Bloom, Kansas by Kathy Alexander.
Early dugout home in Bloom, Kansas.
Bloom, Kansas, is a small, unincorporated ghost town in southcentral Ford County.
The area was first settled by the Thomas J. Vanderslice family, with four brothers who all built homes and a well there. The brothers called the settlement Bloomburg after their Pennsylvania hometown, which was later shortened to Bloom. Situated along the Fort Dodge-Camp Supply Military Road, it soon became a stopping point for travelers, and the Vanderslices kept some groceries and horse feed to supply travelers’ needs.
Bloom gained a post office on December 23, 1885, but it didn’t really become a settlement until the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad came through in 1888. The railroad tracks crossed a section just a little south of the original settlement, and a number of homes and businesses were moved closer to the rail line. At that time, there was a hotel, three grocery stores, and a school.
However, due to severe drought, many people began to move away, and the post office closed on April 30, 1891, when many of the buildings were moved or torn down. By 1893, the town was no longer active, leaving just two families in the vicinity — the S. O. Albright family and the Oscar J. Andrews family. The post office was hauled away in the fall of 1894. By then, business lots that had sold for $1500-$2000 were allowed to go for taxes.
Bloom, Kansas.
However, there were a number of area ranchers, and when people began to settle there again in the early 1900s, Bloom was given a second chance. The post office reopened on August 17, 1908, and S.O. Albright, an original homesteader, opened a store. Two years later, other businesses had also been established.
At its peak, Bloom’s population was a few hundred people, at which time it had a hotel, gas station, restaurant, post office, lumber yard, a church, and schools. In the 1910s, it was described as a “prosperous town that was one of the biggest wheat shipping stations on the Rock Island, west of Hutchinson.
However, the town began to slip again in the 1930s, and its population declined. In 1964, the town’s school district merged with that of Minneola, Kansas. Its post office closed on March 21, 1992.
An old service station in Bloom, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
Today, most of the buildings are in ruins; the high school and others have fallen, and only a grain elevator business and a few private residences remain. Wheat farms and ranches surround the small town. Bloom Township has a population of about 90, but it is unknown how many people remain in this largely abandoned ghost town.
©Kathy Weiser/Legends of Kansas, updated April 2024.
Also See:
Ford County Pioneers
The old gymnasium in Bloom, Kansas, built by the Works Progress Administration, later served as a church by Kathy Alexander.
This old building in Bloom, Kansas looks like it may have been a grade school at one time, by Kathy Alexander.