Aetna Cemetery
Aetna Cemetery is located in NENW 16-34-15. As of 1980, Z-Bar Cattle Company was the land owner. If you have any information on burials in this cemetery or a photo of the cemetery, please send the information to County Coordinator for inclusion in this site. (Information from pages 28-29 of Chosen Land - A History of Barber County, Kansas ©1980)


Barber County Kansas Tombstone Photos
Barber County Kansas Cemeteries genealogy
© 2002 Ed Rucker for KSGen Web Project

Aetna, Barber County, Kansas

Map: Aetna Cemetery, Barber County, Kansas.
Aetna Cemetery, Barber County, Kansas.

Map: Aetna Cemetery, Barber County, Kansas.
Aetna, Barber County, Kansas.


The Aetna Clarion was published at Aetna, Kansas, from September 3, 1885 to September 22, 1887. W.N. Bradbury was the first editor and proprietor. The 2nd editor and proprietor was Mr. Chas. W. Coursen. Subscription was $1.50 per year.


The Aetna Clarion, September 3, 1885.

Aetna! The Queen of the West! Grow rich with the Country. Invest while you can! Aetna is situated upon a beautiful eminence in Southwestern Barber County, two miles east of the Comanche County line and six miles north of the Indian Territory line. Surrounding the town are the large and fertile valleys of Salt Fork river, Big Mule creek, Ash creek, Dry creek, Cottage creek, Sand creek, Yellowstone creek, and others too numerous to mention, all of which have large groves of timber along their courses. Aetna is 30 miles west of New Kiowa - the nearest town of any consequence - also 35 miles southwest of Medicine Lodge, the county seat of Barber county. Aetna is also on the surveys of the Southern Kansas and the Fort Scott & Wichita Railways, and at their proposed crossing. A stage line from New Kiowa to Englewood, Clark county, via Aetna, has been located and will soon be in operation.

(Contributed by Kim Fowles.)


Aetna

The time was when Aetna had considerable pretensions and her progenitors thought they could see in the near future a city that would cut much ice in the commercial and industrial world. But where it was proposed to have a public park is now a horse pasture and on the site reserved for manufactories the gentle cow chews her cud in contentment.

While the town has not fulfilled the prophesies made for it, it nevertheless remains on the map, and the one man who represents the mercantile interests of the town - W.S. Richardson - does a business that many merchants in larger towns would be glad to have.

Aetna is located in the southwest corner of Barber county. Aetna township is given over entirely to the cattlemen, and some of the largest ranch owners in the county reside in that part of the county.

It is said that a cow can come nearer going through the winter solely on the fruits of her own industry in this township than anywhere else in Kansas.

-- "Barber County Townships:, Medicine Lodge Cresset, March 2, 1900. Contributed by Ellen (Knowles) Bisson.


Aetna Cemetery
Gravestone readings and photos by Dee & Phyllis Scherich, 23 May 2004.

Aetna Plot Map, Barber County, Kansas
From Standard Atlas of Barber County, Kansas, 1905. Courtesy of Kim Fowles.

USGS GNIS: Aetna Cemetery

The Aetna Post Office was established 27 Aug 1885 and discontinued 15 Oct 1912. It was also established 6 June 1913 and discontinued 31 March 1931. It was in Comanche County at one time. -- Source: Post Offices in Kansas, 1828 - 1961   The Kansas State Historical Society.

Aetna, Ks: Geographic Names Information System Feature Detail Report

Paul Schwartz's Rocky Mountain Store, 3 miles west of Aetna, Kansas, on the Camp Suppy Trail.

Obituary: Vernie White He was born on March 21, 1916, at the Holmes Ranch in Barber County near Aetna, Kansas, the son of Neal and Elizabeth (Alley) White.

Livonia (Richardson) Wells She passed away at her home near Aetna 6 a.m. April 14, aged 71 years, 9 months and 16 days.

Obituary: Chauncey Palmer Wells The funeral was held at his home in Wilmore on Friday afternoon and the remains were taken to Aetna for burial.

7 May 1927:
BARBER COUNTY SWEPT BY TORNADO
LEAVING DEATH AND DESTRUCTION

Published in The Barber County Index, May 27, 1927.

Obituary: C.E. Richardson Two sisters, Mrs. Susie Clark of New York and Mrs. Lavonia Wells of Aetna, Kans., preceded him in death.

Obituaries: John & Lizzie Platt They are buried in the Aetna Cemetery.

Ranches and Ranching in the Comanche County, Kansas, Area All I can remember of that trip is we stopped on a high ridge in a big pasture southwest of Aetna (probably the Mays Ranch) at noon.

Obituary: Mrs. O.H. McCorkle She leaves to mourn her loss... Mrs. Billie Morris of Aetna, Kans.

Obituary: Jessie Powell Hubbard Due to a blizzard, they were forced to spend an extra night in Aetna, Kansas.

Obituary: Mrs. Anna C. Hecht She is survived by... Reuben L. of Aetna, Kans.

Pat Gallagher Charley Matthews, a little two-year-old son of Mr. and Mrs. Dick Matthews, of near Aetna, in some way got a small bottle of carbolic acid off of a stand table, which had been placed there by some one while cleaning the house, and drank part of it and in less than ten minutes after drinking it he was perfectly paralyzed.

Evansville, Kansas My mother, Opal's niece, taught at the one-room Aetna School on the Salt Fork in the middle of the Z-Bar.

Mabel Olive Snyder "She taught at Aetna and in Comanche County at Coldwater."

Lucy Tennison She was laid to rest in the Aetna cemetery Monday. -- The Western Star, April 9, 1898.

J.R. Holmes "His cattle feed upon a thousand hills will apply to J.R. Holmes of Aetna township. Mr. Holmes owns and controls 22,000 acres of land in that township..."