Kansas is an extraordinary state for Ghost Towns - not every Ghost Town on this particular video was a "population zero" ghost town - and really unincorporated towns - and past ghost towns that now have inhabitants living in them again (like Cerro Gordo) would be an interesting discussion and topic! Meanwhile - the towns that are presented in this video make up a small number of other ghost towns across the state - the history is rich. What Ghost Towns are you familiar with in Kansas? Would love to dig further in this state!
Detroit and several others along Old Highway 40 through Dickinson and Geary counties. Some nominally inhabited. Usually an old schoolhouse, or a grain elevator, and a few houses.
@@beckycook4569 I have plans to get some video footage - Kansas is one of those states that I get spoiled watching my friend John (Wise Guy) with his videos. Thank you for commenting.
@@robchit1 I agree with you 100% - I have more in depth work coming, especially with the podcast. It's interesting as you start something and you start digging, and you look back at past work or research and notice some things you either glossed over or one of the community members catch something or add (which quite frankly is the best! Because we learn together. That's half the fun.) I'm with you on diving deeper ESPECIALLY with Kansas! Thank you for the comments and feedback!
Stay out of Kansas the chemical farming is poisoning all of us. Destroying our trees, children and elderly suffering, living in fear. The chemical wasteland.
Trivia: Tom Mix (who was a film actor and star of early Western movies) served as Le Hunt's town marshal before he became famous. Mix has a very interesting story himself. Also, Le Hunt was less than 10 miles from the real Little House on the Prairie near Independence, Kansas. It's possible that when Le Hunt was founded in 1905, the Ingalls' original log cabin may have still been standing.
The history of that town...I didn't do it justice. Great excuse to travel to Kansas! The black baptist church which is so iconic in many photographs is no longer standing...time stops for no one..What a reminder of our own mortality. Thanks for commenting - appreciate it.
The first place in the video is called BOO-Shong. There are many places that are just disappearing. Elmdale is really known for Camp Wood today. Sadly there is not much left in Dunlap.
@@Sondan1988 😊 I am going down there now after you called me out....lol. I put it much higher on my list. MY job has me all over the beautiful states in the country (midwest...or more of the Great Plain states) When I first started making ghost town videos I did them more as a documentary and as time went on, found myself loving the history and the connections with people, which means this will now be a forever thing for me. Bushong was brought up a few times from this older video - telling me to get down there!
Great series. When I was a young man I used to spend my weekends driving around Iowa (primarily northeastern Iowa near Dubuque) exploring the small towns. To me it was heaven on earth doing a summer drive with my top down seeing all these fascinating sights.
Pretty country up by Dubuque...rolling hills. Mississippi River lands...not to mention "The Field of Dreams" nearby. That whole area around Dubuque and stretching east towards Galena, Illinois has a fasinating history with lead mining. Thanks for dropping by and commenting.
Thank you so much Linda - I have to get a running list going on all of these! I appreciate the info and feedback! Honestly, talking with any of the subscribers or commenters - is what keeps me going. I appreciate it! Thank you.
The former town of Crisfield, About 17 miles west of Anthony Ks. A place I've been many times with my job as a driver for bnsf transporting rail crews. The most I can see remaining are foundations where buildings once stood. It is now just a train siding..
@@BuccaneerBruce I appreciate the feedback on this! Especially with Kansas...I'm in the Dakotas, and Nebraska alot - and so I'm always grateful when I get tips from my Kansas friends!
I am a Dunlap native. I went to elementary school there. The last year the high school was open was the 1959-1960 school year when I was in the seventh grade. Starting with the 1960-1961 school year, Dunlap students of high school age could attend either Americus High School or Council Grove Rural High School because the school district consolidation had not yet occurred. Buses from both the Americus and Council Grove high schools came through town to pick up students. I attended Americus High School the 1961-1962 school year and Council Grove Rural High School through the end of the 1964-1965 school year when I graduated. Sometime after I left for college at K-State the official consolidation of the former Dunlap school district into Kansas Unified School District 417 occurred and the option to attend Americus High School was no longer available. The Dunlap schools were integrated long before the well-known "Brown vs. Board of Education" case was ruled upon by the US Supreme Court. Growing up, I knew nothing about Pap Singleton but my father, who was the rural mail carrier for Dunlap, told me about an area southwest of Dunlap and southwest of the Dunlap Road bridge over the Neosho River where a large number of black families had lived at one time. The Singleton colony had their own schools that were supported by the Presbyterian Church. The black population of Dunlap had dwindled to just a few families in the 1950s and early 1960s when I was in elementary school. I remember three black families living on farms near Dunlap. The Talley family lived southwest of Dunlap where the main Singleton Colony had been. Ralph Davis and his son Jackie lived just north of Road 300 after it turns east from Road A in Lyon County. Jackie Davis put up a memorial to the exodusters just before his death that is near the entrance to the Davis farm on Road 300. I believe that London and Anna Harness lived on the west side of Road B north of Road 300, but I'm not sure of the exact location. The black population remaining inside the city limits was concentrated in the northeast portion of town, with a number of black owned homes along the west side of Broadway north of 4th Street on the east edge of town. When I was young, there was an AME Church on the northwest corner of the intersection of 3rd and Ohio, and a black Baptist Church on the west side of Ohio Street between 2nd and 3rd Streets. I remember being at my maternal grandparents' home just outside the city limits east of 4th and Broadway listing to singing of gospel music and spirituals when there was an occasional service at the black Baptist Church. During a couple of summers after I had begun attending Council Grove Rural High School, I worked for the Dunlap Cemetery District, a publicly supported cemetery district of Valley Township, mowing and cleaning up both the Dunlap Cemetery and the Dunlap Colored Cemetery, which were about half a mile apart northeast of Dunlap. The last passenger run on the MKT railroad took place in 1954. My mother and I rode the "Doodlebug," a self-propelled combination passenger and freight car, from Dunlap to Americus just so I could say I had ridden the Katy. The tracks were removed in 1957. If you look at Google Maps or Google Earth on the satellite view northeast of 1st Street and S 150 Road you can see the location of an MKT spur line that ran from a rock quarry southeast toward S 150 Road. The location of the remainder of the spur that connected to the main MKT line just southeast of Dunlap is no longer visible. My great uncle Grant Hylton and his son Robert both worked for the MKT on a track crew. They both retired from the MKT after the tracks were pulled. My first cousin Wylie Ryman was a station agent for the MKT in White City KS until the tracks were pulled and later was a station agent at several locations on the MKT in southeast Kansas along the remaining MKT branch lines. In the 1950s I can remember when Dunlap had the Hobble grocery store, a lumber yard and a grain elevator both run by Walter Cobb, the Guaranty State Bank, the Wynn Bernard Hardware run by Fred Bernard, a fixit shop, a skating rink owned by the same people as the skating rink in Emporia KS, the Post Office where Francis Edwards was the postmaster and my father Royal Ryman was the rural mail carrier, and the Fred Bernard service station on the northeast corner of 4th Street and the Dunlap Road. There was a small city library originally in the City Hall on the southeast corner of 4th and Commercial and later in a small building just north of the Post Office on the west side of Commercial. All the earlier mentioned businesses were on Commercial Street between 4th and 5th streets except for the grain elevator that was on the southeast corner of Commercial and Guilford along the MKT tracks. Some of the elevator buildings are still standing. The Methodist Church was on the northwest corner of 6th and Ohio. It is still there, but is now owned by the Morris County Historical Society. The Methodist parsonage was on the southwest corner of 5th and Guilford. When I was very small the house just south of the parsonage was the home and office of a Dr. Woodmancy. A small house for the principal of the high school was just north of 4th Street near the intersection of 4th Street and Ohio. The Dunlap Telephone Exchange was in the 2nd house south of 5th Street on the west side of Commercial. At one time when I was very small I remember a portable screen being set up in 5th Street just west of Commercial and a movie was shown there with the projector being in the intersection of 5th and Commercial. The population of Dunlap was 134 at both the 1950 and 1960 census and 102 at the 1970 census. As of this writing (August 27, 2024) the City Building and volunteer fire department building remains on the east side of Commercial between 4th and 5th Streets. The Tri-County Telephone building is just north of the city building. The school gymnasium is still there between the former locations of the elementary and high school south of 5th Street on the west side of town. It is owned by the volunteer fire department and is available for public functions. The former Methodist Church building is still on the northeast corner of 6th and Ohio but was donated to the Morris County Historical Society when the Dunlap Methodist Church merged with the Council Grove Methodist Church. It is available for funerals and other public functions by arrangement with the historical society. Many of the remaining private houses are in poor shape, including the house I grew up in on the southeast corner of 6th and Commercial. A number of the remaining occupied private residences are trailers. The population of Dunlap was 27 at the 2020 census but at least one of those residents has now passed away.
@@JeffRyman69 WOW! Thank you so much for sharing. That was a wealth of information! I'm grateful for the comment, and detailed history ESPECIALLY from a local - who had feet and eyes on the ground to share stories and past experiences. It's quite the history!
I will add one more piece of information that I was not sure of yesterday. There is conflicting information on the internet about the incorporation status of Dunlap. I received an email from the Morris County Clerk today, August 28, 2004 that confirms that Dunlap is still incorporated as a city of the 3rd class. I am going to try to change any incorrect information I find on Wikipedia or other web sites, but correcting information is not always possible. There is a web site that purports to show a picture of a Dunlap school building but that identification is incorrect. The picture of the school shown is a one-room country school that was known as the Big John School because it sits alongside the Big John creek on the way from Dunlap to Council Grove. I have contacted the owners of that web site twice but have not even gotten the courtesy of a reply, let alone a correction.
@@midwestghosttown Thank you for your reply and for discussing Dunlap in the first place. There isn't much left of Dunlap now and I feel that I should add information when I can give it reliably.
@@JeffRyman69 this is good info Jeff. Especially when facing incorportaed vs. unincorporated status. Than you have the other unique question of what deems a town a ghost town? Absolute population zero? Or 90% population reduction from its highest population point? I call them living ghost towns. So, Dunlap is incorporated as of 2024? Just following up. Thank you!
The Bushong story about the baseball names doesn't hold water with me. Any other towns near there aren't baseball related except the ghost town of Comisky to the west near Council Grove. Thanks for your information
@@robchit1 it could be - I'll need to do some more digging. If anyone has any stories on baseball leagues in or around Bushong it would be much appreciated. Thanks for commenting Rob!
He never said that the other towns named after the Browns players were nearby, just that several other depots were named after players by the Missouri Pacific Railroad. Those could have been in Missouri as well. Guessing the info came from Wikipedia.
Ahhh! I meant to reach out to you before posting, just to check on a few...I didn't want to leave Elmdale off this list just because they aren't zero population. They have a heartbreak history with the floods! I'll keep my eyes peeled for the video. How was your time there?
=) one more! Kansas is one of those states - that literally has more than most states (minus Texas of course) - studying the dust bowl and Great Depression era towns - puts Kansas front and center on ALOT of that history - I appreciate Kansas historians and locals reaching out - thanks for the extra one!
Any that touches on Kansas history would be appreciated. John gets around a lot more but perhaps this gentleman can go more in-depth with the history of these communities. Watch them all!
@@replicant_7774 I'm not offended at all! John is a friend of mine. He also touches on towns that arent technically ghosttowns - more unincorporated or small towns...BUT...his travel schedule amazes me. LOL...we were talking once (my oldest son runs track collegiately) and I was trying to figure the balance between being WSU track coach, traveling AND youtubing with both footage, editing, and research background information ontop of it. He is amazing. - not to mention his drone shots. I'm looking to go more in depth with the stories and transitioned to more podcast - along with the channel. I appreciate your comments no matter what - and keep following wiseguy! Great guy.
Thank you Jim. I went back over it and you called it! I was focusing more on storyline and missed some western representation. I owe Western Kansas a couple of videos. Appreciate the observation.
For some reason I thought I had Nicodemus on this list...and you are right! I feel it deserves both a video and podcast done on it...I'm putting it down on content calendar for February. Thank you for reaching out on this one Alan!
