Freed slave Hiram Young built his fortune and legacy in Independence — then got forgotten

Independence, Missouri, was the epicenter of westward expansion in pre-Civil War America. Hiram Young, a formerly enslaved man, became the wealthiest man in the county by building wagons and ox yokes, before almost losing it all.
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A single-story brick schoolhouse with an unassuming name rests atop a gentle hill overlooking Independence, Missouri. Its freshly painted corridor holds a story that’s been slow to reach beyond its doors.

This building is where Alversia Pettigrew learned her ABC’s as a child in the 1950s. But even though she and her classmates passed under the words “Young School” every time they walked through the building’s double doors, she never gave much thought to the name.