City Wagon Yards

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's the story of the City Wagon Yards of Johnson County. Back before the highways smoothed out and the automobiles took over, if you were a farmer or a traveler rolling into town behind a team of horses, you had a problem, and this lot was the answer. For two bits, just two bits, you could pull in right here and your animals got fed and watered, you got a roof over your head, crude as it may have been, and somewhere in the shuffle you got something maybe just as valuable as any of that: news.

The wagon yards were where rural folks converged, where the latest word traveled from mouth to mouth faster than any newspaper could carry it. Buy, sell, trade, catch up; all of it happened right here on this lot. Now, the wagon yards didn't last forever.

Better roads came. Then came the cars. Then the trucks.

And just like that, a whole way of life rolled on past. But here's the thing worth sittin' with for a moment: those crude overnight accommodations, that two-bit stop for a weary traveler and his team? Turned out to be the forerunner of the motel.

Every time you pull off an interstate and check into a room for the night, well, the wagon yards got there first.

What the marker says

Were meeting places for early rural folks coming to town to buy, sell, trade, catch up on latest news. Here on this lot farmers, travelers for "two bits" got feed, water for teams; crude overnight accommodations. Wagon yards, outdated by better roads, cars, trucks, were forerunner of motels.