Millbrook
Located about three miles southwest
of Hill City, Millbrook was platted on April 8, 1879 by a homesteader
named N. C. Terrell. He owned the general store that was established
in the fall of 1878. Millbrook was named the temporary county
seat on April 1, 1880 by Governor John P. St. John, and it retained
the county seat following an election in June. The choices were
Millbrook, Gettysburg, Hill City and Roscoe. Another election
was held in July 1881 and Millbrook got 473 votes to Gettysburg's
349; shortly thereafter people started leaving Gettysburg to move
to Millbrook.
A tornado (or cyclone as it was known
in those days) hit the town on August 4, 1887 and basically wiped
it out. Hill City then decided to take advantage of the downfall
of Millbrook to bring the county seat to them. The voters in the
election held on March 6, 1888 decided that Hill City would become
the county seat. The Millbrook post office was discontinued on
August 15, 1889 and moved to Hill City.
By 1895, an act of the Kansas Legislature
vacated the town sites of Roscoe, Gettysburg, and Millbrook.
The ethnicity of its settlers is unknown.
Sources
Clary, Blossom and Ruth Siegrist.
"Centennial Tid-Bits." Hill City, KS: Hill City Times,
1980.
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