Moberly is a city in Randolph County, Missouri, United States. The population was 13,974 at the 2010 census.HistoryMoberly was founded in 1866, and named after Colonel William E. Moberly, the first president of the Chariton and Randolph County railroads.Like other towns in the Little Dixie region of Missouri in which it is located, Moberly has a history of racial violence. On February 18, 1893, John Hughes, an African American, was lynched by whites because he was deemed to have insulted a white person. In November 1919, meanwhile, four African-American men alleged to have beaten and robbed a white farmer were arrested. A mob of white men built a fire in Forest Park -- today's Rothwell Park -- and removed the arrested men from the jail. When they attempted to hang George Adams, one of the African-American men, from a tree, the limb broke and when Adams tried to escape he was shot dead. The Kansas City Star called the event "a disgrace to the community and the state."In 1959, the local school board was party to a legal case, Naomi Brooks et al., Appellants, v. School District of City of Moberly, Missouri, Etc., et al; in which post-Brown v. Board of Education desegregation resulted in the termination of all the African-American faculty members; based on their "poor performance". This was appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States; but was not heard on, and thus upheld.
