thought everyone had as much as their hides could hold. Joe Cody and Bob Shanklin represented the Falls at Kaw City, and they had a little wagon loaded with tobacco and whisky, and came home empty. Phillip Allen was sent to Oskaloosa to watch how things were carried on, and just got home in time enough to vote, but as full as a tick, and we could get nothing out of him, but he persisted in singing a song about a Frenchman on his road from Paris to Paradise, who promised to take a black mare to some woman’s first husband way up in the skies, but the woman’s second husband soon got after him and meeting a boy, made inquiry. But the little fellow was bribed to tell the Frenchman and the mare went right straight up into the air and claiming he could see him yet cantering in the clouds. The Frenchman’s song was made applicable to our case at the Falls, and we could deeply sympathize with the second husband in the loss of the black mare, for we had not only lost the county seat but four hundred dollars in borrowed money.

Phillip Allen and the boys put in a full night of it, singing about the old black mare cantering through the air, occasionally throwing in the old bacchanalian rhyme:

He who goes to bed sober

Dies like the leaves in October,

But he who goes to bed mellow

Lives a long, jolly life,

And dies an honest fellow.

Oskaloosa won the county seat by 40 votes.

Courthouse, Oskaloosa, Kansas, 1868-1960

We had two elections after this. The legislature of 1864 authorized another vote, the provisions of the bill being the same as the last, to hold the county seat required a majority of all the votes. No point had a majority at the first election, but at the second it stood again between the Falls and Oskaloosa, the latter receiving 579 votes to 335 for the Falls.

*Ozawkie was the first county seat in Kansas Territorial days. After several elections, the vote placed the county seat at Oskaloosa. The records were removed by force from “Osawkee.” That formed a story line for a ’50s movie, “The Second Greatest Sex,” starring Jeanne Crain. ("The Second Greatest Sex" is also available on YouTube.) Parts of it were filmed in the old town of Ozawkie.

This story appeared in “Yesteryears” in April 1988.