Jesse James' Boyhood Home Draws Tourists

K E A R N E Y, Mo., Jan. 5 -- Outlaws Jesse and Frank James made a livingrobbing banks and trains. Apparently, their mother also knew how torake in the money, although in a legal if crass way.

Not long after an assassin shot Jesse James in 1882, ZereldaJames Samuel began giving tours of the home where she raised herboys. She even sold souvenirs.

For 25 cents, visitors could buy a pebble from Jesse's grave inthe front yard. And when the rocks got low, she simply replenishedthem from a creek bed.

Zerelda Samuel may have been one of the first Missourians topromote the birthplace of a famous — or in this case, infamous —native son. But she certainly wasn't the last.

Now, the Clay County government promotes her family home as theJesse James Farm and Museum, charging $6.50 for adults to tour thehome and a nearby museum and still selling pebbles for 25 centsalongside shirts, books and toys.

In the city of Hamilton, the municipal library shares a buildingwith the J.C. Penney Museum, which offers tours of the home wherethe businessman was born. The federal and state governments alsorun parks promoting the birthplaces of such famous Missourians asPresident Harry Truman, author Samuel Clemens (better known as MarkTwain) and educator George Washington Carver.

From Truman to Disney

Other sites have been created to promote the childhood homes ofTruman and Twain, whose families moved not long after their births,as well as those of Walt Disney and World War I Gen. John Pershing,whose birthplace is disputed but whose elegant boyhood home stillstands in north-central Missouri.

Most of the houses passed from one owner to another over theyears, undergoing alterations and gaining more modern conveniences.Except for the James home, it was only later — after their formerresidents gained fame — that someone seized on the tourismpotential of the humble beginnings and repaired the deterioratingchildhood homes as public showplaces.