Wayne Countys Lost River Settlements is a history of six hamlets in southeastern Missouri that were destroyed by the government to clear the landscape for development of Lake Wappapello on the St. Francis River in the late 1930s. Several of the profitable river bottom homesteads had been in the families for well over 100 years, but with nothing else to do the evicted farmers moved on reluctantly in what became the greatest upheaval in the history of the county. With so much of Wayne Countys assessed valuation lost in the government buyout, it was feared remaining tax revenues would be inadequate to support essential services and that the countys various parts by necessity soon would be attached to adjoining counties. That didnt happen, but citizens at the doomed county seat, Greenville, struggled through an ordeal of pain and uncertainty that went on for several months before finally coming to an agreement to build a new town outside the flood plain. Greenvilles turmoil and fight for survival is covered in the concluding segment of the book. It lives on as the county seat in its new location, but little is known today of the lost settlementsChaonia, Taskee, Ojibway, Bethel, Center Ridge and Kime, each near the other and all at the time of their destruction closely aligned by blood and marriagewhich gives added significance to the discovery of the papers of Henry Yeakley Mabrey (1836-1915), who spent his childhood at Kime and for the greater part of the rest of his life resided a few miles to the south at Center Ridge, which was just north of Chaonia, whose birth he witnessed in 1888. Chaonia, a railroad town, became the trading center for one of the richest farming areas in the southeastern part of the state. Much of what is known of the settlements formative years is based on information gleaned from the Mabrey papers, which include school, church, governmental, and Civil War journals, as well as diaries, letters, and personal notes. Mr. Mabrey, a teacher, served in a number of political posts, including two terms as commissioner of public schools and two terms as probate judge of Wayne County. The author brings a unique perspective to the story, since he has lived with it since early childhood. As he states in the preface of the book, My involvement, my yen to write about these people, was possibly ordained, for I had heard much chatter about many of the families and of course the lost settlements while growing up at Greenville. It is his hope his work brings a measure of honor if not appreciation to the families in the lost settlements whose sacrifices for the common good were for the most part made without fanfare or public notice.

Wayne County's Lost River Settlements is a history of six hamlets in southeastern Missouri that were destroyed by the government to clear the landscape for development of Lake Wappapello on the St. Francis River in the late 1930s. Several of the profitable river bottom homesteads had been in the families for well over 100 years, but with nothing else to do the evicted farmers moved on reluctantly in what became the greatest upheaval in the history of the county. With so much of Wayne County's assessed valuation lost in the government buyout, it was feared remaining tax revenues would be inadequate to support essential services and that the county's various parts by necessity soon would be attached to adjoining counties. That didn't happen, but citizens at the doomed county seat, Greenville, struggled through an ordeal of pain and uncertainty that went on for several months before finally coming to an agreement to build a new town outside the flood plain. Greenville's turmoil and fight for survival is covered in the concluding segment of the book. It lives on as the county seat in its new location, but little is known today of the lost settlements Chaonia, Taskee, Ojibway, Bethel, Center Ridge and Kime, each near the other and all at the time of their destruction closely aligned by blood and marriage which gives added significance to the discovery of the papers of Henry Yeakley Mabrey (1836-1915), who spent his childhood at Kime and for the greater part of the rest of his life resided a few miles to the south at Center Ridge, which was just north of Chaonia, whose birth he witnessed in 1888. Chaonia, a railroad town, became the trading center for one of the richest farming areas in the southeastern part of the state. Much of what is known of the settlements' formative years is based on information gleaned from the Mabrey papers, which include school, church, governmental, and Civil War journals, as well as diaries, letters, and personal notes. Mr. Mabrey, a teacher, served in a number of political posts, including two terms as commissioner of public schools and two terms as probate judge of Wayne County. The author brings a unique perspective to the story, since he has lived with it since early childhood. As he states in the preface of the book, "My involvement, my yen to write about these people, was possibly ordained, for I had heard much chatter about many of the families and of course the lost settlements while growing up at Greenville." It is his hope his work brings a measure of honor if not appreciation to the families in the lost settlements whose sacrifices for the common good were for the most part made without fanfare or public notice.

The turbulence of a wonderful time brought four railroads, several new towns, thousands of new residents, the first newspapers, and an untold number of other businesses to sparsely settled but timber-rich Wayne County. It commenced as logging of the countys precious virgin timber (a good part of it pine) gained momentum after arrival of the first train in 1871, but glimpses of the excitement and the heartache, integral parts of it, have been preserved in the authors recordings of the year-by-year happenings, often in the precise language used by the newspapers of that day to report them.

The ordeal of twenty-year-old schoolteacher Sarah Pauline White, sentenced in 1864 to confinement at hard labor in the state penitentiary for the duration of the Civil War for writing a letter to a rebel soldier, was one of several painful experiences endured by Wayne County families that are described in Old Wayne. Why her impassioned quest for a pardon failed was never fully explained; but it gained the enthusiastic support of Missouri governor Thomas C. Fletcher, formerly a Union army general, and appears to have been a casualty of President Andrew Johnson's acrimonious relationship with the Missouri commander General John Pope who, at a later time, was fired by Johnson.