Its Register listings are the State Steet Bridge and the First Christian Church. Below: 7 old photos and papers, maps from 1886 on, and the census since 1870.
Founding year: the first Erie post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Erie’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Erie is more historic than 67% of U.S. towns. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its age pulls it down.
B+
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Erie’s overall grade.
Kansas towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Kansas town has 5.1 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Erie’s 16.4 sits above most of its state (76% of Kansas towns have fewer) while its 2 listings outnumber those of 60% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from B− to A−. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±7.2 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Erie’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Lost a third of its people between 1870 and 1880, then grew 3-fold.
16 censuses, 1870–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Erie’s Wikipedia page.
Every building
Erie, building by building, 1886–1912
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
1886Sheet 1 of 1
Edition
Sheets
BrickWoodStone
Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
A settlement named "Erie", later referred to as "Old Erie" and "Beantown USA", was platted 2 miles (3.2 km) northwest of the present townsite, while another community, known as Crawfordsville, was started two miles northeast of the current site. In 1866, the proprietors of these two towns made a compromise to abandon the towns and combine with the settlement at the present Erie site. Four men gave 40 acres each, that butted together, out of their 160-acre shares, to create the city plat of Erie. These men were: David Bray, Luther Puckett, John Himmelwright and Peter Walter. In November of that year the Erie Town Company was formed. Each member of this company donated forty acres of land in the center of Section 32, Township 28, Range 20 east. Each member was to buy city plots and improve them.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
The Erie post office opened in 1866, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Erie rank for history?
Erie is more historic than 67% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Erie?
Two places: the State Steet Bridge (listed 1985) and the First Christian Church (2021).
How old are the homes in Erie?
23% of Erie’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±7.2 points), against a typical 10% for a Kansas town; the median home was built in 1971.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (5), the Library of Congress (4), the National Register of Historic Places (2), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1940
1940
1940
1979
2026
2005
