This page is written by Nicholas L. “Nick” Clark. Nick is a native of Maple Hill, Kansas and was born November 16, 1944, the son of John L. “Tim” and Lucille (Corbin) Clark. Members of Nick’s family in Wabaunsee County, Newbury and Maple Hill Townships, stretch back to the 1860s.

Nick became interested in the history of the area in the 1960s, when his grandmothers, Mabel (Jones) Clark and Mildred (McCauley) Corbin, were in their 60s and 70s and would spend lots of time telling stories about family history and that of other people in the area.

Mabel Clark was the telephone operator, then called a “central”, in Maple Hill from 1914 until her retirement in 1958. The telephone switchboard was in one room attached to the front of her home at the southeast corner of Maple Hill’s Main Street. There, she had a front row seat to everything that happened over those 43 years. Grandmother Clark had an excellent memory and strangely, even from the time I was a small boy, I was interested in listening to her recount information from her long life.

I spent a lot of time with Grandmothers and other relatives. Our families gathered often for Sunday dinners, for reunions, for family sings, for church services, and special events in the Maple Hill Community. I graduated from grade and high school in Maple Hill, and then graduated from Washburn University, where I majored in American History and Kansas History.

In 1970, I began writing a local history column for The Alma Signal Enterprise and The St. Marys Star. The column was called “Notes From Moundview Farm,” where I lived at the time. The house and 10 acres were directly north of Buffalo Mound, and three miles west of Maple Hill. The name was given the property by Sen. W. W. Cocks, who built the stone house and owned 320 acres around it. My mother and grandmothers were alive and able to help me with historical information.

In 1978, I left the Maple Hill area to attend graduate school at the University of Idaho. Sadly, I never again lived in Maple Hill, but continued to visit often and started another historical activity, family genealogy. Again my grandmothers and other relatives helped me gather information and enter it into the websites Family Tree Maker and Ancestry. Since beginning genealogical research, I have grown my tree to include more than 13,000 relatives. I have tried to prepare genealogical trees for all the families I have written about and those trees are managed by me but available in Ancestry.com In all, there are over 100 trees there. I’m happy to share them with anyone that asks and is interested.

My Grandmother Clark bought a little Brownie Box Camera in 1915, and began taking black and white photographs from her Main Street office and for other events. She gave relatives pictures they might want and then gave me what was left of her collection, over 600 photos. Both my grandmothers were the “keepers” of their family’s old historical family photos and when they passed away, I received those photos as well. I bought a little Kodak Super 8 camera in 1968 and began taking movies of family and at special occasions. I have had those films digitized and they are included in the collection.

In 2014, I began writing an historical page for the new social media format: Facebook. I named the page: “Maple Hill, Kansas: Its History, People, Photographs and Legends.” Since that time, I have written 350 articles of between 2,000 and 2,500 words. Each of those articles is accompanied by appropriate photographs. Generous citizens and family members have loaned photos and scanned photos written about their families, for which I have been most grateful. Together, the photo collection now numbers over 2,000. I have been careful to advise those who loan photographs that I will put them online and that they will be labeled “public.” The reason is that it is very difficult for family members to share photos with others in the family and friends who might want them. I wanted the photos used with my writing to be public so that they could copy the photos and either save them on their computers or print them on photographic paper.

I am beginning this website, so that all my writing and the associated photographs might be preserved. I am 77 years old and I don’t know how long I’ll be granted the privilege of writing about area history, but I have just begun to cover what is available and pertinent. I will continue so long as I am able to do the research and write the articles.

I take great pleasure in writing about the history of Maple Hill and its people. My hope is that this will become an archive of information for those who wish to learn more about Maple Hill and the families that lived there. Don’t hesitate to make suggestions about what might be written or to make inquiries as to information that is available. Thanks for reading. I wish you many blessings.