Aulne is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either hav ...

Marion County, Kansas Marion County (standard abbreviation: MN) is a county located in the U.S. state of Kansas. Its county seat is Marion and its most populous city is Hillsboro. As of the 2020 census, the county population was 12,660. The county was named in ...

, United States. The Aulne name was suggested by officials of the railroad when it was built through Aulne during the 19th century. It is located southwest of Marion at the intersection of Pawnee Road and 140th Street next to the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pac ...

History

Stouffer's Railroad Map of Kansas 1915-1918 Marion County

Early history

For many millennia, the Great Plains of North America was inhabited by

nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the po ...

Native Americans. From the 16th century to 18th century, the

Kingdom of France The Kingdom of France ( fro, Reaume de France; frm, Royaulme de France; french: link=yes, Royaume de France) is the historiographical name or umbrella term given to various political entities of France in the medieval and early modern period ...

claimed ownership of large parts of North America. In 1762, after the

French and Indian War The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the st ...

, France secretly ceded

New France New France (french: Nouvelle-France) was the area colonized by Kingdom of France, France in North America, beginning with the exploration of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to King ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' ( Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

, per the Treaty of Fontainebleau.

19th century

In 1802, Spain returned most of the land to France. In 1803, most of the land for modern day Kansas was acquired by the United States from France as part of the 828,000 square mile

Louisiana Purchase The Louisiana Purchase (french: Vente de la Louisiane, translation=Sale of Louisiana) was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803. In return for fifteen million dollars, or app ...

for 2.83 cents per

acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial and US customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one chain by one furlong (66 by 660 feet), which is exactly equal to 10 square chains, of a square mile, 4,840 square ...

. In 1854, the Kansas Territory was organized, then in 1861

Kansas Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to ...

became the 34th

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

. In 1855, Marion County was established within the Kansas Territory, which included the land for modern day Aulne.The History of Marion County and Courthouse
/ref> In 1872, a railroad contractor, named Col. W. Sherburn, decided the location would be good location for a town and named it after himself, Sherburn, but it was too early and never used. In 1887, the

Chicago, Kansas and Nebraska Railway The Chicago, Kansas and Nebraska Railway (originally ''Railroad'') was formed in 1885 with Marcus Low, a former attorney for the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad, as its president. The CRI&P advanced the CK&N about twenty-five million dol ...

built a branch line north–south from

Herington Herington is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Jon Herington (born 1954), American musician *Leigh Herington, American politician * Marieve Herington, Canadian actress and singer Fictional characters: *Tjokkie Herington, chara ...

through Aulne to

Caldwell Caldwell may refer to: People * Caldwell (surname) * Caldwell (given name) * Caldwell First Nation, a federally recognized Indian band in southern Ontario, Canada Places Great Britain * Caldwell, Derbyshire, a hamlet * Caldwell, Eas ...

. It foreclosed in 1891 and was taken over by Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway, which shut down in 1980, and reorganized as

Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas Railroad The Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas Railroad (OKT) was a railroad operating in its namesake states in the 1980s. OKT I The Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas Railroad was originally created on May 29, 1980, after the demise of the Chicago, Rock Island and Pa ...

which merged in 1988 with

Missouri Pacific Railroad The Missouri Pacific Railroad , commonly abbreviated as MoPac, was one of the first railroads in the United States west of the Mississippi River. MoPac was a Class I railroad growing from dozens of predecessors and mergers. In 1967, the railroad ...

, and finally merged in 1997 with

. Most locals still refer to this railroad as the "Rock Island". A post office existed in Aulne from August 19, 1887, to February 28, 1954.

20th century

Aulne was one of the finalist communities considered for Tabor College before it was established in Hillsboro in 1908. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, the local telephone company decreed that "No German could be spoken over the telephones", because of

anti-German sentiment Anti-German sentiment (also known as Anti-Germanism, Germanophobia or Teutophobia) is opposition to or fear of Germany, its inhabitants, its culture, or its language. Its opposite is Germanophilia. Anti-German sentiment largely began w ...

towards German-Americans.

Geography

Aulne is located at

coordinates In geometry, a coordinate system is a system that uses one or more numbers, or coordinates, to uniquely determine the position of the points or other geometric elements on a manifold such as Euclidean space. The order of the coordinates is si ...

38.2761266, -97.0766933 in the scenic

Flint Hills The Flint Hills, historically known as Bluestem Pastures or Blue Stem Hills, are a region in eastern Kansas and north-central Oklahoma named for the abundant residual flint eroded from the bedrock that lies near or at the surface. It consists ...

and Great Plains of the state of

. It is roughly halfway between Marion and Peabody next to the

Area attractions

Aulne United Methodist Church
north-east corner of 140th St and Pawnee Rd. * 1890 Marion County Poor Farm (asylum), 1 mi west, 2.1 mi north. Large 3-story limestone house, now privately owned house, occasional tours by appointment.

Darren E. Burrows Darren E. Burrows (born September 12, 1966) is an American actor and director. He is best known for playing Ed Chigliak in the television series ''Northern Exposure''. He also appeared in ''Cry-Baby'', '' Amistad'', ''Sunset Strip'', ''Forty Shad ...

lived here briefly as a child. Indigent, and somewhat "incompetent" people would live here with adult supervision, work the land, raise their own food, and earn their keep. Unwed pregnant girls could stay there until they delivered their babies, which were put up of adoption. The asylum was self-sustaining for a number of years, even paying taxes to the county. *

Marion Reservoir Marion Reservoir is a body of water on the Cottonwood River, north-west of Marion, on the western edge of the Flint Hills region of Kansas in the United States. It was completed in 1968 and is operated by the Army Corps of Engineers for the ...

, approximately seven miles north of Aulne.

Education

The community is served by Marion–Florence USD 408 public school district. All students attend schools in Marion. The high school is a member of T.E.E.N., a shared video teaching network between five area high schools. * Marion High School, located in Marion. * Marion Middle School, located in Marion. * Marion Elementary School, located in Marion.

Media

Print

* ''

Marion County Record The Marion County Record is a weekly newspaper published in Marion, Kansas, and serves as the official newspaper of City of Marion and Marion County. The paper publishes every Wednesday. History Origins The newspaper's first issue came off the ...

'', newspaper from Marion. * ''

Hillsboro Free Press The ''Hillsboro Free Press'' is a local weekly newspaper A weekly newspaper is a general-news or Current affairs (news format), current affairs publication that is issued once or twice a week in a wide variety broadsheet, magazine, and elec ...

'', free newspaper for greater Marion County area.

Infrastructure

Transportation

U.S. Route 56 is to the north,

U.S. Route 50 U.S. Route 50 or U.S. Highway 50 (US 50) is a major east–west route of the U.S. Highway system, stretching from Interstate 80 (I-80) in West Sacramento, California, to Maryland Route 528 (MD 528) in Ocean City, Maryland, on the Atlantic ...

is to the south, and U.S. Route 77 is east of the community. The Oklahoma Kansas Texas (OKT) line of the

runs through the community, but it no longer has a side-spur at Aulne.

Utilities

* Internet ** Satellite is provided by

HughesNet Hughes Network Systems, LLC is a wholly owned subsidiary of EchoStar. It is headquartered in Germantown, Maryland and provides satellite internet service. HughesNet has over 1.3 million subscribers in the Americas. History Hughes Communications ...

, StarBand, WildBlue. * TV ** Satellite is provided by

DirecTV DirecTV (trademarked as DIRECTV) is an American Multichannel television in the United States, multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California, El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary ...

Dish Network DISH Network Corporation (DISH, an acronym for DIgital Sky Highway) is an American television provider and the owner of the direct-broadcast satellite provider Dish, commonly known as Dish Network, and the over-the-top IPTV service, Sling TV ...

. ** Terrestrial is provided by regional

digital TV Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative advanc ...

stations. * Electricity ** Community and Rural areas provided b
Flint Hills RECA
* Water ** Community and Rural areas provided by Marion County RWD #4
map
.

Notable people

* Floyd B. Danskin, American politician, Washington State House of Representatives from 1921 to 1933, and Speaker of the House from 1925 to 1927.

References

External links

Aulne United Methodist Church
Historical *
Aulne church celebrates 125th anniversary

Historic Images of Aulne
Special Photo Collections at Wichita State University Library.
1905 photo of Aulne Rock Island Depot

archive of KsGenWeb
Marion County history bibliography

Marion County school bibliography
Kansas Historical Society Maps * Marion County maps
CurrentHistoric
KDOT
Topo Map of Marion / Aulne / Canada area
USGS {{Authority control Unincorporated communities in Kansas Unincorporated communities in Marion County, Kansas