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1894 Map of Ellsworth

Name: 1894 Topographic Map of Ellsworth
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1924
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1924

About this map

Ellsworth serves as the central hub of this Central Kansas landscape, surveyed in the late nineteenth century when the region's character was defined by a expanding network of iron rails. The Union Pacific Railway and the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad cut across the prairie, anchoring settlements like Kanopolis and Holyrood. The terrain is marked by a transition from the Saline River in the north to the distinctive Table Rock formation in the east.

Smaller stops and townships reveal a dense grid of early development, with places such as Blackwolf, Lorraine, and Geneseo situated along the competing lines of the St. Louis and San Francisco Railway and the Missouri Pacific Railway. Numerous creek systems, including Cow Creek and Wolf Creek, crisscross the townships, illustrating the vital water sources that supported the cattle and farming economies of this era.