Founded as a post office on September 13, 1881, it was called
Altory. Anselmo B. Smith platted the town site, located 10 miles
of Oberlin, in 1885 and called it Kanona. The town had a hardware
store, a barbershop, two general stores, and a hotel. By 1910,
the population was 125. By 1920, Kanona was a shipping point along
the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad line. A stockyard
and two elevators were built near the tracks.
Several fires in the 1920's destroyed several of the businesses,
and a tornado in 1949 damaged the school, lumberyard, and many
other buildings in town. Today there is not much left of the town.
The ethnicity of its settlers is unknown.
Sources
Fitzgerald, Daniel. Faded Dreams:
More Ghost Towns of Kansas." Lawrence, KS: University Press
of Kansas, 1994.
"Kansas: A cyclopedia of
state history, embracing events, institutions, industries, counties,
cities, towns, prominent persons, etc." Chicago: Standard
Publishing Company, 1912.
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