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History · Madison

Madison’s post office opened in 1858, and 41% of its homes were built before 1940

1858first post office
0on the National Register
41%homes built before 1940
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Quick answers

How Madison began

When was Madison founded?

1858

The Madison post office opened in 1858, the earliest record of the town by name.

2020 census: 689168 years
Founding year: the first Madison post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Madison’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of Madison are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.Old housesHalf of Madison’s homes were built before 1946.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Madison’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Madison’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
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The story

How Madison came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Madison.

Read it all →

Madison was founded in 1872, northwest of the present town. In 1879, the town was relocated to its present site when the Howard Branch of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad was built from Emporia to Moline. The first building was the home of W. H. Green, a Civil War veteran. Green went to Kansas in 1867, took up a homestead, and operated a trading post on the original town site. Madison took its name from Madison Township.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

By decade

Madison, decade by decade

Today1 recent
Madison-Kansas-depot-atsf-back-side2016Madison-Kansas-depot-atsf-back-side

Questions about Madison’s history

What year was Madison founded?

The Madison post office opened in 1858, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

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Sources

Where this page comes from

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). How TownRatings grades history →

From Wikimedia Commons (1), Wikidata (1), Wikipedia, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.