2009 Map of Castle Rock NW

About this map

Red Top Cemetery sits as a solitary cultural landmark in this section of Gove County, where the High Plains landscape is defined by a rigid grid of rural roads and meandering drainage systems. The survey area is organized by the Gove County road network, including thoroughfares such as Gove 74, Gove 80, and Gove U, which carve the prairie into predictable sections for ranching and agriculture. The drainage of the land is dictated by the eastward-flowing waters of Big Creek in the north and the complex tributaries of Hackberry Creek in the south. These waterways are seasonal in nature, yet they create the only significant breaks in the flat, surveyed geometry of the region. The map highlights a typical late-twentieth-century Kansas rural structure, where human presence is sparse and focused on the intersections of named county lines.