06/19/2026
This Juneteenth, I wanted to share some family history. Shortly after Trey was born, I started doing some research on my Great Great Grandfather, George Washington, who was a slave at the Miller Plantation (north of KCMO where the airport is now) from when he was a baby in the 1840s, until he escaped in the early 1860s. He settled with his family and bought property west of Lawrence after fighting for the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry Regiment during the Civil War. I had always wondered where in Bloomington, KS (now Clinton Lake) his land was. Amazingly, there are census records and land maps available on Ancestry.com from 1880 and 1921 that show where the properties were that he and his family purchased.
I sent this info to my friend and professional map guru Kristen Jordan, who did some digging and found aerial photos from the 1930s. She put together an interactive website that overlayed the property maps from 1880/1921 and aerial photos from the 1930s/40s with a map of the lake today, so we were able to see exactly where George’s land was (middle of the lake). Interestingly, one of George’s sons, Albert, bought property west of George’s, a portion of which appeared to still be land on the modern day map. When I went to Clinton lake, I was excited (understatement) to see that a small peninsula still exists on what used to be Albert’s land! This point is just a few hundred yards northeast of Bloomington beach. It’s beautiful there.
Much credit is due to my late uncle, Jimmy Johnson, who worked for decades to research and keep George’s story alive. I’m happy that Jimmy documented these stories so I can tell them to Trey when he gets older. Growing up, my parents took me to Clinton Cemetery to see several ancestors’ resting places. It will be nice to have a place to go where they stood when they were living.
