Birth of the Town

Learning of the great excitement occasioned by the curing of Mrs. Hightower, the Cruce brothers arrived at the site to find hundreds of people drinking from the spring. They at once decided to lay out a town. On July 20, 1881 El Dorado Springs, Missouri became a reality.

El Dorado Springs in the early 1880's

The town was laid out in such a manner that the spring and about ten acres surrounding it was designated as a public park. An area from Martin to Joe Davis and from High Street to Kirkpatrick Street was the original size of the town. It was surveyed, streets were laid out, and the rest of the area was broken up into lots which sold for $10 to $600 each, according to size and location.

The Hightowers made a total of three trips to the spring before they decided to move here. They erected the first house in El Dorado Springs on August 10, 1881. It stood on the ground where Wix Hardware stands now. It was a small four room house that stood in a grove of trees.

Later in the 1890's the HIghtowers built another home at 115 West Broadway. This house still stands.

Since the area east of the park was designated for business buildings, it created the necessity of cutting down a sizable hill and the leveling of the street. This was a long tiring task, working with horses, wagons, crude scrapers and many hours of manual labor.

Grindstone Branch, that crosses Main Street at Gay, was covered with a wooden bridge. During the process of building the streets within the city limits, more wooden bridges were erected on Spring Street, Hightower, Hickory, Joe Davis, and Jackson Streets so they could be opened to traffic.