Edson | Eustis
| Gandy | Goodland
| Itasca | Kanorado
| Ruleton | Sherman
Center | Voltaire
Homesteading in Sherman County
Itasca / Leonard
The town, which was laid out and platted
in December 1885, was first named Leonard after Thomas P. Leonard,
one of the platters and a member of the Sherman County Land Association.
A real estate office, a school, a drugstore, and a livery stable,
as well as the Commercial Hotel, were built the following spring.
Getting a post office proved to be
a problem because the name of the town was similar to other town
names in the state. After trying 3 times during the summer of
1886 to establish a post office and being refused because of the
name, the board of trustees met on August 16 decided to change
the name from Leonard to Itasca.
Itasca made an unsuccessful bid for
the county seat, and when the railroad came into the county late
in 1886, the tracks were several miles from the town. Most of
the businesses moved to Sherman Center and Eustis that fall, and
the Commercial Hotel and the Swigart Building moved to Goodland
in 1887. There is nothing that remains today of the town of Itasca.
The ethnicity of its settlers is not
known.
Sources
Fitzgerald, Daniel. "Faded
Dreams: More Ghost Towns of Kansas". University Press of
Kansas, 1994.
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