Marysville, KS

Marysville sits on the Big Blue River in northeastern Kansas, about 75 miles northwest of Topeka and 67 miles south of Lincoln, Nebraska. It is Marshall County’s seat, and the town’s main street still carries the layered history of a river crossing, a railroad town, and a place where the Oregon Trail and Pony Express routes passed through. Francis Marshall first came to the river to run a trading post and rope ferry; the old Pony Express home station remains downtown, and the Marshall County Museum occupies the original county courthouse. County-seat work and old travel routes still meet in the same small center.

Union Pacific tracks still run through Marysville, with an underpass carrying the line below U.S. 36. Downtown has a Pony Express statue and mural, while Historic Trails Park brings together a rope-ferry story, wagon-route history, and city-managed green space. Marysville USD 364 serves local students, and the aquatic center, library, parks, and downtown businesses fill out the present-day routine. The town is also known as the Black Squirrel City, a nickname tied to an isolated population of black squirrels. For all its small scale, Marysville has an unusually visible travel-and-rail past.