Buckhorn, Missouri

Witmor Farms Restaurant

Buckhorn, Missouri is a former community on Route 17 at its junction with Interstate 44 in Pulaski County. It is also on historic U.S. Route 66. In 2003, it was annexed by nearby Waynesville. Numerous businesses line the highway at this location.

Transportation

Waynesville Regional Airport at Forney Field serves the community with air service; even though it is on Fort Leonard Wood, it is jointly run by the cities of Waynesville and St. Robert and is available for civilian use by private pilots and scheduled commercial passenger service.

The major east-west route is Interstate 44; before that, the main highway was U.S. Route 66, which still exists as a scenic route through the area and passes through Devil's Elbow, St. Robert, Waynesville, Buckhorn, and Hazelgreen. Names for U.S. Route 66 vary - at different places, it is called Teardrop Road, Highway Z, Old Route 66, Historic Route 66, and Highway 17. State-posted signs mark most of the alignment of the road.

Major north-south routes in the Buckhorn area include:

• Route 7 runs north from Interstate 44 exit 150 about three miles (5 km) west of Buckhorn to Richland, then north out of the county toward the Lake of the Ozarks region.
• Route 17 crosses Interstate 44 at exit 153 at Buckhorn, runs east through Waynesville, turns north to Crocker, and then runs north out of the county to Iberia. South of Interstate 44, Highway 17 hugs the western edge of Fort Leonard Wood, passes near Laquey, and circles south of the post until it runs out of the county and eventually joins Highway 32 in Roby.

Major attractions along U.S. Route 66 include the Old Stagecoach Stop in downtown Waynesville, which is now a museum but began as a tavern and boarding house and is the oldest standing structure in the county. It was used as a Civil War hospital for Union troops who were garrisoned above the city in Fort Wayne, which was demolished after the war. The Old Courthouse Museum in downtown Waynesville is near the Old Stagecoach Stop. Three bridges cross the Big Piney River at Devil's Elbow—the modern Interstate 44 bridge, the later U.S. Route 66 alignment on Highway Z that was made possible by the Hooker Cut through a steep hillside, and the original U.S. Route 66 alignment on Teardrop Road that includes a historic bridge that's in the process of renovation. The Elbow Inn is a biker bar that's a frequent stop on the original U.S. Route 66 alignment.

Media

Pulaski County has one daily and three weekly print newspapers, as well as an online internet daily newspaper. The county also has two internet discussion sites, the Pulaski County Web and Pulaski County Insider.

KFBD-FM and its AM sister station, KJPW, are the dominant news radio providers in the Pulaski County area, which includes Fort Leonard Wood, Waynesville, and St. Robert. These stations compete with the only other station broadcasting from Pulaski County, KFLW Radio, owned by the Lebanon Daily Record [1] and working locally from the St. Robert offices of the Pulaski County Mirror [2] weekly newspaper.

The Daily Guide, commonly known as the Waynesville Daily Guide [3] but based in St. Robert and serving the entire county, is owned by Gatehouse Media [4] and is the central printing plant for three other Gatehouse newspapers in nearby counties, the daily Camden Lake Sun Leader [5] and Rolla Daily News [6] as well as the weekly St. James Leader-Journal.[7]

The content of the weekly Fort Leonard Wood Guidon [8] is produced under the auspices of Army Public Affairs at Fort Leonard Wood but printed under contract by the Springfield News-Leader,[9] a Gannett-owned [10] newspaper which produces and sells advertisements in the Fort Leonard Wood Guidon.

The weekly Pulaski County Mirror [11] is owned by the Lebanon Daily Record, [12] a family owned newspaper in an adjoining county. The paper is a merger of the Richland Mirror and Pulaski County Democrat in St. Robert, which were separate weekly papers owned by the Lebanon Daily Record until their owner merged them in 2009.

The Pulaski County Daily News [13] internet newspaper is privately owned by a St. Robert resident.

The Pulaski County Insider [14] is run by a group of St. Robert and Waynesville residents and maintained and hosted by a Potosi resident.

The Pulaski County Web [15] is run and maintained by a Devil's Elbow resident.

A third weekly newspaper, the Dixon Pilot, doesn't routinely cover Buckhorn.

School Districts

Although much of Buckhorn is now in the Waynesville city limits it is still part of the Laquey R-V School District.[16]

Fort Leonard Wood is in Pulaski County and a high percentage of military personnel live off post in surrounding communities, especially St. Robert and Waynesville but also the farther-out cities of Richland, Crocker, and Dixon, and the unincorporated communities of Laquey, Swedeborg and Devil's Elbow, all of which have a lower housing cost than nearer housing in St. Robert and Waynesville. Military personnel assigned to training areas on the south end of the post sometimes choose to live in the unincorporated areas of Big Piney and Palace in Pulaski County, or the northern Texas County communities of Plato and Roby.

Seven main school districts are fully or partly within the borders of Pulaski County, not counting two small districts which are mostly within other counties and only have only a few dozen residents within Pulaski County. All seven school districts have a high percentage of Fort Leonard Wood military dependents, and over two-thirds of Waynesville students fall into that category.

The cities of Waynesville and St. Robert and the Fort Leonard Wood army installation, along with their surrounding rural areas running east to Devil's Elbow, are served by the Waynesville R-VI School District[17] which is by far the largest in the county.

Other Pulaski County school districts are the Richland R-IV School District, Swedeborg R-III School District, Crocker R-II School District, and Dixon R-II School District. Though located in northern Texas County, the Plato R-V School District serves Pulaski County residents living south of Fort Leonard Wood.