***There's no cache at the posted coordinates. This is a bonus cache associated with the Lee's Summit History adventure lab. The correct coordinates are revealed upon completion of the Lee's Summit History adventure lab.***
Settlers began arriving in the area, now known as Lee's Summit, around the 1830s. The pioneers who settled here were mostly from Kentucky. They built farms and worked hard. The area was known as Big Cedar. In the 1850s the Border Wars started and by 1861 had escalated into this area and continued into the Civil War. The residents of Big Cedar and the surrounding area were Southern sympathizers and were forced to leave the area, some returning temporarily to Kentucky. After the war the settlers returned to the area and found their homes mostly in ashes and started to rebuild.
At the close of the war the Missouri- Pacific Railroad began to finish laying their tracks between Warrensburg and Kansas City. William B. Howard, who had purchased 833 acres of land from the government, gave the railroad a grant of land and laid out 70 acres in town lots. He laid out the town in lots of 50X80 feet and it made up an eleven block area. Howard called his settlement Strother, his wife's maiden name. Eventually the town had to change its name because there was already another town in Missouri by that name. The town became known as Lee's Summit, in honor of Dr. Pleasant Lea, Post Master and town physician. Although, there were rumors that the town was really named after General Robert E. Lee, historical documents lead to the Dr. Pleasant Lea story.
Much of the town was destroyed in 1885 when a fire that began in one of the buildings downtown spread quickly throughout the town of wooden buildings. When the townspeople began to rebuild, instead of wood, they used brick and limestone. Some of those early buildings still stand in historic downtown Lee's Summit.