Dorris Keeven Franke

In 1815, when treaties were signed ending the War of 1812, the population of St. Charles County exploded. Residents petitioned for roads to be established in 1816, and the Osage trace became the Boone’s Lick Road. In 1819, fifty years after Louis Blanchette established his home in the St. Charles Territory, the debate for Missouri’s Statehood began. When Missouri became a State in 1821 it set the stage for the Civil War, after sparking a national debate whether it should be “Slave or Free”. Many of the young state’s residents were slaveowners, having brought their property with them from Virginia and Kentucky. A brilliant young Senator named Henry Clay, known for his oratory skills was Speaker of the House, would suggest a compromise. And when the war began forty years later, the population of St. Charles County was 16,523, of which 2,210 were black and still enslaved.

In August of…