The first explorers and settlers came to a region of cypress swamps and forested prairies. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Little River Drainage District was formed to reclaim the land. This was the world's largest drainage project, moving more earth than completed during the construction of the Panama Canal. In 1541, Spanish explorer
Hernando de Soto may have stood upon the
Sikeston Ridge, although some historical references dispute this, believing that he traveled further south than Sikeston. The area was claimed by the French as part of La Louisiane, and they ceded it in 1763 to the Spanish after being defeated by Britain in the Seven Years' War. In 1789, by order of the King of Spain, an overland route was laid out to connect the cities of
St. Louis and
New Orleans. This frontier road was known as the El Camino Real or King's Highway. In 1803 the United States acquired this area under the
Louisiana Purchase. More Americans began to settle west of the river. From December 16, 1811, to February 4, 1812, the area was struck by the
1811–12 New Madrid earthquakes (a series of more than 2,000 events). They are believed by some to have been the greatest in North American history. The Hunter Memorial Cemetery, located on the grounds of the local Presbyterian Church, was established around 1812 after the
New Madrid earthquake by Joseph Hunter II who served under
George Rogers Clark during the
Revolutionary War and on the Territorial Council for
President Madison. In 1814, the village of Winchester was laid out about one-half a mile south of the future site of Sikeston. It was the seat of justice for
New Madrid County, but after the county seat was moved in 1822 to
New Madrid, Winchester became defunct and abandoned. The Winchester jail was completed in 1817 and was used until December 1821, when Scott County was organized. The land for the city of Sikeston was first owned by Frenchman Francis Paquette. In 1829, the city site was acquired by the Stallcup family. In 1859, city founder John Sikes, who had married into the Stallcup family, gained control of the land. In April 1860, he had the city platted in anticipation of the completion of the Cairo and Fulton Railroad, which would intersect with the King's Highway. In the city of
New Madrid, the street was known as Big Prairie Road, and later as Sikeston Road after the city of Sikeston was established. Today Kingshighway, also known as Business
U.S. Highway 61, serves Sikeston as a primary north–south street. It is lined with businesses and older historic homes. Sikeston's downtown area includes Malone Park, the city's oldest park, and the historic First Methodist Church columns. These six pillars are all that remain of the 1879 church which was destroyed in 1968 by fire. The first house in Sikeston is believed to have been located at 318 Baker Lane. The "Baker House" was probably built in 1855, about five years before the town was founded. One of the early inhabitants of this house was Lee Hunter, after whom one of the elementary schools is named. The house once had a large barn, located on the site where Lee Hunter school was later built. The Baker family moved into the house in 1888 and purchased it from the Hunter family in the early 1950s.
Civil War era Although Sikeston was a small village during the
Civil War, its position at the railroad and highway intersection gave it strategic significance. Around July 1861, Confederate forces of
Brigadier General Gideon Johnson Pillow planned to link up with units commanded by
Sterling Price and
Benjamin McCulloch for an advance on St. Louis, using the Sikeston-area road of Kingshighway. In preparation for this advance, Confederate General
Jeff Thompson gathered Missouri state troops and irregulars near Sikeston; he robbed a bank in nearby
Charleston to pay men and buy arms and supplies. Legend has it that he hid part of his money in Sikeston under one of the oak trees at the corner of New Madrid Street and Kingshighway. In the fall of 1861, General Pillow pushed a column of troops from
New Madrid towards Sikeston and
Cape Girardeau. On October 4, Confederate General Jeff Thompson reached Sikeston, planning to strike Cape Girardeau; however, his manpower was limited, and he decided to retreat into the swamps off to the west. On November 3, from
Cairo, Illinois, US
Brigadier General Ulysses S. Grant wrote a letter to Colonel
Richard J. Oglesby, commander of the Union Headquarters District Southeast Missouri at
Bird's Point, ordering his troops to "strike for Sikeston" from the
Mississippi River town of
Commerce.
Brigadier General Benjamin Prentiss and
Colonel W. H. L. Wallace also converged in the Sikeston area in preparation of Grant's attack at the
Battle of Belmont. In 1862, Sikeston was used as a transportation connection as Union Brigadier General
Pope sent his artillery across the river to Commerce, Missouri, to be sent by rail to Sikeston for cart transportation to New Madrid, in preparation for the
Battle of Island Number Ten. On February 28, 1862, Pope left Commerce with his army of 12,000, arriving in Sikeston on March 2. US Colonel
William Pitt Kellogg, future
governor of Louisiana, commanding the 7th Illinois cavalry, was the first to encounter the rebel sabotage of recently burned bridges and other obstructions. The federals were attacked just south of Sikeston by a small group of rebels led by General Thompson (he was called the Swamp Fox, a nickname after the
Revolutionary War Brigadier General
Francis Marion). Thompson commanded a detachment of 85 horsemen and four to six experimental cannons that had been manufactured in
Memphis. Seeing that Colonel James Morgan's Illinois troops were reinforced by Brigadier General Schuyler Hamilton's 2nd Division, Thompson fled. Entering the area from
Bird's Point, Brigadier General Eleazor Arthur Paine, commander of the 4th Division of
Army of the Mississippi, repaired the railroad and telegraph lines and used troops from
Illinois to form a garrison for Sikeston,
Bertrand, and
Charleston. War records indicate that on March 31, 1862, there were six Union officers and 143 Union soldiers present in Sikeston. On September 22, 1864, during
Price's Raid, a Confederate force of 1,500 men near Sikeston, under the command of Colonel William Lafayette Jeffers, attacked Captain Lewis Sells' company of Union soldiers who were moving from Cape Girardeau to reinforce two companies of soldiers in
Bloomfield.
Post Civil War era One of the first rail lines west of the
Mississippi River ran to Sikeston, and it was the terminus of the Cairo and Fulton Railroad until 1872. By 1900, Sikeston had a population of 1,100, and two drainage ditches had been completed. By this time, the city had two banks, two newspapers, and three hotels. One of the hotels built between 1895 and 1898 was a three-story brick hotel later known as the
Marshall Hotel or Marshall-Dunn Hotel. It is listed on the
National Register of Historic Places. Prominent individuals who stayed at this hotel included
Harry S. Truman,
Alben W. Barkley, and
Tom Pendergast.
World Wars era During
World War I, an infantry company was organized in Sikeston on August 25, 1917, until the spring of 1919. Company K became part of the 140th Infantry, 70th Brigade,
U.S. 35th Infantry Division and fought in the
Meuse-Argonne Offensive. It also served as part of the occupation force of Europe. In 1920, American Legion Post 114 was chartered for the community of Sikeston and named after Henry Meldrun, a Sikeston native who was killed in Europe during
World War I. Between the two world wars, Company K was reorganized. The company helped secure rail centers during the railroad workers' strike of 1922, helped out with the aftermath of the
Poplar Bluff tornado of
May 1927, and worked on the
Mississippi River levees during the
floods of 1927 and 1937. In 1941, Company K was sent to
Camp Joseph T. Robinson, near
Little Rock, where they drilled for eight months. The
Sikeston Memorial Municipal Airport was built in the 1930s, opening in July 1934. From 1940 until 1944, it was known as Harvey Parks Airport. Long barrack-style buildings were constructed to hold the Missouri Institute of Aeronautics, established after General
Hap Arnold asked flight training operations to triple their enrollments. The first U.S. Army Air Corps inspection officials arrived in July 1940 with the first flight cadet arriving that September. In June 1940, a home at West Gladys and New Madrid streets was transformed into a district infirmary in coordination with the building of the new air barracks. World War II flying aces
Robert S. Johnson and
Harold E. Comstock trained at this location. The original gated entrance to Harvey Parks Airport now serves as the entrance to the city's Veterans Park. During World War II, local National Guard unit Company K was assigned to the Western Defense Command in
California. Sikeston-area students helped raise money to have three
B-25 bombers named the
Spirit of Sikeston,
The Sikeston Bulldog, and one other. These three planes were supposedly used in the
Doolittle Raid, during which they went down and are at the bottom of the Pacific between Japan and China. The local
International Shoe Company factory had a contract for a major shoe order for the US Army during the war.
Lynching of Cleo Wright Sikeston was the site of the first
lynching to occur in the United States since the onset of World War II. In the early hours of Sunday, January 25, 1942, a Black man named Cleo Wright was arrested on charges of allegedly assaulting a white woman. Upon resisting arrest, Wright was shot several times by a city night marshal. The local General Hospital refused to admit Wright for treatment of his injuries due to his race. Police initially brought the ailing Wright to his home to die, but later returned him to the city jail, where a white mob abducted Wright in the early afternoon and burned him alive in front of two Black church congregations. The lynching spurred the first ever federal investigation into a civil rights matter, though no indictments were made.
Post World War era Following
World War II,
Miner was founded as the next city. The city was first known as Minner, in honor of one of the original residing landowners. However, the name was altered when the railroad inadvertently omitted an "n" from the switching station, renaming it Miner Switch. In 1951, the city became incorporated due to modern-day pioneer William Howard McGill. In 2000, the remains of Mason Yarbrough, a Sikeston native and World War II marine, were found in the Pacific area on
Makin Island and returned to his hometown for a military funeral. The
George E. Day Parkway is named for
Medal of Honor recipient Colonel George E. "Bud" Day, an
F-100 Super Sabre pilot who is the only known American
POW to escape into
South Vietnam. He was later recaptured and sent to the
Hanoi Hilton. Sikeston is home to the Missouri
National Guard unit Company C 1140th Engineer
Battalion, which took part in
Operation Iraqi Freedom from February 2004 until February 2005. Company C has been restructured from an engineering unit to a detachment of the 1221st Transportation Company, headquartered in
Dexter, Missouri. ==Geography==