MO ROSLYN-Stagecoach from Junction City, Kansas

          Junction City is so named due to its position at the confluence of the Smoky Hill and Republican rivers, which forms the Kansas River.

          Originally, the site was intended for a city that Andrew J. Mead of New York planned in 1854. The Cincinnati-Manhattan Company of “Free Staters” connected to the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company planned for a community to be called Manhattan. Unfortunately, when the steamship Hartford delivered the immigrants, it could not reach the site because of low water on the Kansas River. The Free Staters settled eight miles east in what today is Manhattan, Kansas.

          The city that did develop went by several names before local farmers in the region renamed it Junction City and formally incorporated it in 1859. It did not have the same colorful history as its nearby neighbor, Lawrence, Kansas, possibly because of close proximity (four miles) to a major military institution, Fort Riley.

          In addition to Junction City enjoying a certain amount of commerce due to its proximity to the fort, in its early years, it became an agricultural region with settlers pouring in and buying land.

Junction City, Kansas

          Junction City became a stage stop for the Kansas Stage Company line as early as 1860. In September 1865, David Butterfield of the Butterfield Overland Despatch (no, that is not a typo on Despatch) also established a station in Junction City for his line. The two companies served some of the same communities along the Smoky Hill Trail, but the Butterfield Overland Despatch continued west beyond the Kansas Stage Line all the way to Denver, Colorado. 

          (Butterfield is a well-known name when it comes to stagecoach companies. However, there is no relationship between David Butterfield who started the B.O.D. in Kansas and John Butterfield who ran the Butterfield Overland Mail Company from St. Louis, Missouri south through Texas, New Mexico and Arizona Territories, and California in the 1850s until he lost the mail contract for that route at the start of the American Civil War.)

          In Mail Order Roslyn, Roslyn came to Junction City to marry a man she knew not at all except from a letter. While she waits for him, she visits the livery close to where she is staying. There she meets a man who plays an ongoing role in the story. This man was also a minor character in my last book, Hannah’s Handkerchief. When it is time to leave Junction City, Roslyn boards a stagecoach on the Butterfield Overland Despatch to travel to her next destination.

          For a chance to win one of two prizes—first prize, a $10 Amazon gift card; second prize, two Zina Abbott ebooks of the winner’s choice—complete the Rafflecopter below no later than Friday, May 1, 2020. The answer to one of the questions on the Rafflecopter is found in this blog post. To find yesterday’s post, CLICK HERE. Return tomorrow for another post with another answer.

BONUS POINTS: For an extra five points on the rafflecopter, name or describe in ten words or less a minor character in Hannah’s Handkerchief that might be the man Roslyn meets in the Junction City livery.

          Mail Order Roslyn is not on preorder, and there is a reason I am not yet sharing the book description. (See bonus points section above.) It is scheduled to be published later this week. When it is available, I will notify my readers through my newsletter and this blog, plus the Mail-Order Bride Romance Readers group on Facebook.

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