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William Henry Hatch Cache Virtual Cache

Hidden : 3/23/2003
Difficulty:
1 out of 5
Terrain:
1 out of 5

Size: Size:   virtual (virtual)

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Geocache Description:

A visit to the bronze statue honoring Rep. William Henry Hatch, in downtown Hannibal's Central Park.

Central Park in downtown Hannibal Missouri is the site of a statue, dedicated in 1914, honoring Rep. William Henry Hatch (1833-1896), the author of the Hatch Act of 1887.

William Henry Hatch was

  • a distinguished lawyer,
  • a Confederate Army officer during the Civil War, and
  • a long-time (1879-1895) Representative of the State of Missouri to the U.S. House 1 2.

Hatch sponsored the bill that created the office of the Secretary of Agriculture. He was also responsible, via the Hatch Act of 1887, for the establishment of an agricultural experiment station at each land-grant college of agriculture 3, including the University of Missouri 4. At the University of Missouri in Columbia, Hatch Hall, a residence hall, is named after him, and eight Graduate Fellowships are awarded yearly in his name 5.


The statue was the work of noted Missouri sculptor Frederick C. Hibbard, who was born in 1881 in nearby Canton, Missouri, studied electrical engineering at the University of Missouri, and studied sculpture at the Art Institute of Chicago 6. Hibbard subsequently sculpted the Mark Twain statue that overlooks the Mississippi River in Riverview Park, as well as the statue of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn at the foot of Cardiff Hill.


To log this cache you may either:

  1. With your log, post a picture of yourself in front of the Hatch statue, with your GPS in hand, or

  2. Email us the answer to the following questions:

    a. What one word in the text on the back of the statue base is contracted (i.e., contains an apostrophe to shorten it, such as the word "isn't").

    b. Locate the Veterans Memorial in the same park, at coordinates N39 42.540, W91 21.553, locate the panel of names that faces the river. Find the column headed with the name "Griffith, Clifford"; send me the 51st name.

Huckleberry


Footnotes

[1] William Henry Hatch, 1833-1896, http://www.whitesville.net/Willliam%20Hatch.htm
[2] HATCH, William Henry, 1833-1896, http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=H000339
[3] A Note on the College of Agriculture, Food & Natural Resources, http://www.ssu.missouri.edu/iap/Brownfl4.htm
[4] Western Historical Manuscript Collection - Columbia, http://www.system.missouri.edu/whmc/invent/rep.htm
[5] Financial Assistance for Graduate Students, http://www.psu.missouri.edu/entomology/gra.stm
[6] A Kaleidoscope of History: Frederick C. Hibbard, Master Sculptor, Part II, http://raymondhistory.org/history/hibbard1.htm

Additional Hints (No hints available.)