Existing for 150 Years
...reason enough for Seymour, IA to cheer
By Richard Gilbert:
SEYMOUR, IA —The Wayne County town of Seymour hasn't had many breaks over the last century and a half.
Still, a sign near the north town limits reminds visitors that the girls' basketball team won the state championship in 1947 and the boys were state track champs in 1964.
Last Saturday, July 10, was one of those feel-good moments when you are just glad to be in Iowa.
It was the town's annual "Old Settlers Day" on the square.
Out-of-town visitors easily outnumbered Seymour's population of 701.
Most were drawn back by the all-alumni reunion for Seymour High School; plus a vintage car show, a barbecue, a parade that featured every truck the highly-regarded volunteer fire department could muster, two convertibles with the queen candidates, entries from local businesses, and a giant birthday cake float observing the 150th anniversary of the founding of Seymour, Iowa, in 1871.
I was drawn to the event by a phone call reminder from Tom Morrow, an old friend, and former classmate at Seymour High School. In the moment, Julie and I decided to take the easy hour and a half drive from Des Moines south to Seymour. Several lines of thunderstorms had rolled through the night before. It was a trip through south-central Iowa at her prettiest.
Founded as a railroad town just 10 miles north of a state line it shares with Missouri, Seymour first prospered as a coal mining center until the mines petered out in the early 1900s. It boasted a population of almost 2,300 in the 1910 census. Two railroad lines served it—Rock Island and the Milwaukee. Then the Rock Island line went belly up. Economics has been a downer ever since — farm consolidations, young people fleeing to Sun Belt cities. After the railroads gave way to big trucks, Seymour's location wasn't a plus anymore. Today you reach Seymour from a turn to the south off Highway 2 between Corydon and Centerville, then take what used to be Highway 55 but is now downgraded to county road S60 for about 4.5 miles to the town's north limits.
The future of small Iowa towns, in general, is largely uncertain, but there's no doubt in Seymour of its pride in her past.
And for those drawn back by Old Settlers Day, there's still enough to evoke memories of youth. I was a Seymour High School student before leaving to complete my senior year in Chariton.
I began my media career with The Seymour Herald, still in existence, locally owned, and still published weekly by Karen Young and her daughter Vicky Decker. It is the oldest ongoing business in town, published continuously for 138 years -- so proclaimed the sign on the Herald's golf cart entry in the Saturday parade.
(My first newspaper job as a 15-year-old kid was when then owners Wayne and Jeanne Davis paid me a nickel per column inch for feature stories.)
Not many other businesses remain on the square. Gone is Morrow's Meat Market, run by the late Jared Morrow, father of my best buddy Tom, my feature-writing sidekick. Tom's life trajectory is just one example of Seymour's steady population drain: Graduated high school, joined the Navy with a bunch of his buddies, served his time, then relocated to the Sun Belt, never to return (except for an occasional Old Settlers visit). While Morrow left Seymour, Seymour never left him. In 2016 he published a history/memoir of life in Seymour entitled "Kingdom of the Tall Corn," still available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.
Gone also is Cunningham's Grocery, where I spent Saturdays as a clerk and delivery boy. Mr. Cunningham sold the store while I was employed, and for a short time, I worked for the new owner, scraping the sprouts off aging potatoes to go back on the shelf again. (That was before "sell by" dates were there to inform shoppers.)
Today, some groceries are available at the Casey's, just off the square, with the nearest Hy Vee supermarkets in Corydon or Centerville.
The Milwaukee tracks still cut through town bringing memories of times when my kid brother and I hopped slow-moving freight cars as trains crossed through. After a couple of miles we’d tumble off, near wooden areas great for overnight campsites. That was a time when kids didn’t wear bike helmets and cars didn't have seatbelts.
On this Saturday on the square, Emcee Dennis Doggett, a retired Seymour High teacher, strolled through the crowd, wireless microphone in hand, greeting visitors and asking for their names and graduating class. His broadcast introductions helped me link up with the only classmate I could locate, Kay Murphy Fox, class of '58. She lives in Phoenix and has for years.
Dennis Doggett, on the other hand, stayed in Seymour. He was the Class of 1966, from Seymour High, coming home after college and a tour in the Air Force. He taught school here more than 30 years. His wife Sherri is director of nursing at nearby Centerville Mercy Hospital.
"Seymour has been good to me," Doggett explains when asked what's kept him here. "Given me a career, a place to raise a family. And I get inspiration (from the Old Settlers event) seeing so many people working so hard to make this happen."
He then gave a shoutout to four folks who have been integral to the success of the Vintage Car Show annually for the last 20 years—Ernie and Merla Schmell, and David and Dottie Snider.
He credits the Sniders with connecting the vintage car group with the Old Settlers volunteers to get this popular addition launched two decades ago. There are good stories everywhere. Ernie Schmell exhibits his 1971 Chevelle in the show each year, a car he has had since the day he and Merla were married. Said Doggett: "Ernie's had the same wife and same car for 50 years!
The car show was a reminder why I wasn't recognizing other classmates from my school days...these shiny antiques are younger than I am and certainly in better shape.
Putting on Old Settlers Day every year requires lots of volunteers and often becomes a family endeavor. Such is the case with the Herald's co-publisher Vicky Decker. Not only were Vicky's sleeves rolled up in the effort, but she enlisted daughter Angie Enright and Angie's daughter Ali in preparations for the summer's big event. The reward for all the work: A chance to ride on the Herald's golf cart entry in the Saturday parade.
Vicky's mom, Karen Young, the Herald's co-publisher, looks on the bright side for Seymour's future. She acknowledges Casey's is the only place to get groceries, and the sole restaurant has limited hours. And while the town didn't have a bank for a while, now Peoples has a branch in Seymour. Residents enjoy the Seymour lifestyle, she says. So they willingly make the commute to jobs in Corydon, Centerville, Ottumwa, or Pella.
Most social scientists wouldn't have given Seymour much of a chance two generations ago, but it's still here. It was a wondrous place to be on a picture-perfect July day under big shade trees on the square. It poured rain again Saturday evening but not before an evening meal was served. The music performance by Beth Hunter and the Harvest Band from Albia was moved from the square to the new junior high building and went on before any drops fell on the crowd.
The coal mines petered out long ago. Same with the railroads. The meat market and grocery are gone, and it's now a drive to a big supermarket. Being at the end of a county road cuts into the tourism trade. An EF2 tornado touched down in Seymour on March 6, 2017, damaging the high school and some houses. Volunteers rallied, and new construction replaced the buildings damaged by the twister. No one was hurt.
But even though sometimes it seems Seymour has had more than its share of setbacks, folks I talked to remain bullish on their town.
Scores of friendly Seymourites were going all out to celebrate this milestone Old Settlers Day. (Except almost everyone watching the parade stood still, at attention, hands over hearts, as the American Legion color guard passed by.)
It hasn't been an easy 150 years for this small Iowa town. But Seymour's still there, hospitable as ever. That in itself is cause for celebration.
Editors Note: After his newspaper start in Seymour, Richard went on to edit the newspaper in Harlan and owned the Eagle Grove Eagle. Richard served as press secretary to Governor Robert Ray, then was president of The Des Moines Register and two other media companies in New York and Chicago. He and his wife, Julie Gammack, live in Des Moines, Okoboji and Punta Gorda, FL.
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What a warm and insightful column from what was obviously a wonderful visit back in your ol' hometown, Richard. I don't think I ever understood that it was probably the Seymour connection that took you to Harlan to work for the Mores family; Leo Mores was, like you, a Seymour guy, right? I've always liked Seymour, except for one thing. Years ago, I wrote a great new town slogan for the folks there, and they've ignored it ever since: "Seymour? We've seen less!"
A wonderful story. It is likely there is a plethora of Iowa small towns resembling this history.