Overbrook

“Inspire opportunity for all in a respectful, sustainable way while building a healthier community for this and all generations to come.” As you can see, Overbrook has numerous small businesses, a great school system, and a number of churches, which together creates a self-sustaining city with a hometown atmosphere for vistiors, as well as those already living in Overbrook. We enjoy meeting new friends, so stop by if your driving down Highway 56! While you are here you will see for yourself why so many of our young people have returned to their hometown to raise their families and... Overbrook was founded in 1886, when the Kansas, Nebraska, & Dakota railroad built through the area. W. T. Coffman and J. B. Fairchild were the founders of Overbrook. They had farms side by side on which they started the town. They gave the railroad half-interest in the town in return for the railroad coming through the town site. The earliest description of Overbrook in a newspaper was in the Burlingame Independent, November 11, 1886. Overbrook was named by a construction engineer for the railroad. He named it after his hometown of Overbrook, Pennsylvania. The first business was a grocery store owned by William Kincaide. There was no other railroad station or trading point for miles around, so Overbrook attracted a good business from the start. Residents moved in from the surrounding area. By 1888 the town had two general stores, a grange store, a depot, a druggist, a hardware store, two blacksmiths, two carpenters, a confectioner, and a barber. The Methodist Episcopal Church was organized in the spring of 1885 at a school house a mile and half southwest of the present town of Overbrook. The meetings of the society were held at the school house until 1886, and then moved to the school house a mile northwest of town, where the church remained until 1888, when the church building in town was erected. It was in 1911 that “DON’T OVERLOOK OVERBROOK” was coined as the town’s slogan. That slogan was submitted by Lewis Coffman in a contest by the Chamber of Commerce. It was during this time that the town well was dug and the pump set in place in the center of Overbrook’s main street. There was a trough built where farmers would come to water their horses, and over the pump a white bandstand was erected. There was a city band that would play in the bandstand which was also used for many special events. It was the point where town folk gathered for special times. Two young men from our community did surrender their lives in the first World War – Ralph P. Anderson and Joseph R. Raible. It was in their honor that Anderson-Raible American Legion Post was named. Hardly a family in Overbrook escaped the influenza epidemic of 1918 and one young woman in Overbrook died from the influenza. In 1919 the schoolhouse burned. This was a large two-story structure that housed both the grade school and the high school, and sat on the site of the present grade school. Nothing was saved. When the school was replaced, the grade school was built at the old site and the high school at the site of the Middle School located at Ash and Fourth. The Thirties were among the hardest years this country has ever known. People who had had money in the Twenties lost it all in the Crash. There were 18 banks in Osage County before the Crash. After the Depression only three were still in business – two of those in Overbrook. In the summer of 1936, there were more than 80 days with a temperature above 100 degrees. Grasshoppers moved in hunting for a spear of something green. When the corn dried in the fields, local farmers tried to put it up for silage, but the grasshoppers had left nothing but the bare stalks. Prices hit rock bottom during this time – no one had money to spend. Farmers bought chicken feed in printed sacks and the women used the sacks to make colorful dresses, aprons, and even curtains. The Variety Store advertised peanuts for 14 cents a pound. G.P. Hart advertised bath