Concordia City Hall is located at 701 Washington Street, Concordia, KS 66901.
Phone: 785‑243‑2670.
The community of Concordia was established in 1871, with the city officially incorporated as a city of the third class in 1872. The early history of the community included the Nazareth Motherhouse, built in 1903, and railroad connections serving as a cultural stop with the Brown Grand Theater built in 1907. Through the railroad and traveling shows, many well-known figures and shows were seen in Concordia, including Ringling Bros, Wild Bill Hickock, and Buffalo Bill Cody. [1]
Concordia as described in 1939 [2]
Concordia, a railroad junction on the south bank of the Republican River, is the trade center of the surrounding dairying and farming country; it has several creameries and mills. J. M. Hageman selected the townsite about 1864 and at his own expense opened a road to Junction City. A town company was formed in 1869 and the settlement given the name Concordia, "in view of the harmony and unanimity" that marked the meeting at which the town was named seat of Cloud County. The settlement had a post office, a land office, a store, and a hotel. The hotel was pulled here by eleven yoke of oxen from its original site several miles to the west. In 1870 Concordia's first newspaper, the Republican Valley Empire, was established by Henry Buckingham. Late in 1872 a great fire swept through the town, and a large part had to be rebuilt from its foundations.
In the 1870s Boston Corbett, said by some to have been the slayer of John Wilkes Booth, President Lincoln's assassin, sought safety from enemies in a dugout on his claim a few miles to the southeast. He seldom appeared on Concordia's streets.
Concordia's first house, a small frame structure at 100 Cedar St., was built by Hageman in 1866 or 1867. Brown's Hill, at the west end of 6th St., affords a fine view of the tree-shaded city and the rich agricultural valley. Especially noteworthy civic possessions are the Recreation Park (band shell, swimming pool, tennis courts, playground), 10th and Washington Sts., and the Concordia Junior and Senior High School, 10th and Cedar Sts., which covers a city block. The school is of Georgian Colonial architecture and has a swimming pool, a large gymnasium, and an auditorium. The North-Central Kansas League Music Festival is held here each April.