Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
More historic than 42% of U.S. towns. What drives it
Most of High Prairie Township was built recently: 7% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1992. Its Register listing is the Little Stranger Church and Cemetery. Below: maps from 1950 on and old-book passages.
The High Prairie Township post office opened in 1875, the earliest record of the town by name. Three smaller post offices, Bell (1871), High Prairie (1875) and Boling (1882), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
More historic than 42% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, High Prairie Township is more historic than 42% of U.S. towns. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
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 High Prairie Township’s 9.3 sits near the middle of its state (63% of Kansas towns have fewer) while its 2 historic buildings outnumber those of 60% of U.S. towns.
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 →
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how High Prairie Township’s history is told.
Three other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of High Prairie Township yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.
High Prairie Township is a township in Leavenworth County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population was 2,014.
Its first post office opened in 1875. Its population held steady between the last two censuses: 2,002 in 2010, 2,014 in 2020.
Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.
Passages that mention High Prairie Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
High Prairie Township. — High Prairie Township was organized on September 16, 1867, as follows: All that part of Stranger Township lying north of. the section lines dividing sections 4 and 9, 5 and 8, 6 and 7, in township ten, ranges twenty-one and twenty-two and sections 1 and 12, 2 and 11, and 3 and 10, in township ten, range twenty-one was declared to be a new and distinct township known as High Prairie Township.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
tured by the Confederates, but escaped shortly after and joined the Melton's Reserves just prior to the close of the war. Mr. Wright came to Kansas in 1886 and died here about November, 1900 and is buried at White Church in High Prairie Township. John W. Wright came to Leavenworth June 18, 1883 from Virginia and for a number of years worked by the day. About thirty years ago, he began contracting and building, doing work mostly for the government, in which work he is still actively engaged. He built the last one-half of
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of High Prairie Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of High Prairie Township.
The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Nobody well known was born in High Prairie Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The High Prairie Township post office opened in 1875, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
High Prairie Township is more historic than 42% 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.
One place: the Little Stranger Church and Cemetery (listed 2015).
7% of High Prairie Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±5.0 points), against a typical 10% for a Kansas town; the median home was built in 1992.
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
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 the National Register of Historic Places (1), U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
