Strawberry, Kansas

There was once a town here called Strawberry, named for the wild strawberries that grew thick across this Washington County ground. Settlers arrived in the spring of eighteen sixty-one, and within a decade the place had a post office, a school, a general store, and a blacksmith shop. It became known across the region for one thing in particular.

A community dance pavilion, later joined by a skating rink, drew people from miles around to dance to traveling name bands. For a while Strawberry was a real social destination on the prairie. But the post office closed in nineteen oh four, and the town slowly faded.

In nineteen fifty-one the last buildings were torn down to make way for a new state highway, and that was the end of it. Today Strawberry is a ghost town, remembered for its sweet name and its lively dance hall.