Main Street in Galatia, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
Galatia is a small town in Fairview Township in northwestern Barton County, Kansas. It is also an extinct town as it no longer has a post office. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city’s population was 45 in 2020, and its total area was 0.38 square miles, all of it land.
Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad in Galatia, Kansas, 1970.
David C. Barrows founded the community and laid out the townsite in 1885. Originally named Four Corners, settler Henry G. Weber renamed it Galatia after his hometown of Galatia, Illinois. The first building constructed was a United Brethren church. A post office was established at Galatia on June 3, 1889.
In 1910, Galatia had daily stagecoach connections, and its population was 65. Olmitz, on the Missouri Pacific Railroad, was the nearest shipping point
On July 1, 1919, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad extended a rail line to Galatia from Holyrood, about 30 miles away. The town grew to include three grain elevators, a bank, a lumberyard, and three general stores.
Grain Elevator in Galatia, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
By 1921, the population had grown to 202.
After that, however, the population began to decline.
Galatia’s post office closed on May 31, 1966.
At some point, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad line running east-west through Galatia was discontinued. Its schools were also closed through unification.
Today, the community is served by the Hoisington USD 431 public school district, based in nearby Hoisington.
The St. Paul Lutheran Church is still active in Galatia.
Galatia lies roughly two miles west of Landon Creek, a tributary of the Smoky Hill River. It is 22 miles northwest of Great Bend, the county seat, and 110 miles northwest of Wichita. It is six miles west of U.S. Route 281 and seven miles north of Kansas Highway 4.
©Kathy Alexander/Legends of Kansas, October 2024.
St. Paul Lutheran Church in Galatia, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
Main Street buildings in Galatia, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
Also See:
Old grocery store in Galatia, Kansas, by Kathy Alexander.
Extinct towns in Barton County
Sources:
Blackmar, Frank W.; Kansas: A Cyclopedia of State History, Vol I; Standard Publishing Company, Chicago, IL 1912.
Fort Hays State University
Kansas Post Office History
Lost Kansas
Wikipedia