Wilsey, Kansas

Wilsey, Kansas, is a tiny town in Elm Creek Township in south-central Morris County. As of the 2020 census, its population was 139, and its total area is 0.28 square miles. It is also an extinct town, as it no longer has a post office.

The first settlers in the area were Mr. and Mrs. Matson B. Otis, who moved from Strawn, Kansas, in the summer of 1871, to a homestead 12 miles west of Council Grove on 80 acres. In time, their land would directly adjoin the north boundary of the future town site of Wilsey. Mr. Otis dug a well, constructed a 16-foot square house, and built a sod stable directly to the west. Other early residents were the Berry, Kinkel, and Watkins families.

John D. Wilsey, originally from Ohio, acquired a 160-acre plot on August 25, 1873. By that time, Frank Wierman taught a small number of students in a little frame building on the northwest corner of 1800 Road and V Avenue. The little school was called Mildred.

When this settlement first began, the post office moved from Hill Spring and reopened under the name of Mildred on December 12, 1878.

Several families settled in the area before the townsite of Wilsey was created, including William H. Pirtle, W.C. Gardner, Dr. Walker, Henry W. Riegel, Andrew Yakle, and George W. Coffin.

John D. Wilsey founded and promoted a new townsite, which would eliminate most of those long trips to Council Grove. Area residents generally welcomed his plans. Working hard to promote the new community that was to bear his name, John Wilsey, met with George W. Coffin, Matson Otis, and Henry Vorse, Sr., on the night of May 14, 1884, to draw a plat and to name the streets. The following day, May 15, 1884, the town of Wilsey was born as the four men and a surveyor named Tyler began laying out the lots. When the work was completed, the original town included 20 blocks, with one block serving as a park around which the business section was to be built. Thus, Wilsey became the fifth town in Morris County following Council Grove, Parkerville, White City, and Dunlap.

With the coming of the new community, the first school became overcrowded. Sometime in the mid-1880s, the townspeople moved the frame building to the open area between the hotel and the lumberyard.

Wanting the town to progress rapidly, Wilsey took action to ensure that it did. He visited the businessmen throughout the county and offered to give lots to those who relocated or began a new enterprise in his town. He then gave sites to several individuals. He also gave lots to the Christian Church congregation and promised the Methodists and Presbyterians free lots when they organized congregations.

Because of this free lot policy, by the end of 1884, the town of Wilsey had three general stores, a drug store, a doctor, a livery stable, and a lumber yard. John Wilsey also extended his free lot offer to church groups, which brought to Wilsey first a Christian Church, then a Methodist Church, and a Presbyterian Church quickly followed.

In the spring of 1884, John B. Doner established the first business when he opened his lumberyard. C.R. Francis built the first general store a short time later. Amos W. Hampton opened the second general store. The next general store was built and owned by George W. Coffin just across the street to the east of Mr. Hampton’s store. That fall, Dr. A. Walker opened a drug store. In November, Harvey Meyers and his brother-in-law, O.C. Sheldon, opened yet another general store. This two-story structure rented rooms upstairs to boarders. Matson Otis provided the town with its first livery stable. By the end of that first year, the business section had been firmly established along Fifth Street.

On May 23, 1884, the town’s name was changed from Mildred to Wilsey.

J.W. Seguine then built the Wilsey Hotel. The first floor of the two-story structure contained an office, living room, dining room, kitchen, pantry, and a small bedroom off the kitchen. The bedrooms were upstairs. Throughout the following years, the hotel had several owners and even more managers.

The Missouri Pacific Railroad made its way through Wilsey and established a station at the end of 1886. At that time, a depot and stockyards had already been constructed. Soon, a section house was built that was used by two crews: one going east to Helmick and the other going to Delavan. At one time, three agents kept the depot open 24 hours a day.

On the original site occupied by the first school, a second school, a much larger two-story frame building, was constructed.

Development continued at a rapid pace. In 1887, a cemetery was established on land owned by John B. Doner. By that time, Milt Kimmel had opened a hardware store, and Alex Monroe started an additional dry goods store.

Mr. Padget established the Wilsey Bulletin in 1889. He sold it a year later to the younger George W. Coffin. Mr. Coffin operated this paper for a year and moved it to Council Grove, where it was later merged with Milt Amrine’s Guard.

C.M. Beachy opened the first bank in 1890. A few years afterward, he disposed of his interests and moved to Wichita. The second bank was started with Thomas C. Snodgrass as cashier, but he eventually requested his depositors to withdraw their money.

In 1893, the residents of Wilsey dug a town well. The pump, windmill, and tank were placed at the center of Fifth and Lyndon Streets and provided the townspeople with fresh water until 1903..

By the turn of the century, the town had evolved into a shipping point for a large agricultural area, and its population grew.

Shortly after 1900, Art Sisson constructed a livery stable and a barn for his horses west of the lumberyard on the northwest corner of Sixth and Main. With the coming of the automobile, he converted his business into a garage.

The Wilsey State Bank was chartered on May 2, 1902, with Wilbur Henderson as cashier. Operations began in a wooden building until a new building was erected in about 1905. At that time, cowboys still drove longhorns to the stockyards.

By that time, the second school had also become overcrowded. To ease this problem, Mrs. Davis, the teacher of the first three grades, conducted her classes at the East Creamery building on Main Street until the third school was completed.

In 1905, William Charles Hopper began the Wilsey Warbler. The weekly publication served the community for many years under various owners.

The Morgan family constructed the grain elevator at the south end of Third Street just north of the railroad, and Perry Morgan operated it, perhaps as early as 1906. In the following years, it changed hands several times before it ceased business in the summer of 1983.

The town’s population peaked at 374 in 1907. At about that time, Mr. Lew Berry helped construct the two-story brick structure on the east side of the 100 block of Fifth Street. This building was erected for W.T. “Billy” Brown. Mr. Brown ran a butcher shop in the north half of the structure, his sister Minnie operated a cafe in the other half with no partition separating the two businesses, and their mother lived upstairs.

The third school was completed in 1909. It was a two-story red brick building with a full basement, four rooms on the first floor, and two rooms on the upper floor. Soon afterward, the high school was established in this building, eventually causing overcrowding once again, until the high school was relocated to its own structure. Then, in the fall of 1927, the boiler exploded, and the subsequent blaze destroyed the structure.

Wilsey was incorporated as a third-class city in 1910. That year, it was still on the Missouri Pacific Railroad, had a bank, a weekly newspaper called the Warbler, a flour mill, a grain elevator, a hotel, telegraph and express offices, and a money order post office with two rural routes, and its population peaked at 350. It was the shipping and receiving point for a large agricultural area, and large quantities of grain, livestock, and produce were handled every year.

The high school began as a one-year organization in the fall of 1911. It operated a two-year program in 1912-13 and 1913-14 and then developed into a four-year institution in the fall of 1915.

In 1917, the Trail Garage served the community.

In 1920, Harvey L. Meyers established a Chevrolet agency in the Meyers-Sheldon Building. The dealership lasted until at least 1932.

Throughout the early 1920s, the Wilsey State Bank thrived. Its net worth increased to $275,000, of which $100,000 or more was in certificates of deposit. However, it closed in the final week of 1927.

Charles H. Brown and his R.T. Brown established the Wilsey Oil Company in 1923 on the northeast corner of Fifth and Main. Across the street to the south, Lloyd Garner installed the pumps, tanks, and pipes needed to store the oil and gas shipped in by the railroad. Having several owners over the years, the company sold Derby, Enarco, Sovereign, White Rose, and Conoco products. It finally closed in June 1981. Later, the Kovac family reopened it for a short time, calling it Kovac’s Korner.

The same year, the school district voted to construct a separate high school building in 1923. The builders completed the new structure in November, and the students and teachers moved in immediately. The school was a two-story brick building with a gymnasium in the basement and the auditorium directly above it on the second floor.

In 1926, Richard Downey acquired the Warbler News and later sold it to George Edgerton on September 1, 1928, then served as editor with his wife Ethel until the Warbler was discontinued in 1941. At that time, they moved to Eskridge to run its newspaper.

Wilsey’s other service station was built after 1926. It was erected on the southwest corner of Fifth and Lyndon. For 20 years, this business was known as the Sinclair station.

Two cream stations were present in Wilsey during the 1920s and 1930s. Initially, William and Carrie Ramsey ran one in the structure north of the Wigle Building on the west side of Fifth Street. Lew Bullock operated a second station on the east side of Fifth Street.

The fourth-grade school was constructed in 1928. This tan brick building consisted of four classrooms on the south and a gymnasium with a stage on one end on the north; the gym and stage sat below ground level. In 1953, the primary room was added onto the east side, and one of the existing rooms was converted into a library. When Delavan Grade School was annexed to Wilsey in 1961, only the seventh and eighth graders were brought to the school because of overcrowding, so Margaret Goldsmith taught grades 1 to 6 at Delavan in 1961-62. After the construction of a metal classroom for the seventh and eighth grades just east of the gymnasium in 1962, the Delavan school was closed.

George Edgerton acquired the Warbler newspaper on September 1, 1928, and served as editor with his wife Ethel until the Warbler was discontinued in 1941. At that time, they moved to Eskridge to run its newspaper.

In the 1930s, E.C. Christensen and then Charles Sheldon operated the town’s last drug stores. Later, the building became an ice cream parlor, a cafe, and a garage before it was torn down in 1978.

After the Great Depression, Wilsey began to suffer. The bank went broke in the early 1930s, and the newspaper ceased publication later in the decade.

On March 27, 1933, fire seriously damaged the Otis Store, weakened the W.T. Campbell Building to the south, and destroyed the John Mowrey Meat Market and R. W. Powers Drug Store. Despite the fact that the townsmen kept the fire engine running at full pressure for 3 1/2 hours, the blaze resulted in an estimated $20,000 in damage to the business section. Although the structure housing the meat market and drug store was not rebuilt, Mr. Otis hired George Fisher and Lew Berry to reconstruct his store.

After the newspaper was discontinued in 1941, the Warbler Building became a recreation center, hosting recreational activities sponsored by churches, schools, and various clubs, such as the 4-H Club. Shortly after a New Year’s Eve dance, the structure was destroyed by a fire. The loss of the building was estimated at $3,000; it had been covered by only $1,300 insurance.

Afterward, the community voted to erect a new structure to be built by volunteer labor. On June 17, 1949, the community officially dedicated the present 40-foot by 60-foot concrete block structure, costing $7,000, with an open house in the afternoon and evening and with a program of vocal and instrumental numbers.

In 1959, Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Douglas purchased the Wilsey Hotel. Finally, about 1970, the Douglases tore down the hotel and moved a mobile home onto the site.

The small community maintained well into the 1950s and 1960s. Its business district included two grocery stores, two restaurants, a drug store, a lumberyard, a hardware store, two service stations, and a mechanic shop. Its population in 1960 was 224.

The Missouri Pacific finally closed the depot in 1962.

On December 8, 1964, the school board members of Council Grove, Dwight, and Wilsey voted unanimously to unify their school districts, which became District No. 417, headquartered in Council Grove. In the spring of 1967, the district encouraged students from Wilsey and Dwight to transfer to Council Grove in the fall, and so many did that Wilsey became the smallest high school in the state in 1967-68 with just 18 students. Then, in January of the following year, the district board decided to close Wilsey Rural High School. Consequently, the seven 1968 graduates became the school’s final class after 53 years. During that time, nearly 700 students graduated.

Afterward, the grade school was relocated to the high school building.

Tragedy struck on March 10, 1977, when a fast-spreading fire destroyed the lumberyard office, storage buildings, three trucks, and an inventory valued between $60,000 and $100,000. Within two hours, the fire had burned the structure entirely.

The market closed in August 1994.

Wilsey’s post office closed on September 27, 1997.

In 2002, the U.S.D. 417 board closed the grade school in Wilsey.

Today, the community is served by Morris County USD 417 public school district, headquartered in Council Grove.

Today, the community building is used for meetings, parties, receptions, reunions, elections, and bloodmobile visits.

Wilsey is 12 miles west of Council Grove, the county seat.

©Kathy Alexander/Legends of Kansas, updated May 2025.

Also See:

Extinct Towns of Morris County

Kansas Ghost Towns

Morris County, Kansas

Morris County Photo Gallery

Sources:

Adam, Janet; Wilsey vs. Helmick, Morris County, Kansas: A Twin Town Rivalry That Ended in a Knockout, Chapman Center for Rural Studies, Fall 2012.
Blackmar, Frank W.; Kansas: A Cyclopedia of State History, Vol I; Standard Publishing Company, Chicago, IL 1912.
Evans, Marc, A  History of Wilsey, Kansas.
Wikipedia