Howard Authors

[W. Gray]

Besides Ruth Smith can anyone come up with the name or names of anyone else from Howard who was an author?

The Kansas City Star said in 1931 that Thomas E. Thompson was such a good writer that if he had ever been able to write a book or books they would all have been best sellers.

[W. Gray]

In a Coffee Shop thread, Diane's mention of a Mr. Bascom connected with the Mr. Peepers 1950s television show, triggered my brain concerning another Bascom.

Samuel J. Bascom wrote Memoirs of S.J. Bascom Done at Howard, Kansas, January 16, 1916.

It is informative, although only eleven double space typewritten pages.

He came to Howard County in March 1868 and "legally settled" in what is now Union Center Township.

He was one of the first settlers in that area.

He disdains those who were illegally settling in the area south of him, including what is now Howard.

He called his place the Occidental Ranch, which may sound racist for our time.

But it probably had more significance to the fact that he says there were Indians always coming and going through his place.

It was not just Osage.

There were several tribes much further north of Howard County who were in the process of being moved by treaty.

They came and went as needed to complete their families to Indian Territory.

The memoir is on file at the Kansas State Historical Society.