Business House, Chappell

The destinies of people are so interwoven that one can hardly understand it. In the years when John O'Neil was teaching school in the crude surroundings of the depot at Chappell, Allie Warner was teaching school in New York. One of her pupils was F. G. LaSelle ; something brought Miss Warner to Chappell, and when they built the frame school house and established the first real school, Allie Warner became the first teacher. Then she married John O'Neil, the merchant, and after that her former pupil, J. G. LaSelle, came from New York to Chappell and bought her husband's store. LaSelle and his sons, G. S. and G. G. LaSelle, ran this store for many years, finally selling to the Ryan Chain Department Stores. So the first store in Chappell still exists merged in the larger establishment of Ryan's.

John ( i'Neil early entered enthusiastically into the plan- of Air. Carmichael to make the railroad station at Chappell a community center, with conveniences and associations of the best. Ira Brashear's voice and pen, the fine characters of W. II. Babcock and Isaac Woolf, the business enterprises of Joe Johnson, Fred Sudman, and 'Gene Fish, the ranch home properties ni August Neuman, Mr. Wolf and

others all combined early in the formation years to build an enduring basis for Chappell's ultimate success.

Gordon & Chingreen started a store in 1886 and then Chingreen sold his interest to Gordon and later Gordon sold to Milliken & Swanson. They in turn sold to Burke, and Burke to M. L. Tobias. This store is now known as the Chappell Mercantile Company.