The story
Read it all →How Plains came to be
From Wikipedia’s history of Plains.
Plains was originally called West Plains, and under the latter name was platted in January 1885.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
–Not graded
History · Plains
Plains’ post office opened in 1894, and 21% of its homes were built before 1940
Below: 1 old photo or paper from 1900 on and old-book passages.
1894first post office
0on the National Register
21%homes built before 1940
1old photo or paper
Quick answers
How Plains began
When was Plains founded?
1894
The Plains post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name. Another post office, West Plains (1884), opened inside today’s city and later closed.
2020 census: 1,037132 years
Founding year: the first Plains post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
What stands out about Plains’ past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
★ What stands out · Help out
Start Plains’s collection
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Plains’s history is told.
Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
1 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.From the old history books
What they wrote about Plains in 1916
Passages that mention Plains, cut from the printed page as they were published.
A history of Meade County, Kansas1916 · page 84Read the page →
Read the text
I'p to this time 77 miles have been designated as county roads, as follows: A road extending from the northwest corner of the city of Plains north to the county line. 11 miles; extending from the southeast coiner of the city of Plains south to the State line.
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.
Timeline
Plains, 1884 to 1900
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
By decade
Plains, decade by decade
One decade in the archive so far: the 1900s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
1900s1 item
1910s–1990snothing yet
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.
Add from your albumThen & now
Stand where they stood
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Retake this viewPlains, Kansas (early 1900s), c. 1900
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Plains’ page.
Retake this view · +15Famous people
See all →Famous people close to Plains
Nobody well known was born in Plains itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Places that used to be
Lost post offices and burying grounds
Plains’s post office has been open since 1894. Another post office, West Plains, opened and closed inside today’s town.
West Plains
Plains
18801950today
1cemetery inside Plains
Plains
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Questions about Plains’ history
What year was Plains founded?
The Plains post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
Memory lane
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Start a conversation
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), Wikipedia, 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.