The Ozarks Chronicler

History buffs may already be familiar with Kaitlyn McConnell, the face behind the one-woman website, OzarksAlive.com, which showcases the people, places, folklore, and “things you can’t find in a Google search” of the region.

As of last November, fans have even more to read: Kaitlyn’s new self-published guidebook, Passport to the Ozarks.

“I’m always asked about places to see and things to do. This book is for anyone who loves the Ozarks, anyone who likes exploring and discovering something new and seeing a piece of it firsthand,” she says.

Perhaps no one has dedicated more time to exploring the nooks and crannies of the Ozarks than Kaitlyn, a seventh generation Ozarkian born and raised in Webster County. She grew up in the same house as her grandmother. Her parents still live there. “It was so cool to be in an environment where you could see how things played a role in the past,” she says. For the thirty-one-year old, history isn’t a dusty thing from the days gone by. It’s alive.

At seventeen, McConnell began writing a newspaper column in The Marshfield Mail chronicling different sites in Webster County, ultimately leading her to pursue journalism at Drury University. While living abroad post-graduation, Kaitlyn felt heartsick and unmoored. She missed writing about her favorite subject: home. So after three years, she moved back and started a blog. “I wasn’t going to wait for someone to give me the chance to do that writing. I was just going to do it myself.”

Today, Ozarks Alive has over 25,000 fans. While readers often categorize her work as historical, Kaitlyn focuses on connecting it to the present.

“We’re a very unique region,” she says. “Every place can say that, of course, but we’re unique because it feels like the Ozarks modernized a lot slower than other places in the country. You don’t have to look back very far to find a completely different world. My grandmother didn’t have electricity or water or indoor plumbing growing up. In a lot of cases, those people are still here and I’m capturing those stories.”

Her project is mostly self-funded. Donations and T-shirt sales help, too. She uncovers subjects through newspaper articles, tips, and sometimes just exploring.

“I don’t want things that are commonly known. I want it to be a surprise,” she says. “I just drive around. Sometimes something’s hidden out there, like the Golden [Pioneer] Museum down on the border. I was just driving down to Eureka Springs one day and there was this museum there! It was just mind-
blowing.” The museum sits less than one mile from the Missouri-Arkansas border.

To date, Kaitlyn has written roughly 250 entries on Ozarks Alive. Asking her to pick a favorite person, place, or event makes her shift in her seat.

“They’re all my favorites,” she says. “But the one that always sticks out to me is Porter’s Café in Douglas County. It was run by a lady who was ninety-one years old.” Sadly, Theta Porter passed away in 2019. “She ran it single-handedly: took the orders, cooked the orders, baked the pies, cleaned up the tables, and she’d been doing it all since she was in her thirties. As time passes, more and more longtime Ozarks landmarks and ordinary-yet-legendary people disappear. I want to share as many of these people and places as I can while they’re still with us. I’ll be forever grateful that I got to meet Theta.”