In a rural area of southeast Kansas lies an unassuming town that’s an off-the-beaten-path destination for travelers seeking interesting architecture, unique museums, and photo-worthy murals. The town of Chanute, Kansas, isn’t a typical tourist spot, but, situated along the Neosho River and surrounded by farmland, it offers a quiet respite from everyday life.
The best of Chanute can be experienced during a day trip to rural Neosho County. Travelers often travel from the closest metropolitan areas, which are Wichita, 100 miles to the west, and Topeka, a bustling and wildly underrated Kansas city found 111 miles to the north. A car is necessary to get to the small town. Summer offers the most options for activities; the town hosts a “Cruise Night” every third Friday during the season, during which people are encouraged to drive, or “cruise,” their cars down Main Street. A local farmers market is held every Tuesday evening in the summer.
Chanute is named for a famous aviator
Like another under-the-radar Kansas city with riverside charm, Chanute celebrates its historical ties to a famous aviator. The town was established as a settlement in 1870 and named in honor of French immigrant Octave Chanute, a civil engineer and aviation pioneer. As chief engineer for a railroad expanding into southeast Kansas, Chanute visited the region in the mid-1800s and suggested the incorporation of a town where the railroad could go through. Area settlers agreed and named their newly formed municipality after him. This history and more information about the town’s early days are celebrated at the Chanute Historical Museum, located south of the historic Santa Fe Railroad depot.
While visiting Chanute, it’s easy to glimpse an homage to the town’s namesake — a sculpture of his glider can be spotted from Main Street. Chanute was fascinated by flight, and in 1896 he tested a glider that was the most significant aeronautical structure of the time. The “Chanute glider” became the starting point for Wilbur and Orville Wright’s own designs. Chanute and the brothers became friends, and the sculpture in the town of Chanute honors all three men.
Museums and architecture to see in Chanute, Kansas
Quirky attractions in Chanute
Travelers interested in small-town oddities will find delights in Chanute. Though it isn’t a town located smack dab in the middle of America, let alone the world, Chanute commissioned a mural in the center of a downtown intersection to commemorate the time a Google employee from Chanute set the town as the default location of Google Earth.
This piece of peculiar history is on display at the intersection of Main Street and Lincoln Avenue. The inspiration for the Center of Google Earth Mural came from Google software developer Dan Webb and was painted in 2010, when the town was vying for a residential fiber internet project. As it’s in the middle of a road, this particular mural can be difficult to photograph. But another mural celebrating the town, found on the side of a building at 3 W. Main Street, is a popular photoshoot location.
During your time in Chanute, make space in your itinerary to visit Cardinal Drug Store, an independent pharmacy. Like any small town trying to entertain visitors who want to hearken back to simpler times, Chanute is home to an old-fashioned soda fountain inside the pharmacy that serves up sodas, shakes, and malts.
