The old man, Gabriel Prudhomme, had died. His estate couldn’t be settled amiably among the heirs, so the land went up for sale. It was advertised as “admirably calculated for a ferry across the Missouri River, also one of the best steamboat landings on the river, also an excellent situation for a warehouse or townsite. Fourteen men got together and bought Prudhomme’s 256 acres for about $4,200. Some suggested calling the settlement Kawsmouth, since it was near the mouth of the Kaw River. But eventually the town came to be known as Kansas, the other name for the Kaw. Much later it gained the name by which we know it today: Kansas City. At the time the community was named, the territory or state of Kansas didn’t exist.
