Our little hometown communities are quickly slipping away. Modern day generations do not know the feeling of living in small communities where the post office and general store were usually in one building. A gathering place for old and young alike to check on the mail, buy everyday needs and share local gossip. To me, these were the good old days.
Many other small close-knit communities were scattered all over the county, one of these was the village of Frances. Seems it had other names before it was finally christened with a post office and named Frances. Here is some early history of that community.
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Because of a bride, a place in Kentucky first called Needmore, and fabulous deposits of fluorspar, the town of Frances sprawls in a curve on Highway 70 in Crittenden County. The bride and the town of Needmore were responsible for the name Frances. The fluorspar enabled the town to service as a business center even after rural people were able to travel and go to other places.
Frances was a place, however, long before anybody knew that fluorspar veined the ground of Crittenden County in a quantity that makes this county one of the foremost spar fields in the world.
The first log cabin in the community was built about 1797 by James Armstrong who came from Giles county Tennessee. But Frances did not begin to look townish until about 1844 when Alvin Duvall built three cabins on the site now occupied by Frances Graded School.
By 1872, the area still wasn't anything to brag about, but it had improved to the extent that it had a physician, Dr. Charles Owen, who had survived a shipwreck on his way to American from England. Dr. Owen bought a small triangle of land from Alvin Duvall and set out at once to provide a home for his family. Dr. Owen built the first store and apothecary and a Masonic Hall, Liberty Lodge was added to the growing collection of buildings. Dr. Owen was a very prominent and civic minded citizen of the area, for in 1880 when a new school was established just a short distant from the town, it was named Owen School in his honor.
In 1874, the small cluster of buildings was known as Crossroads. The name was applied loosely because the Eddyville and Salem roads and the Dycusburg and Marion roads, heavily traveled routes in those days, crossed there. Later, residents of the tired-looking collection of buildings noted the sad appearance of Crossroads and the never-ending fields of persimmon and sassafras bushed around it, and decided that the place should be known as Needmore. The name was a fitting one because Crossroads needed more – of about everything the residents could think of.
But one day Needmore, as it was known by that time, had prospered enough to qualify for a post office, and this new important addition to the community had to have an official name. The populace said call it Needmore, as that is what it was now known by, but Uncle Sam said, No, as Kentucky already had a Needmore post office. A duplication of that name would put mail people in a dither, and cause the mail to be sent to the wrong Needmore. So unofficially, the citizens of Needmore got in a huff and told the postmaster to name the town himself.
Along about his time, President Grover Clevand's new bride, was the toast of the nation. President Cleveland was trying to think of ways to honor his bride. The post office employees of the postmaster general were aware of this, and when the task of renaming Needmore fell in their laps, they quickly chose the name Frances.
The Frances post office was established June 1886 with John C. Allen postmaster; other postmaster were Wm. J. Tabor; and Frederick Perkins. It was discontinued in Nov. 1887 with papers sent to Marion, but it was re-established in April 1888 with Wm. W. Pogue as postmaster, following him were Marion F. Pogue, Samuel H. Matthews and in March 1908 it was discontinued and the mail was sent to Marion.
Now Frances could have made out all right with Crossroads or Needmore or any other name, as far as names go, but without the fluorspar the curve in Highway 70 might be just a curve bordered by persimmon and sassafras bushes. Or there might not have been a road at all.
Fluorspar is the life blood of the town, the mineral brings in the people and the trade and the money that any town has to have to exist, and it is responsible for a closely knit village of people who understand each other and work for the good of all.
The small community has become a veritable beehive with miners, prospectors and capitalists all in a rush to better their financial condition by developing the spar mining business. Almost a stone's throw from Frances is located the Asbridge Mines, which was opened about 1900. The mine is worked by four or five men and it was learned that the profits on the spar taken from that mine last year was over $8,000. The vein is almost inexhaustible and it is claimed can be worked profitably for the next 50 years.
Within 80 feet of the Asbridge is the McClelland Mines, which promises to be an even greater producer of spar. The mine was opened by Mr. F. A. McClelland. He is an experienced mineral man and an expert on spar. The Hodge Mine, said to be the largest and best paying spar mine in the world is only one and a half miles from Frances. Mr. John Hodge, upon whose land this mine is located, is said gets $3,000 a year as royalty. The Yandell and Tabb and the Tabor are names of some of the other mines, all within a radius of three miles of Frances. They are all doing a fine business and new mines are being opened every week.
Some of the Frances merchants from 1874 to 1950's included: Dr. Charles Owen, drug store and grocery; Critt Allen, general merchandise; M. F. Pogue, drugstore and general merchandise; Pogue and Matthews; general merchandise; W. E. Asbridge and Milton Yandell. Later day store businesses included Dr. Abell, eye doctor, Brown Brothers, Oman Matthews, Wm. Asbridge, Robertson Krone, Doom's garage, Sam Matthews, and John Holloman.
There is farming, too, But farming alone could not have spawned the proud, little town of Frances and kept it on the up grade in an age of emphasis on larger shopping centers. (Information from Doyle Polk and from notes written by his aunt Stella Simpkins in the 1940's)
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