|| Home | Links| Contact Us | Sex Offenders List | Area Events | School | News | Patch History |

Pulaski County Sheriff’s Department Shoulder Patch

In 2005 Sheriff J. B. King adopted a new shoulder patch for uniform wear. This new patch offers a history lesson on the colorful past of Pulaski County. The patch had first been proposed several years before Sheriff King assumed the office of Sheriff. The original patch designer was a reserve Deputy for the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Department, Deputy Elgen Mansion. Deputy Mansion is no longer with the Department but if you are ever driving above the speed limit in the State of Texas watch out for Trooper Elgen Mansion, Texas Department of Public Safety.

The history of the patch starts with the establishment of Pulaski County in 1833. From there it moves to the Old Stagecoach Stop and the first organized travel through Pulaski County via stagecoach. Next we move onto the American Civil War. And once again we look at the Old Stagecoach Stop building, which served as a Union Army Hospital from 1862 to 1865. One of the people who may have been treated at the hospital was a Union Army scout named James Butler (Wild Bill) Hickok who rode through this part of Missouri during the Civil War.  As a side note to the Pulaski County Sheriff’s Department history the elected Sheriff of Pulaski County H. W. Stuart, deserted his office in 1861 to lead a company of troops south from Waynesville to fight for the Confederate States of America.

After the Civil War Pulaski County experienced a period of rapid growth when the railroad was built across the northern half of Pulaski County. The towns of Dixon, Hancock, Crocker, Swedeborg, and Richland owe their life to the railroad expansion. In a side note the final railroad track abandoned the proposed route that existed before the Civil War in the southern half of Pulaski County near Waynesville for a new route that followed a road the Union Army supply wagons had blazed during the war.

The patch shows the old Pulaski County Courthouse that was built right after the Civil War. The courthouse stood for many years until it was destroyed by fire in 1903. Next the patch moves on to the establishment of Route 66 and all of the fond memories that came about because of the magic road and the chance to travel. The first segment of four-lane roadway came about in 1942 along Route 66 in the eastern half of Pulaski County near Devil’s Elbow, Missouri.

The patch highlights the next major event in the history of Pulaski County by featuring the American eagle with stars on an olive drab background to represent the establishment of the United States Army Post of Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. The Federal Government purchased the land for the base in 1939 and 1940 as the United States rushed to get ready for World War II. Many small local communities were wiped out to make room for the Army base. Without a doubt the arrival of Ft. Wood in Pulaski County produced major changes in the local way of life. For a much more recent historical note the Weather Channel radar map shows Pulaski County with the letters TBN highlighted. This stands for Tribune, a small community that ceased to exist in 1940 because of Ft. Wood.

And there you have it, a few brief remarks about the major events that have happened in Pulaski County history. A colorful and diverse history that fits with ease on the shoulder patch of a Pulaski County Sheriff’s Deputy.