Dawn and Lisa Harrison are now partners in the land title business and house their growing business, the former Guaranty Land Title, renamed the Missouri Land Records Office, at 102 South Market Street
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Dawn Harpster and Lisa Harrison are reclaiming history — inside and out.
Even before Dawn decided to consolidate her Cameron and Gallatin land title offices, she realized she was going to need more room for the stacks and stacks of land records she had already purchased from the former owner of the abstract business in Gallatin, Dudley Brandom.
Dawn and Lisa Harrison are now partners in the land title business and house their growing business, the former Guaranty Land Title, renamed the Missouri Land Records Office, at 102 South Market Street.
The move also allowed them space to sort through and store the enormous stockpile of records. The documents span about 165 years. They are being kept in an upstairs room where they line an 80 foot wall from floor to ceiling.
The two ladies began renovations of the building in December. Standing and looking around the long room of olive green walls and reddish copper tin tiled ceiling, Dawn said, “I don’t remember what the inside of the building used to look like.”
They have started the process to get the building placed on the historical registrar. The two-story brick, now called The Cornerstone Building, dates back to the late 1800s and was built over where the Daviess County Savings and Loan building was torn down. That was the bank the James Boys robbed. Over the years, the building has housed Farmers Mercantile, MFA, a furniture store and a hardware store, to name a few businesses.
With no blueprints and few pictures to go by, they have done what research they could to follow the design of the original building.
“Sometimes we could tell by looking within the structure where the lights had been and if there were walls or not,” Dawn says. “Lots of people have come in and shared what they remember.”
Dawn and Lisa held their breath while workers sandblasted through the loose, flaking paint of a false ceiling.
“The ceiling had been covered up as long as anybody could remember and we knew we were taking a gamble,” says Lisa. “The day they took down the false ceiling was a scary day. But it turned out to not be any better or worse than we expected.”
There was water damage to one area of the ceiling and the tin had rusted through in some places. They searched and found tiles to replace what had been ruined.
The floor had also waffled from the water damage. To cover it, they built a raised platform with a table and chairs which now serves as a conference area.
Past owners of the building had expanded the original space to include the whole block. Restoration required tearing out a few walls.
“There’s a brick wall at the back of the building we discovered and decided to leave as is,” said Lisa. “We found a door under layers of cement. Now we have a back exit.”
The walls were painted as close as they could get to the original paint that showed through the false ceiling.
“We were faced with vast, empty spaces for walls,” Dawn said. “We plastered dates that were significant to the area’s history up there. It turned out pretty well.”
Dawn and Lisa have discovered some unique and fascinating papers mixed in with the yellowing pages of files and folders containing land titles, warranty deeds and abstracts. The collection runs the gamut from newspaper clippings and letters to funeral notices from the 1800’s that were used to clear clouded titles.
“We opened one bundle and found some papers in with the abstract,” Lisa said. “The papers detail this man’s entire Civil War career, from when he entered into service until when he was discharged. There are even the papers about his wife’s pension. Apparently, this man, like a lot of other people, kept everything.”
They hope that their discoveries may rekindle the interest of area history buffs. The Caldwell County Historical Society held their monthly meeting at the Missouri Land Records Office on Saturday, March. 19, with Dawn hosting.
“The Daviess County Historical Society has been kind of dormant for awhile and maybe we can get people interested in that again,” Dawn said. “We’ve uncovered a lot of things that are historically significant to the city of Gallatin that we’d be glad to make available.”
For just one instance, there is a sealed document dated 1843 signed by Nathanial Cruzen. Nat Cruzen was the husband of Mary Edna and the father of Richard. Richard served as second in command on the Admiral Richard E. Byrd expeditions to Antarctica.
Land titles that trace the chain of ownership from today back to the pioneers are still intact and being used. Over the years one piece of property may have changed hands seven or eight times. This documented history of land ownership will surely prove invaluable to genealogy researchers.
“It’s fun to dig around in those old records,” said Dawn. “You can never tell what you are going to find.”
While cleaning out the old bank vault in the abstract office, they stumbled across a complete set of local land records dating back to Missouri’s frontier days. These books had been wrapped in butcher’s paper and stored away well over 100 years ago. Many of the records exist nowhere else. Some were thought lost when the Daviess County courthouse burned in 1890.
The Missouri Land Records Office has a website at www.mo-landrecords.com where interested persons can go to get more information. Historical abstracts are available for some famous Mormon pioneers, including Joseph Smith.
“We have lot of work to do on the website; it’s pretty basic,” Dawn said.
Dawn, an attorney at law, admits she is not particularly computer savvy. But when the website is up and running, it looks like it’s going to be popular.
“One thing has surprised us,” she said. “I saw a question on the ancestor.com site and happened to answer it. All I did was give the lady contact information. That was two or three weeks ago. Since then we’ve had two or three calls a day from people wanting to know about their ancestors. One was from a lady in Alaska.”
Antique tables in the Missouri Land Records Office not only hold items of interest brought in by people from the community for display, but some heavy bound books containing their own unique revelations. Included among them is a hand-written “Book of Original Entries.”
“The book lists every first land owner in the county,” said Lisa. “The oldest date is 1837 in Colfax township. The library has a copy, but this is the original book.”
There are also two original Daviess County Platt books dating 1876. The courthouse has copies of these books.
Hanging on a wall are certified copies of survey maps dating 1823 to 1838. The map gives an overview of pioneer settlements along the Grand River.
Most of the work on the building is done, but not all.
“We’d like to see what the street frontage looked like so we can restore it to its original,” said Lisa.
They invite anyone with photographs, specifics or recollections to stop by.
The old brick building has held onto the past while at the same time finding its place in the future — much like the history of the county’s people.
As Dawn said: “I don’t think we’ll ever really be done.”