Many scenes of the Blue River appear on old post cards, such as this one taken near 15th Street, in 1911. Some picture canoe races, houseboats, motor boats or bait shops for fishermen. Many show details of the bridge crossing the Blue at 15th, now Truman Road. Today thousands of automobiles and trucks cross the river daily at this same location on a modern concrete structure. The river below cannot be seen, however, since the modern bridge has high protective sides. The area also is surrounded by commercial buildings, smelters and steel plants.Years before this bridge was built, a Civil War drama unfolded there. Anxious wives, mothers and children of members of Colonel Van Horn's 13th and 14th Missouri Home Guards gathered there to wait for their loved ones, the defeated soldiers returning from the eight-day Lexington, Mo., siege in September of 1861. At Lexington the defeated Union soldiers had stacked their arms at the square and pledged not to bear arms again against the Confederacy. The news that they were coming home spread quickly and home folks who were able walked out toward the Blue to meet their men. My grandmother, Annie Taylor, went to meet her father, John Taylor. Ragged, footsore and weary men, some wounded and limping, passed by. One called out, Annie Taylor, your father is all right. He'll soon be along. A great moment for young Annie, one never to be forgotten. Kansas City Times, May 16, 1980.
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