Topeka, Kansas

Topeka (, ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Shawnee County. It is along the Kansas River in the central part of Shawnee County, within northeastern Kansas and the Central United States. The population of the city was 126,587 as of the 2020 census. The five-county Topeka metropolitan area has approximately 233,000 residents.

The city, laid out in 1854, was one of the Free-State towns founded by Eastern antislavery men immediately after the passage of the Kansas–Nebraska Bill. Topeka was chartered as a city in 1857. It is well known for the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, which overturned Plessy v. Ferguson and declared racial segregation in public schools to be unconstitutional.