[Excerpt from Dodge City and Ford County, Kansas 1870-1920 Pioneer Histories and Stories. Copyright Ford County Historical Society, Inc. All Rights reserved.]
James E. Fishback was the original owner of the northeast quarter of Section 18, Range 22, Township 29 of Ford County, Kansas, where the town of Kingsdown is located. The townsite is in the northeast [corner] of the northeast quarter of Section 18. Fishback deeded a strip of that land to the Rock Island Railroad, April 13, 1887. On May 13 of the same year, he sold land to the South Ark (Arkansas) Valley Town Company. It was on this land that newcomers from the east settled in an area they called Kingsdown.
Different stories are told of the origin of Kingsdown’s name. The most accepted story is that which came from the conversation of two English homesteaders in the area. Open grasslands in England were commonly called “downs.” The first spring after their arrival, the two friends were admiring the wildflower-covered prairies. One of them said, “How beautiful are the prairies.” The other replied, “Say, indeed, they remind me of the King’s down.” Others agreed that it was a perfect description of the locality and the settlement became known as Kingsdown. Minnie Baldwin told of this version of the name’s origin in an article that appeared in The Kingsdown Clarion in 1951. The article was reprinted in the centennial copy of the Clarion in 1976. There are three towns in England by that name, but this small Ford County village is the only Kingsdown in the United States.
The county records also show that on August 7, 1909, the land belonged to A.S. Sisson, and the original townsite was platted into city blocks by B.L. Glenn, Ford County surveyor. As the town grew, more city blocks were platted by W.B. Barnes on September 9, 1910; by John M. Rau’s on December 18, 1912; by Hollis Boice and A.S. Sisson on May 31, 1917; and by Bertie Sisson on July 25, 1921.
The 1976 centennial reprint of The Kingsdown Clarion includes some recollections of old timers that tell us of life as it used to be. Charles Cummings remembered how his father and his eight-year-old brother came to the Kingsdown area from Waverly, Kansas, early in 1903. The rest of the family came later that spring. At the time, Charles was three years old.
“Two or three years later,” Cummings related, “a cyclone came along and just about cleaned us out. We all happened to be in the cellar, but the dog was in the house. When the house flew apart, the dog dropped out of the bottom. At no time after that could you leave that dog alone in the house.
“The cyclone took the hayrack by the side of the barn, but the barn wasn’t hurt. We picked up pictures all over the country. There was a horse from over on the Shufelberger place-it blew that horse from over there into our pasture. Another horse from over southeast of our place was blown over, so we had those two horses in our pasture.
“We went to school over here one-half mile north of Fred Hiss’s. Part of the time we walked; part of the time we drove the team of horses. One time we had a little runaway over there, it sort of scattered us kids around a little bit. I was probably in the second grade.
“Later on we went to school at Kingsdown. One time we came to school and didn’t wear any coats. It was real nice out. A blizzard came up, so we didn’t have any coats to wear home. Boyd Fritzlen ran the grocery store down here; he fixed us up with coats to wear home.
“I can remember my Dad helped build the first grocery store down here.”
In another article in the same paper, Harry Baldwin remembered: “The way they used to haul wheat before there was an elevator at Kingsdown, whoever wanted to sell wheat would order a railroad car, then all the neighbors would pitch in and haul that wheat, regardless of the weather, whenever the car got there. Then they ‘d scoop it into the car. This was before we had elevators, of course.
“All the wells in those days were hand dug – I don’t know how they did it. I can remember yet where all those old homesteads used to be down around home; there used to be a well on ‘purt near’ every quarter.”
Another article in the reprinted Clarion told of the Rock Island Railroad coming to Kingsdown in 1887. The company purchased property adjoining the townsite to build a roundhouse, a depot, and section houses. The depot was a two-story frame structure with living quarters. After crops failed and businesses closed, the railroad sold some of the buildings to farmers, and the depot was moved to Oklahoma. Later, the last section house burned to the ground. The land owned by the railroad was sold for taxes by 1898.
The Rock Island renewed its faith in Kingsdown in 1910. Businesses improved and more residences were built. A box car was used as a station until a depot could be built in the fall. Section houses were constructed and a water storage tower erected. Water was piped into the depot.
The new depot was painted a deep railroad red and trimmed in white. Through the years, the colors were changed several times. The railroad closed the depot in 1968.
Postal service began in the Kingsdown area as early as April 14, 1887. Mail was first delivered to the Colcord Post Office, but within the month Colcord became Newkirk. In January 1888, the U.S. Post Office Department changed both the name and the site of the office to Kingsdown. Charles E. Vallandingham was postmaster at Colcord and Newkirk. When the post office was moved to Kingsdown, Clark Shelton was put in charge. Later, in 1888, Riley W. Kinslow held the office.
In a one-room school house on May 21, 1904, the Kingsdown Union Sunday school was organized. Eight different denominations were represented. It later became Presbyterian. The first church was built in 1907. The cost of the building and the furniture was $1,525. In 1930, anew brick church was built at a cost of $18,000. A complete history of the church and Sunday school may be found in the 1951 edition of The Kingsdown Clarion and the 50th anniversary booklet of the Kingsdown Presbyterian Church.
As the population increased in the late 1800s, the need for schools arose. To meet these needs, rural schools were built. Belleflower, Poverty Platte, Maple Glen, Springdale, Hoard, North Star, Mulberry and Glover were some of the schools organized over the years. The last to be organized was the two-room Kingsdown school. Salaries of rural teachers ranged from $35 a month in the early years to $125 when the districts were closed by consolidation. Even the Kingsdown school closed in 1924, when the county voted for school consolidation.
The first newspaper in Kingsdown was The Kingsdown Clarion published in January 1912, by Mrs. Ruth Mathews Wilson. The last edition was printed December 21, 1916. Members of the Spirituelle Club published a special mid-century edition of the Clarion in October 1951, dedicated to pioneer mothers. A bicentennial edition was published by community residents in the summer of 1976, as a part of Kingsdown’s commemoration of the 200th birthday of the United States.
In August 1914, F.A. Gresham put in telephones on the new line going into Kingsdown. And during the prosperous times, there was a waterworks in Kingsdown.
Myrna Austin, the daughter of Ray Vanatta, was born in Kingsdown in 1928 and lived there until her marriage in 1947. While she conversed with her uncle, Bill Winsor, they recalled many places and people in Kingsdown and on the surrounding farms. Some of the farm families were the Stimperts and Ellises, the Albert Haags, Harry Baldwins, Homer Clevengers, Perry Cummingses, Harry Couches, D.C. Whites, Clarence Bickerdites, and Cora Vanatta and her son, Ray, who were Myrna’s grandmother and her father. Myrna’s Uncle Bill married Albert Haag’s daughter, Ella, and worked on the Haag farm until he and Ella were able to buy one of their own. He was still farming there when this book was written.
Myrna’s grandfather, Clarence Winsor, owned and operated Pop’s Cafe for many years. Ray Vanatta was a carpenter and farmer. During the 1930s when the Civilian Conservation Corps camp was being built, Hollis Boice and Ray built the long bathhouse that the C.C.C. boys and their leaders used during the construction of the Clark County Lake.
Myrna and her uncle remembered that during the years when Kingsdown was a thriving town, Ted Cory ran the bank and Lena Smith worked there. Charlie and Iva Gross had the grocery store. Miss Mills was the postmistress. At that time, Ben Holliway owned the International Hardware Store, L.J. White ran the lumber yard, Albert Haag had the garage, and Arch Sisson drove the gas truck that delivered fuel to the farmers. Homer Clevenger was down at the elevator and Roy Vanatta was at the Rock Island depot. Dr. Bandy was the doctor and also the owner of the drug store.
Myrna Austin remembered one incident that, while stressful at the time brings a chuckle as it is recalled. Her uncle Roy Vanatta was the Rock Island depot agent in Kingsdown. The time was February 1918, during the last year of World War I. Vanatta had received his “invitation” to join the army at the recruiting office in Dodge City. On the appointed day, inclement weather made it nearly impossible for Roy and his Model T Ford to navigate 20 miles of muddy roads to Dodge. The railroad section foreman came to the rescue by offering to take Roy to the county seat on his handcar. Roy agreed to the handcar ride, but he didn’t reckon with his mother. She informed him she was going along. She wanted to see her son off on the train. And she did. Bad weather and a ride on an open handcar didn’t stop her. Roy Vanatta returned to Kingsdown after the war and again worked for the railroad. Later, the Rock Island transferred him to McPherson, where he worked until he retired.
As highways improved and transportation became faster and more convenient, Kingsdown went the way of many small rural towns. Residents went out of town to shop. Local businesses closed; once busy streets became empty. The town died. In 1995, the cooperative grain elevator and adjacent filling station surrounded by a few homes – mostly those of retired local farmers – are all that remain in Kingsdown.
Lola Adams Crum
Centennial edition 1976, The Kingsdown Clarion
Clayton Hall, research; Bill Winsor; Myrna Austin; Kansas Heritage Center
Ford County Register of Deeds office
Dodge City and Ford County, Kansas 1870-1920 Pioneer Histories and Stories is available for purchase from the Ford County Historical Society.