The Town of Brashear

More details to come later......
If you have any information or pictures to add for Brashear, in Adair County Missouri 
please contact Claudia Minor . cminor at webmoondance dot com

Adair County R-II School

Paulville cemetery

     Brashear was laid out in 1872 but its history reaches back prior to that date for several years.  A mile and a half northeast of Brashear there once stood a prosperous little village called Paulville, or Paultown.  this place was lid out by Walker Paul some time before the Civil War, probably about 1855.  Settlers had been coming into this part of the country ever since 1842, the year when William G. Brashear settled in the area.  According to tradition he was the first white man to settle in this vicinity.

That Paul thought his town would become an important place was evident from his plan in laying it out.  In the center was an open square which was so located as to be on the crown of a beautiful knoll.  Around the square the business houses were to be built and from it the town would grow.  Soon after the town was laid out, a few store buildings were erected on the west and north sides of the square.  The town became a popular trading point for the people in Salt River region.  There was a grist mill in the village, but it was burned during the Civil War to keep Confederate recruits in that section, it is said, from getting supplies from the mill.

After the war the prospects for this little village brightened and it came to have a population of about two hundred people.  However, in 1872 the Quincy, Missouri & Pacific Railroad (later called the O. K.) was completed from Quincy to Kirksville and in that year the town of Brashear was laid out by Richard M. Brashear, son of William G. Brashear.  As soon as the railroad announced that a depot was to be built at Brashear, the people of Paulville realized that the end of their village was imminent and most of them prepared to move to the new town.

The railroad did not begin to stop the trains at Brashear until after the depot was finished in 1873.  By that time several new buildings had been built and some of the Paulville residents had moved to Brashear.  Also several business buildings had been moved.  The town remained under the administration of Salt River Township until May, 1877.  At that time J. N. McCreary and twenty-three others filed a petition with the county court, which was granted, asking for incorporation and the establishment of a local government called a village.

The public school of Brashear is an outgrowth of a country school known as the White School.  This was conducted in a schoolhouse built in 1957 a short distance from what is now Brashear.  The White School was continued until a school was established at Brashear in 1873-1874.  The building erected in Brashear was a one-room affair, and was used until about 1890 when a two-room frame building was erected at a cost of $4,000.  The Brashear school has shown considerable progress since the erection of the present building.
 

The Easley Ludden Opera House on the west side of the square had picture shows, the old silent movies, once or twice a week.  Juanita Easley Rogers played the piano and was very alert in following the action on the screen.  The opera house was also used for school plays, local entertainment, visiting medicine shows, stock companies, and other gatherings.  In the early 1920's Chautauquas, heal in the summer time, continued for several years.  It was necessary for the community to guarantee a certain amount of money in order to obtain these programs.  They were presented in large tents, and lasted five or six days.  The business men of Brashear, who sponsored the Chautauquas, obtained the names of forty or fifty men who promised to make up any deficit between receipts and the amount agreed the Chautauqua company was to receive.  The business men then sold season tickets to try to raise the necessary funds.

At one time Brashear had four churches.  Brashear Methodist Church South was organized at Paulville in 1848. In 1871 a church building was erected and in May, 1880, the building was moved to Brashear. This congregation ceased to exist in the middle 1920's and the building was taken over by the Assembly of God. In 1928 the building was partly destroyed by a tornado and was never used again. The old church bell was given to the United Brethren Church where it was mounted: thus the same bell has called the people in this community to worship for over one hundred years.   The Christian Church was established in Brashear in 1890; however, in the twenties the congregation dwindled and the building was sold and torn down.
The Brashear Methodist Episcopal Church was first organized at Paulville as part of the Sand Hill Circuit.  When Brashear was established as a station on the railroad in the early seventies, the Paulville church moved almost as a unit to the new town.  The membership retained its organization and held its meetings in the schoolhouse.  In September 1883, J. N. and Anne E. McCreary deeded a lot 224 feet by 63 feet to the trustees of the church.  On this lot the first church called McCreary Chapel, was erected and dedicated by the Reverend M. L. Curl on April 13, 1884.
In 1908 the young people of the Brashear Methodist Church were joined by the young people of the Methodist Church South in organizing an Epworth League which flourished for many years.  As the church grew, its influence spread to other communities, and the Brashear Circuit was established to include Hurdland, Sabbath Home, and Bullion, with its pastor residing at Brashear.
Under the pastorate of the Reverend John H. Lane, the Brashear Church building was reconstructed, including the addition of a basement.  The Reverend Lane contributed much of his time to the work.  Following a week of special services, the building was rededicated July 30, 1922, by the Reverend Cameron Harmon.
An unusual climax to the services of the Reverend J. H. Lane, who continued to make his home in Brashear after completing his work as pastor, was his death at his wife's funeral.  Mrs. Lane died May 22, 1942.  As family and friends assembled at the church for the funeral on May 24, the Reverend Lane suffered a heart attach and died in a few minutes.  A double funeral was held May 26 in the church he was instrumental in building.  Both were buried in the Highland Park Cemetery in Kirksville, Missouri.
In 1970 the official name of the church was changed to the Brashear United Methodist Church.  In 1971 several improvements were made to the building.  Two new forced air furnaces were purchased and bathroom facilities were installed in the basement.
In the fall of 1859 a revival was held at the old White schoolhouse a quarter mile east of Brashear's present site and a mile south of Paulville. As a result of this revival a United Brethren class was formed which used first the White schoolhouse and then a building in Paulville as its place of worship.  The congregation had no building of its own until 1873 at which time a church was built in Brashear at the location of the present church.  The building site was donated by Will Allen Conkle, who had the distinction of owning the first house in Brashear.  The church building cost $1,750.00.  A new church building was erected in 1908-1909 which is still in use.  During the 1940's the old United Brethren bell was replaced by the present bell, which was noted above, came from the old Methodist Church South.  During the years of 1950 and 1960 a basement was dug under the church.
The United Brethren in Christ united with the Evangelical United Brethren Church in 1946.  The church celebrated it's centennial year in 1959.  Following the union of the Evangelical United Brethren churches and the United Methodist Church this congregation formed an independent organization called the Brashear Bible Church.  It then united with the Evangelical Church of North America in March, 1970, and soon thereafter purchased the church building from the United Methodist Conference.  It continues to be called the Brashear Community Bible Church.

More to come here .... ran out of time to type....