Alice Rodhouse believes history should include stories as well as names and dates.

The Wentzville woman and Clarksville native is preserving her family narrative in the book “The Mackeys of Pike County Missouri.”

“I want my kids to know their heritage” Rodhouse said. “It’s something I can leave them.”

An incredible tale it is. The first Mackeys to arrive in Pike County in the early 1800s were brothers James, John and Thomas, who lived in Tennessee after coming from North Carolina when their father died.

The brothers and their sons began buying land from the federal government for $1.25 an acre. Most of it was west of Clarksville in an area that became known as Mackey Valley.

Only two of those original land grant farms remain in the Mackey family and Rodhouse owns both of them. Her granddaughter lives on one – which was bought by the son of James – and her son, David  (sixth generation) lives on the farm bought by the son of Thomas in 1825.

The log house that Thomas Jr. built still stands there and a Mackey gathering will be held at the site on Aug. 31 to celebrate the farm’s bicentennial.

Rodhouse admits her book is not meant for genealogical research. Rather, it is stories of the family.

Included are tales of the August 1841 murder of Reason Mackey and the execution of his killer – supposedly the only hanging at the courthouse – and the January 1818 marriage of Jennie Mackey and James Templeton, the first recorded in the county. The book also has stories of the Mackeys as farmers, merchants and politicians.

Rodhouse encourages others to chronicle their family histories.

“If you like to do it, it’s fun,” she said. “If you don’t, you’d better get someone else to do it.”

 

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Alice Rodhouse with a copy of her book “The Mackeys of Pike County, Missouri.”