Its site extends from the southwest corner of the northwest quarter
to the northwest corner of the southwest quarter of section 27, township 60, range 37. It was laid out in i860,
by Thomas Templeton, a son of the pioneer. A son-in-law of Templeton, a man by the name of Gregg, was the first
to sell goods there. Dresden succeeded him. During the war, Walter Lloyd started a small store in the place,
and sold goods as late as 1878.
The most important building in the village, or rather, in its imme
diate neighborhood, is the brick Methodist Church above referred to. In its best days, Richville contained but
five families, and it never enjoyed the convenience of a post office.
Doctors Norman, Thorp and Dozier practiced
in the locality now known as Nodaway Township, from the earliest period of the settlement of the same, but as late
as 1847, there was no resident physician within the territory included in its present limits.
Henry Hornecker, who was killed in the civil war, and William Cook were blacksmithing there in 1847.
Nodaway Township, in point of natural advantages, as well as of
added improvements, is inferior to no other portion of the county.
Fruit of all kinds, which constitutes so large a portion of the export wealth of the county, is extensively grown in this
township, and some •of the largest as well as some of the finest orchards in the county are located in Nodaway Township.
Of these the largest, but by no means
the best in any sense of the word, is on the southwest quarter of section 18, township 60, range 37, on a farm now owned
by E. C. Nuzum. The farm, which includes 840 acres, was formerly the property of Jabez Beaumont. The orchard planted
by him in 1865 covered the entire quarter section on which it remains,—no inconsiderable relic—still appears. Three years
after this orchard was set out a fire in tall grass communicated to the trees and destroyed eighty-five acres of apple trees in the center of the orchard. This disaster occurred in
1868. The destroyed trees were never replaced. Jabez Beaumont, who had moved from the State of Minnesota to this county,
afterwards sold the 840 acre farm on which this orchard was planted to the present proprietor for $26,000. Mr. Nuzum has
always been a resident of Kansas, and the farm has been worked by renters. Though there are still seventy-five acres of
bearing apple trees on the place, there are in the county smaller orchards which are equally as productive, if not more
so. Henry Zackman, who has a fine orchard in the northwest quarter of section 8, in Nodaway Township, also manufactures
sorghum. He employs in the working season three hands.
Source: The History of Holt and Atchison Counties, Missouri; 1882
