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PRING HELPED NAME THE COUNTY
Inventor, absentee officer, farmer, railway worker and politician are just a few of the occupations in which John Richard Pring, who died on Friday July 30, 1943, at the age of 88, engaged in his long and colorful quarry in Shawnee and the neighborhood. Not only did he help name the county of Pottawatomie, but he was closely linked to the history of the region long before independence.
Present at the first Democratic Party meeting and organization in the county, he helped choose his current name to gain Indian votes for his party. He initially preferred to call him Vest for the late Senator Vest of Missouri. The former Shawnee Trusteeship Officer moved to the Potawatomi Nation at the present site of Dale in 1890. He leased land from the Indians and began to cultivate a farm north of Dale.
He built a log house in 1888, which in 1943 remained standing. Born in Indiana and raised in Missouri, he first settled in the Osage Nation near Pawhuska, before settling there later.
After the country opened up to colonization, Pring moved to Tecumseh upon its establishment and lived there for several years. When the railroad was built at Shawnee in 1895, he came to Shawnee and has lived here ever since.
After several years in which he worked in the workshops of the CRI & P Railway Company, he was employed as an absenteeism officer for the Shawnee Schools. He served in that capacity for 25 years, resigning in 1940 due to his age. The county pioneer, who cycled the streets until his death, was active until the end of mind and body.
He was also an inventor and had several patents on a variety of things. Pring was also an ardent prohibitionist and activist in his fight against whiskey. He was constantly vigilant watching the saloons to make sure they were following the law. His funeral was held at the First Baptist Church, of which he was a member.
TENANTS IN THE CITY ARE IRRIED BY THE INCREASE IN HIKING
Outraged tenants saw a steady stream of complaints to the county’s war price board, accusing some landlords of taking a ‘take it or leave it’ attitude about the excessive rent hikes, it has been revealed. Thursday August 5, 1943.
In some cases, council officials have said rents have doubled. But since there was no active OPA rent board in Shawnee, there was nothing the local council could do about it. Officials explained that they were powerless to take action on the growing list of complaints, but said they told those affected to write to the office of the Rent Control Division of the Price Administration in the Key building in Oklahoma City.
The OPA District Rent Advocate suggested forming a citizens’ committee to fight rising rents and added that “in my opinion, if the rents are too high, they will be reduced. However, it will be up to the national office to decide on a rent control panel in Shawnee. “
The first step would be to set rent caps and declare Shawnee a defense zone, after which an investigation would be carried out. Rents would then be brought back to an earlier period before inflationary increases are recorded.
Italian surrender announced
On September 8, 1943, General Dwight Eisenhower publicly announced Italy’s surrender to the Allies. Germany reacted with Operation Axis, the Allies with Operation Avalanche.
With Mussolini removed from power and the earlier collapse of the fascist government in July, General Pietro Badoglio, the man who had taken power in place of Mussolini at the behest of King Victor Emanuel, began negotiating with General Eisenhower. during weeks. Weeks later, Badoglio finally approved a conditional surrender, allowing the Allies to land in southern Italy and began defeating the Germans on the peninsula. Operation Avalanche, the Allied invasion of Italy, was given the green light and the next day would see Allied troops land in Salerno.
The Germans also took action. Since Mussolini had started to falter, Hitler made plans to invade Italy to prevent the Allies from gaining a foothold which would place them within reach of the German-occupied Balkans. On September 8, Hitler launched Operation Axis, the occupation of Italy. As German troops entered Rome, General Badoglio and the royal family fled Rome for south-eastern Italy to set up a new anti-fascist government. Italian troops began to surrender to their former German allies; where they resisted, as happened earlier in Greece. More than 1,600 Italian soldiers were murdered by the Germans on the Greek island of Kefalonia, and the 5,000 who eventually surrendered were eventually slaughtered.
One of the objectives of Operation Axis was to keep Italian Navy ships out of Allied hands. When the Italian battleship Roma headed for an Allied-controlled port in North Africa, it was sunk by German bombers. In fact, the Roma had the dubious honor of becoming the first ship ever to be sunk by a guided missile. More than 1,500 crew members drowned. The Germans also rushed to move Allied POWs to labor camps in Germany to prevent their escape. In fact, many prisoners of war managed to escape before the German invasion, and several hundred volunteered to stay in Italy to fight alongside the Italian guerrillas in the north. The Italians may have surrendered, but their war was far from over.
These stories appear in Volume Two (1930-1949) of The History of the Town of Shawnee. The first five volumes, from 1830 to 2009, are now available for purchase from the Pottawatomie County Historical Society. They are now open, and you can visit them, or you can order them online at their website, or by calling (405) 275-8412. Each volume is $ 35, but a purchase of two or more volumes can be obtained at $ 30 each. We have a special offer. If you buy another volume, you can get the first volume (1830-1929) for just $ 20. Volume Six (2010-2021) is in binding this week and should be available by the end of this week. It covers the history of the Shawnees until mid-June.
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