Happy birthday, Joplin w/ links to historical Joplin slide shows

By Debby Woodin

dwoodin@joplinglobe.com

In 1870, prospectors E.R. Moffet and J.B. Sergeant hit a vein of lead on a stream called Joplin Creek, north of today’s Langston-Hughes Broadway.

It earned them $60,000 in three months.

Within a year, 500 other prospectors had packed mules, horses or buckboards mostly from points East through the Missouri wilderness to get here to try their luck.

Settler John Cox saw a demand for places for the miners to live, so he platted a town on his land on the east side of the creek and named the settlement Joplin, after his neighbor, the Rev. Harris Joplin.

Across the creek, miners Patrick Murphy and W.P. Davis platted what they called Murphysburg. The two burgs struggled against each other for a couple of years until the

founders made up and merged. Joplin won out as the name of the merger, and on March 23, 1873, the city was incorporated.

A celebration of that occasion, Joplin’s 135th birthday, is planned for Tuesday. Residents are invited to come to City Hall, 602 Main St., from 2 to 4 p.m. for a reception. Ceremonial remarks will be made at 2:15 p.m. and a ribbon cutting is set for 2:30 p.m. by the Joplin Area Chamber of Commerce.

Cake and punch will be served and the first 50 people to come to the ceremony will receive a free commemorative item.

A lighted figurine of the historic Newman Building, which is now City Hall, will be available for purchase from the city clerk’s office. City Clerk Barbara Hogelin sells the figurines to pay for installation of the city seal in the floor of City Hall and for other decorative elements such as the building’s Christmas display.

City staff and staff at the Joplin Museum Complex will conduct the ceremony.

Brad Belk, museum director, said there’s a lot to celebrate in the city now.

“Joplin’s booming for the second time. Both of these tremendous booms happened to turn around both centuries, 1900 and 2000.” The city experiences its first boomtown within 10 years before and after the 1900 mark, he said, and it’s happening now again.