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The Dalton Vocational School building is pictured with broken windows behind the Dalton Cemetery. The building now sits on private property but was once an all-Black school that hosted students from multiple counties.
Photos commemorating Dalton sit on top of a shelf at Lizzie Kalinka’s family farm in Dalton. Kalinka attended the church, pictured in front, throughout her childhood.
Tiffany Ervin, left, and Donald Hughes Jr., right, pose for a photo with his uncle, Louis Ervin , in Ervin's living room in Moberly, Mo. His uncle attended the Dalton Vocational School.
Lizzie Kalinka sits in her family’s pew at the church she attended growing up in Dalton. The church closed in 2019 due to a flood, but Kalinka bought it and is hoping to fix it up so the community can continue using it.
Immanuel United Methodist Church is near Lizzy Kalinka’s home in Dalton. “When we were all working to clear out the church after the flood, a young man on the stairs in front of me said, ‘it would be easier just to burn the whole thing down,’” Kalinka said. “At the end of the day, he came and apologized to me and said this was the most beautiful country church he had ever seen.”
Donald Hughes rings the bell outside First Baptist Church in Dalton. “My grandfather used to ring this church bell every Sunday morning,” Hughes said.
Lizzie Kalinka holds out her forearms to show tattoos representing Dalton while at the Dalton Cemetery. On the left contains the legal description, while the right displays the coordinates of the village.
A barbed-wire fence separates Black and white headstones at the Dalton Cemetery in Dalton, Mo. Some residents wish the fence would be removed, but Donald Hughes Jr. believes it is important for future generations to be able to see the implications of segregation.
A set of stone stairs leads up to a field that was once the Dalton Post Office at the old business strip in Dalton. Now, only two businesses remain in the village.
Louis Ervin holds up his hand to show his Dalton Vocational School class ring in his living room in Moberly. He graduated at just 16 years old. He said two girls helped him with his homework, otherwise he might not have gotten through school so easily.
DALTON — Nestled along Route J, centered in what’s left of Dalton, Missouri, lies the old, dilapidated calaboose.
Across the way stands one of two businesses still operating, the grain elevator, located along the railroad that originally gave cause to establish the settlement of Dalton in 1867.
Except for the calaboose, the grain elevator and a row of homes — some occupied, some not — the remainder of Dalton’s town square has vanished.
What remains are historical relics of the town, creating a larger story of a socially and economically changed rural American landscape.
The old schoolhouse is a relic of segregation. The town cemetery still divides people, despite integration. The river bottoms are known for their fertile farmland but notorious for their susceptibility to the river’s power.
Dalton was once a prosperous, vibrant town. Today seven residents remain. Its story lies in the time in between.
While the Missouri River has been called the key to the city of Dalton, it is, in various ways, the bane of its existence.
Early settlers followed the water. The river provided generous deposits of silt, and first settlers cleared away the brush to uncover a fertile prairie lying beneath. While the river created a wealth of fertility, its long history and capacity to flood left its people, livestock and the crops that sustained them devastated. Time and time again.
After experiencing rising water levels in 1844, settlers migrated to a more elevated space located 3 miles north. William Dalton, believed to be grandfather to the then-governor, had a home there, and later the town was named after him.
Dalton is arranged in a “T” pattern, with the railroad crossing parting the main road. The bluffs are tucked above and away from the threat of immersion; the lower half is known to many as the Dalton bottoms. The river drew settlers, then plagued the settlements they built. Residents and others living in Chariton County still experience disastrous flooding, even as recently as 2019.
A set of stone stairs leads up to a field that was once the Dalton Post Office at the old business strip in Dalton. Now, only two businesses remain in the village.
But throughout the early 1900s, the village thrived. At one point, businesses included a post office, grocery store, cafe, ice cream parlor, pool hall, poultry company, two expansive apple orchards and more. An article from the Chariton Courier chronicled 250 people lining up to attend the local fish fry in 1941.
The village was home to a large Black population, and a growing one at that. According to the Moberly Monitor-Index, by the late 1960s, half of Dalton’s residents were Black. The article praised Elmer Leonard Tatum, the city marshal, calling him the only Black city marshal in “non-metropolitan Missouri.”
In terms of infrastructure and business, what’s left of its 20th century boom is very little. But from time to time, the town does get some action: From resident Lizzy Kalinka putting together the Dalton Facebook page to Sunday gatherings at the First Baptist Church, where worshippers pray and sing and reflect on their childhood in Dalton.
Donald Hughes Jr. remembers when he and his sisters were paid $40 some weekends to clean that church.
“I grew up with five sisters in the family,” he said. “We had just a lovely, lovely life. My grandparents on my mom’s side lived there. My grandparents on my dad’s side lived there.”
The Hughes name is highly reputable in the community. Marvin Hughes, his uncle, served as mayor for three terms. “My uncle Marvin was a retired Army guy, and he and his wife moved back to Dalton, and he was one of the first Black mayors,” Hughes Jr. said.
The position was later filled by his father, Donald Hughes Sr., for a number of years.
The Hughes family “felt good about it because it was unheard of for an African American family to have any kind of political spot during those times. They were very proud,” he said.
Tiffany Ervin, left, and Donald Hughes Jr., right, pose for a photo with his uncle, Louis Ervin , in Ervin's living room in Moberly, Mo. His uncle attended the Dalton Vocational School.
Donald Hughes passed away at the age of 91, and his wife followed in his shoes and became mayor. The position is now succeeded by Hughes Jr.’s brother-in-law.
Most people residing in Dalton moved away due to the lack of employment, Hughes Jr. said. During his childhood, friends and family still gathered there on the weekends, he recalled. “Dalton was a place where everyone wanted to come.”
At the highest point on the bluffs sits the vacated grounds of the Dalton Vocational School. The all-Black preparatory college taught students from five counties, with a focus on agriculture, home economics and industrial arts.
The school, originally called the Bartlett Agricultural and Industrial School and founded by Nathaniel C. Bruce, is listed on the National Register as a historic district. In 1908, a single schoolroom was constructed and classes began. Bruce, a pupil of Booker T. Washington, dreamt of the school becoming the “Tuskegee of the Midwest.” Bruce is buried in the Dalton Cemetery across the street from the currently abandoned building and acreage of the vocational school.
By 1949, more than 155 students were enrolled; some 100 students were transported by bus from surrounding towns outside Chariton County. Louis Ervin, a 1951 vocational school graduate, said he benefited from special friendships he made with classmates over his four years. “You learned from each other,” Ervin said.
Joyce Kelly remembers strong mentorship from Muriel and Eliot Battle during her education at the vocational school. “To us, to me and my clique, I don’t know, they were just special. They were young for one thing, and they had young ideas,” she said. “But they were very strict.”
The Battles lived and worked in Dalton. Eliot Battle served as principal at the vocational school. Kelly said Muriel Battle was not teaching then, but that would one day become her legacy. Kelly said when she was in school, Muriel Battle was working hard to raise their children. The couple were married for over 50 years.
“A handsome couple,” Kelly said. “He was tall and agile. We had to keep our eye on Mr. Battle, because he would show up real quick. We’d always hear a jingle in his pocket and know Mr. Battle is on-site, you’re on your P’s and Q’s. He really was tough.”
The Dalton Vocational School building is pictured with broken windows behind the Dalton Cemetery. The building now sits on private property but was once an all-Black school that hosted students from multiple counties.
They later moved to Columbia and played a key role in that city’s schools’ integration. Muriel Battle became the first Black teacher at West Junior High School and, later, the principal. Battle High School in Columbia is named after her, honoring her devotion to education.
When she was in school, Kelly said weekdays were spent in Dalton, weeknights socializing out on the town.
“We’d dress and get ready to sit and wait on the adults and boys that come to pick us up. And without fail, they would be there to pick us up after they got through baling hay,” she said.
Kelly was raised in Triplett, but like many she commuted to the vocational school by bus. Billy Payne commuted from Marceline. He said he waited to catch the bus around 7 a.m., two hours before classes were officially in session.
He met his wife, Madelyn Hughes, at the vocational school. But it wasn’t a typical love story, he said, because they “ran in different social circles” and got married to different people after graduation.
“I went to California and joined the Navy, and she got married in Dalton and had a family. I got married and had a family,” he said. Both Hughes and Payne lost their spouses, and Payne said they met when the Hughes family hosted a reunion sometime later.
Payne recalled his love for playing on the Dalton basketball team. The vocational school taught him how to be independent.
“The teachers we had in Dalton, they were the best. I mean, they really prepared you. I was ready,” he said.
Myra Hodge, his stepdaughter, said growing up in the small town, she didn’t feel she was treated harshly because of her race.
“In Dalton, it was kind of different. There was no Black or white,” Hodge said. “There was no separation between the races, and people can’t believe that when I tell them.”
Kelly added: “I guess Chariton County was known for that.”
Billy Payne begged to differ: “Wasn’t that different than Marceline. I mean we all played together, but I mean you couldn’t go sit down and eat at a restaurant, or at the movies you had to sit two rows back, stuff like that. I mean, people weren’t mean,” he said, “but you sure knew the difference.”
Louis Ervin holds up his hand to show his Dalton Vocational School class ring in his living room in Moberly. He graduated at just 16 years old. He said two girls helped him with his homework, otherwise he might not have gotten through school so easily.
Unlike the small-town life, Kelly said she experienced racism when she later moved to Columbia.
“I was disappointed. I’d never been subjected to the prejudices that they had here in Columbia,” she said. “So it took a long time for Columbia to come around to where it is today.”
Kelly’s father worked in Triplett for a railroad company, and her family traveled quite a bit growing up. After her father passed away, duties of providing for the seven children fell to her mother. Kelly lovingly recalls thinking she would end up being a housewife just like her mom.
“When she said we’re moving because you girls need this, you girls need education and employment. Just burst my bubble,” she laughed. “One day I saw Mr. And Mrs. Battle going to the Student Union, and that is how we connected with them when we got down here.”
After nearly 50 years of operating, the Dalton Vocational School closed in 1956 because schools were integrated as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education.
Today, as the number of residents and businesses in Dalton dwindle, there is one person still trying to archive it all.
Her heart, Lizzy Kalinka says, belongs to Dalton.
She has tattoos of the town’s plat maps and the coordinates of her mother’s farm to prove it. Kalinka collects information about her home. What started as a small project of compiling her family’s genealogy became a hardcover book eight years later. She began by interviewing her father’s friends and family and some of the neighbors. Doing this, she got to know more about her father, since he died when she was 4 years old.
Lizzie Kalinka holds out her forearms to show tattoos representing Dalton while at the Dalton Cemetery. On the left contains the legal description, while the right displays the coordinates of the village.
Eight years later, the final product, “Dalton, Missouri: Looking Back,” consisted of stories, photographs and newspaper clippings of residents’ lives from the 1930s and on. Dalton’s Facebook page, which centers on community history, bears the same name and author.
The goal was and still is, Kalinka said, to highlight Dalton. “I tell people I have the best hobby in the world,” she said.
Kalinka, a member of the Chariton County Historical Society and a Dalton alderman, lives on her mother Bonnie Kalinka’s land. It’s a Century Farm that’s also home to a number of animals: donkeys, chickens, a turkey, goats, sheep, peacocks. “I usually start my day at, like, 9, and I get done at 2 in the afternoon. I have Wednesdays off. So whenever I get home, I help with the chores,” Kalinka said.
Photos commemorating Dalton sit on top of a shelf at Lizzie Kalinka’s family farm in Dalton. Kalinka attended the church, pictured in front, throughout her childhood.
Then, in her free time, she works at two tables, thumbing through documents or sifting through old yearbooks people lend her to add to Facebook, though she’s “terrified” of technology and worries that “everything will disappear” with the touch of a wrong button.
Kalinka is much more comfortable surrounded by the history she wants so badly to preserve. On a quiet weekend afternoon she sits in her family’s church pew in the Immanuel United Methodist Church, staring in the distance to recollect something special her mother once shared: In December of 1972, her father carried her as a baby inside the church for her first service.
A 2019 flood damaged the church. There was no one else to save the building, so Kalinka bought it.
Lizzie Kalinka sits in her family’s pew at the church she attended growing up in Dalton. The church closed in 2019 due to a flood, but Kalinka bought it and is hoping to fix it up so the community can continue using it.
Dalton’s river bottoms and other parts of Chariton County have been prone to disastrous floods. A newspaper clipping from Kalinka’s book dated June 1942 expressed as much. In “Flooding Causing Damage to Many Farms,” the Grand River was said to have reached a 17-foot mark, bringing the worst damage done to hundreds of acres of farmland in Dalton and Brunswick, Chariton County since 1925.
The Great Flood of 1993 forced a lot of people to pick up and move, Kalinka said.
With startling clarity, while looking out at the Dalton Cut-Off, she remembered: “Yeah, this looks peaceful and calm, but I know what 8 feet of water looks like inside a home.”
When media comes to Dalton or to Brunswick or other cities in Chariton County, it is usually because another flood has occurred, said Joni Deweese of Brunswick. Deweese ran unsuccessfully for mayor in a spring election after working in city government for decades.
There was a brief period where Kalinka’s family picked up and moved to Keytesville, which she reflects on as the worst time in her life, achingly waiting to get back to Dalton.
Immanuel United Methodist Church is near Lizzy Kalinka’s home in Dalton. “When we were all working to clear out the church after the flood, a young man on the stairs in front of me said, ‘it would be easier just to burn the whole thing down,’” Kalinka said. “At the end of the day, he came and apologized to me and said this was the most beautiful country church he had ever seen.”
The town cemetery, the First Baptist Church and the vocational school are, in Hughes Jr.’s eyes, the three remaining landmarks of Dalton.
Today the Dalton cemetery remains separated by race, through a barbed-wire fence separating the headstones of the white and Black residents buried there.
“We have a beautiful cemetery on both sides,” he said. “The fence is there, and there were some people against tearing the fence down on the Caucasian side. A lot of other people are offended and have been trying to get it for years torn down.”
Hughes Jr. originally felt the fence needed to be removed but now feels taking it down would erase a part of African American history.
A barbed-wire fence separates Black and white headstones at the Dalton Cemetery in Dalton, Mo. Some residents wish the fence would be removed, but Donald Hughes Jr. believes it is important for future generations to be able to see the implications of segregation.
“My perspective about that has changed,” Hughes Jr. said. “In 30 years my kids and grandchildren aren’t going to know anything about that fence.”
Kelly said when she drives through rural areas, she feels a sense of longing for her small-town upbringing.
“I look at those houses with the porches and everything, and I get nostalgic, yes,” she said. But she adds, “I guess I am better off where I am, because there’s employment.”
Kalinka doesn’t picture herself leaving.
“Dalton is my past, present and future,” she said. “Almost daily I whisper thank you to my ancestors for finding and settling in the most beautiful place in the world.”
Donald Hughes rings the bell outside First Baptist Church in Dalton. “My grandfather used to ring this church bell every Sunday morning,” Hughes said.
Anna is an assistant city editor and covers the 13th Circuit Court. She can be reached by aewytn@umsystem.edu, @fromaew or in the newsroom.
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Feature reporter for The Columbia Missourian, Spring 2021. Reporter, Anchor and Producer at KOMU 8 News. Studying broadcast journalism and political science. Contact me at aemf82@mail.missouri.edu.
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