Riverfront Park in Atchison, Kansas, courtesy of the City of Atchison.
Riverfront Park east of downtown Atchison, Kansas, provides a close-up view of the Missouri River, upstream from the nearby Amelia Earhart Memorial Bridge that carries traffic between Kansas and Missouri.
Riverfront Park was dedicated on June 19, 2004, after many years of planning. The park’s Lewis & Clark Pavilion overlooks the river and is named for the expedition that passed this point in 1804 in search of a water route to the Pacific Ocean. The pavilion provides interpretive information about the expedition, the river, and the Kanza Tribe that was once prominent in the area. It also features the Veterans’ Memorial Plaza, a hiking/biking path along the river, enhanced boat access with a river overlook area, fishing, picnic areas, playgrounds, trails, and restrooms.
Lewis and Clark Trail by the Bureau of Land Management.
On July 4, 1804, Lewis and Clark, exploring the new Louisiana Purchase, camped near this site. Fifty years later, Atchison was founded by pro-slavery men and named for Senator David R. Atchison.
The Squatter Sovereign, Atchison’s first newspaper, was an early advocate of violence against abolition. Here, Pardee Butler, a Free State preacher, was set adrift on a river raft and on his return was tarred and feathered.
During the heyday of river steamboating in the 1850s, Atchison became an outfitting depot for emigrant and freighting trains to Utah and the Pacific Coast, a supply base for the Pike’s Peak Gold Rush, and, in the early 1850s, a starting point for the Pony Express and the Overland Stage lines. In this pioneering center of transportation, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad was organized in 1860.
In contrast to the straight borders that separate most of Kansas from its neighbors, the boundary in its northeast corner mostly follows the rambling path of the Missouri River.
Before being engineered to control floods, stabilize banks, and ensure more predictable navigation, the river frequently changed course by meandering across its floodplain. Although now engineered with levees, upstream reservoirs, and bank stabilization projects, the river still rises, falls, floods, and sometimes shifts small bits of Kansas to the east side and vice versa. One of the most visible examples of this phenomenon is found to the north in adjacent Doniphan County, Kansas. When flooding in 1952 cut off a meander loop containing Rosencrans Memorial Airport near St. Joseph, Missouri, the river’s new route separated the airport from the rest of Missouri. Although the river shifted, the state line didn’t, so for a short stretch, they now take different paths.
Lewis & Clark Pavilion in Atchison, Kansas, by the Kansas Geological Survey.
The open-air Lewis & Clark Pavilion in Riverfront Park is found along the Glacial Hills Scenic Byway. This beautiful byway gets its name from the rolling hills and rock-strewn valleys carved by ancient glaciers. The receding ice left behind a beautiful landscape and highly fertile loess soil farmland. The Glacial Hills region also includes one of the most famous Pony Express routes as well as Fort Leavenworth, the oldest Army post in continuous existence west of the Mississippi River. Abraham Lincoln delivered one of his most famous campaign speeches in Troy in 1859, and years later, people watched Atchison resident Amelia Earhart grow up to be a renowned aviator.
It is also on the Frontier Military Historic Byway, where you can visit multiple historic forts that are the namesake for the byway. Originally built to move soldiers and supplies, the Military Trail has watched American history unfold. Traveling from North to South, you’ll find various landmarks such as Fort Leavenworth and Fort Scott, and other historical gems like the John Brown Museum. Also, along the route, hear legends and see monuments that memorialize history across the Kansas landscape.
Riverfront Park is located at 100 Commercial Street in Atchison, Kansas.
©Kathy Alexander/Legends of Kansas, September 2025.
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