A Little “Ivy Bend” History
The road to Ivy Bend is unique and has an interesting history.
At one time, the area known as Ivy Bend was a thriving farm community. Settlers came to the rolling hills of central Missouri, saw the rich bottom land, and built their homes.
The name Ivy Bend comes from Col. Ivy, a man who supposedly brought his slaves from Kentucky to work his farm. Ivy owned the big end of the Bend before the government took the land over. Many families lived just outside the Bend along a wagon trail that eventually became Lake Road 135-12 and later Ivy Bend Road.
In 1929, Union Electric went into the farming region of the Bend, wanting to create a source of power; a man-made lake.
Families like Ivy’s sold the bottom land to Union Electric. The farmland was to go under water. The farmers moved away and Union Electric backed up the waters of the Niangua and Osage rivers.
The lake was full in 1931. Ivy Bend became a finger of land surrounded by water. Those who now populate the Bend are different than the earlier settlers. What had been a farming community became a lake community with resorts and other commercial features. Many of those who presently live in the Ivy Bend area are from cities such as Kansas City. In the early years most of the property owner were “weekenders”.
Ivy Bend, a peninsula former by the Lake of the Ozarks, is in the southwest corner of Morgan County and is surrounded almost completely by water. Children who live in the Ivy Bend area attend Morgan County R-1 school in Stover.
