Girard

Girard is the county seat of Crawford County. Out in front of the county courthouse is a nice big lawn, complete with a gazebo and a helicopter on display honoring the town's veterans. 

Downtown are some shops and a bar called "Bender on 7." The town also has a park, a swimming pool, and a lovely sesquicentennial display of decorative quilt squares.

Perhaps surprisingly to those who know Kansas as a solid "Red State" Republican party holdout, Girard used to be a bastion of the Socialist Party, especially from the 1890s through the 1920s. Fred Warren, a citizen of Girard, commissioned Upton Sinclair to write The Jungle, and the notorious Socialist politician Eugene V. Debs lived in the town in the early 1900s. 

 

Cottonwood Falls

Cottonwood Falls is just south of Strong City; you can walk over on a nice wide sidewalk that crosses the Cottonwood River. It has a cute brick-street downtown area with a magnificent old limestone courthouse. A park near the river affords a fine view of the falls the town is named for.