Alexander and Margaret (Dickson) Garrett were the first settlers to put down roots in what was first El Paso and was renamed Derby, Kansas. In 1869, the area was considered Indian Territory (Osage Trust Lands) and had many transient traders, trappers…
In 1869, Fred Gerteis homesteaded this land. In 1900, he traveled back to Germany to get his 23-year-old nephew, Albert Lauber, to help work the land by promising the farm eventually would become his. After Albert Lauber returned to Germany to get…
El Paso Cemetery sits on a slight hill in the center of Derby but was once surrounded by farmland and was about a mile southeast of the growing settlement. In 1878, the cemetery opened, 9 years after the Garrett family staked a claim near the bank of…
In March 1924, this red brick building opened as the third school at this site. It had 10 classrooms, study hall, small office, two modern lavatories and a gymnasium/auditorium. From 1924 to 1953, this was the only public school in town; high school…
In 1912, Oliver and Alice Smith began a family farm on 240 acres, including this current park land. In 1938, Robert and Mildred Smith took over the farm. In the 1950s, the Smith farm sold to build houses needed for the post-war baby boom. From 1953…
On July 11, 1871, J. Hout Minnich and John Hufbauer filed a town plat for El Paso in Sedgwick County, Kansas. It established streets from Madison to Kay and from Water Street to Georgie Avenue, and business boomed.
In 1871, Dr. Henry Clay Tucker arrived in this area from Ohio and began practicing medicine. With no bridge across the Arkansas River, he often swam across to tend to patients west of the river.