Byers Ablaze

Clark Beck, Byers, Class of 1954

In Isaac Werner's time there was no Byers, which came about a decade later.  In Isaac's time the neighboring town just about a mile south of his homestead was Naron.  Naron was never very big, but there was a general store, a school, a church, and some small businesses--possibly located in the homes of the few residents of Naron.  On a hill outside of the town was a cemetery maintained by the Woodmen of the World, an organization about which I have written in a previous blog. The town of Naron is gone, but the cemetery remains, and occasionally there is still a burial.

What put an end to Naron was the railroad.  When the tracks were laid about a mile south of Naron,  the old town died and a new town by the railroad tracks was born.  Many of the Naron businesses and residents simply moved to the new location, but the name did not go with them.  Instead, the new town was christened Byers, named after the president of the Anthony and Northern Railway, O. P. Byers.

Byers 1st & 2nd Graders in 1950

Probably the first business built was the grain elevator on the east side of Main Street, as farmers were eager to have a place for selling and storing their crops, and with the train for shipping it seemed like a worthy business.  The State Bank of Byers was promptly incorporated, and the post office opened for business on May 6, 1915.  Plans for a new school building were quickly made, and the dedication of the school was held September 9, 1916.  The town continued to grow and reached its population peak in 1924, with 227 residents.

By 1933 the Byers State Bank closed, and many families suffered.  The railroad ceased operation in 1940.  The demand from farmers for machine shops kept those going, in fact to the present day, and the school and a few businesses were surviving into the 1960s.

History of Byers, KS, Wilma Carr Beck

I had married and my husband and I were in college, both of us with jobs that kept us from coming home very often.  However, we were at the farm visiting my parents when my father suggested that we go into Byers for a little entertainment one evening.  I could not imagine what he had in mind.  My Aunt Wilma operated the post office in the little grocery store that had once been the bank, but she was closed in the evening, and about the only other business other than machine shops was Walt Fisk's barber shop.  I was very surprised when my father pulled up in front of the local beer hall!  I had never been inside that business and was shocked that it was our evening's destination.

My father bought the four of us our drinks--Cokes probably--and probably paid for our dominoes.  Of course, we could have played dominoes at home, but he made a little adventure for us that night.  Apparently, what I had known as "the beer hall" was being operated as a restaurant at that time, and we may have had hamburgers.  I don't remember.  

Byers, KS train depot and elevator

Not long after our evening at the Byers Pool Hall, located under the Odd Fellows Lodge on the second floor, the east side of Byers Main Street burned.  According to an old clipping on which someone has written "March 23, 1966," with the headline "Blaze Levels Byers Block," the fire began in the ceiling of Roberts Restaurant at 4:45, and the restaurant, the IOOF Hall above, Walt Fisk's barber shop, and the old city hall burned to the ground in a little over an hour.

The Volunteer Fire Department came from Iuka but could do little but put out grass fires started from sparks.  Everyone counted the town lucky that when the blazing second floor collapsed on a propane tank below, the safety pop-up valve worked, avoiding a huge explosion.  In addition, someone had thought to rescue the records from the old city hall before the fire made that impossible.

Soon after the fire, the school was consolidated with other small schools and relocated, the post office was eventually closed, and even the Methodist Church was no longer used for services.  Surely all of those things would soon have happened anyway, but the fire seemed a dramatic ending to the brief life of a once thriving community, now diminished to primarily the L&W Repair shop, a hunter's lodge in the old bank, a fire station built since the fire, and a few family homes. 

Naron--an early settler, a town, and a cemetery

Near Isaac's homestead were two country cemeteries in use in the years before his death.  The nearest one was the Naron Cemetery in Pratt County, about two miles southwest.  The community of Naron took its name from an early settler, and the cluster of buildings included a store, a school, and a church.  In 1914 the town of Byers was founded about half a mile to the south of Naron, and the businesses in the old community literally picked up and moved to the new town.  The old Naron Cemetery continued to be used by the neighborhood, for it sits on a hill about a quarter of a mile northwest of Byers.

My aunt, Wilma Carr Beck, wrote a history of Byers, 1914-1964, in which she describes the celebration day of the new town, using information found in the Pratt Union newspaper.  The death of Naron and its rebirth as the new town of Byers was the result of the decision by the Anthony & Northern Railroad to locate its tracks where they did.  Byers was built along the north side of the tracks and was given the name of the railroad company president, O. P. Byers.  Relying on the promise of the railroad that the tracks would arrive in Byers on October 15, 1914, the town scheduled its celebration for that date.  The tracks did not actually arrive until later, but two political candidates did--the Honorable J. S. Simmons and Senator Jewett Shouse, and the town celebration became a sort of political rally.  There was also a balloon ascension and a barbeque dinner, and the citizens felt that their town was off to a strong start. 

As for the town of Naron that Isaac had known, Byers drew what was left of it like a magnet.  Many houses were moved, but the certain end to Naron was when W. F. Brown moved his store into Byers in March of 1915.  He carried a complete line of dry goods and groceries, and his slogan expressed his disappointment for the demise of Naron, as well as his commitment to Byers.  "We never came here and we don't intend to go away!" the slogan declared.  Using the pen name of 'Old Fisher Brown,' he wrote for the Pratt Union newspaper, and about the time of his commercial move to Byers, he wrote, "Old Naron was almost gone, but not forgotten."  Today, most of the people who remembered the old town of Naron are gone, taking their memories with them.  Even the town of Byers has nearly disappeared but for a few houses and one thriving business.

Isaac did not live to see the founding of Byers, but he certainly knew the settlement of Naron, often mentioning trips to the Naron Store, Farmers' Alliance meetings in the Naron school house, wagons parked around the Naron Church, and funerals held at the Naron Cemetery.  Naron was about a mile and a half south of Isaac's homestead, and the cemetery was about a half mile southwest of the town, so both were an easy trip for Isaac, even before he owned a horse.  Although Isaac chose to be buried in the Neelands Cemetery to the north of his claim, several of his friends and neighbors are buried in the Naron Cemetery, including:  Frank Curtis, whose life Isaac may have saved when he was only a teenager by suggesting changes in the boy's diet after the doctor had told his mother there was no hope; Charles Shattuc, who farmed some of Isaac's land as Isaac's health began to decline; William F. Brown, with whom Isaac shared an interest in books and ancient history, as well as progressive politics; Gus Gereke, who was a nearby neighbor and someone who joined with Isaac and others in planting a cooperative field of potatoes; and neighbors James Lattimore and Wesley Logan, whom Isaac hired to harvest a crop.  A visit to the Naron Cemetery cannot help but evoke sadness to see the several gravestones of infants and young children of Isaac's friends, their lives cut short by the hard times Isaac's Journal describes so vividly.


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