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Fort Scott

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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A city and the county-seat of Bourbon county, Kansas, U.S.A., on the Marmaton river, about roo m. S. of Kansas City, Missouri. Pop. (1880) 537 2; (1890) 11,946; (1900) 10,322, of whom 1205 were negroes; (1906, estimate) 12,633. It is the point of intersection of the Kansas City, Fort Scott & Memphis (St Louis & San Francisco system), the Missouri, Kansas & Texas, and the Missouri Pacific railways, and has in consequence a large traffic. The city is built on a rolling plain. Among its institutions are an Epworth house (1899), Mercy hospital (1889), the Goodlander home, and a Carnegie library. Near the city there is a national cemetery. Fort Scott is in the midst of the Kansas mineral fields, and its trade in bituminous coal is especially important. Building stones, cement rock, clays, oil and gas, lead and zinc are also found in the neighbourhood. An excellent white sulphur water is procured from artesian wells about Boo ft. deep, and there is a mineral-water bath house. The city is also a trading centre for a rich farming region, and is a horse and mule market of considerable importance. Among its manufactures are mattresses, syrup, bricks, pottery, cement and foundry products. In 1905 the total value of the city's factory product was $ 1 ,349, 026, being an increase of 89% since 1900. The city owns and operates its waterworks. The fort after which the city is named was established by the Federal government in 1842, at a time when the whole of eastern Kansas was still parcelled out among Indian tribes; it was abandoned in 1855. The town was platted in 1857, and Fort Scott was chartered as a city in 1860.