History

Historic 'halfway' Kansas road sign has been greeting cross-country travelers for decades

KMUW | By Beccy Tanner

Published August 11, 2026 at 4:00 AM CDT

Julie Miller, curator of the Edwards County Historical Society Museum and Sod House Museum, with the famous Saturday Evening Post cover.

For more than 80 years, a sign along U.S. Highway 50 near Dodge City has served as the midway marker for travelers making their way through Kansas en route to California or New York.

Next to an old steam locomotive in a park on the west side of Kinsley, Kansas, is a sign positioned on two telephone poles.

One arrow points to the east: New York, 1,561 miles. The other points west: San Francisco, 1,561 miles.

This has earned Kinsley the nickname “Midway USA.”

But most Kansans have been taught that the geographic center of the contiguous 48 United States is near Lebanon, Kansas, closer to the Nebraska border. How did Kinsley get this nickname?

“I moved here in 1979," Julie Miller said, "and I saw the Midway sign in the museum, and I was curious about it because I love history.”

Miller is a curator of the Edwards County Historical Society Museum and Sod House Museum, located in the park where the Midway sign sits.

“In 1939, there were two World’s Fairs — one in San Francisco, the Golden Gate Exposition, and one in New York," Miller said. "The April 22, 1939, Saturday Evening Post put a picture of one car headed for the fair in San Francisco, and one headed for the fair in New York. Behind them was a sign.”

The photo became the cover of that Saturday Evening Post. But in actuality, the sign had yet to be created. That idea came from the local Chamber of Commerce.

“The director of the Chamber of Commerce was George Taylor," Miller said. "Upon seeing the mileage shown on the sign on the magazine’s cover, George had a brainstorm that the halfway point from New York to San Francisco would be somewhere close to Kinsley. Using dead reckoning, he determined that this fictional point would be two miles outside of Kinsley.”

The sign was erected west of Kinsley on U.S. Highway 50 in February 1940.

But as the years went by, the sign was often vandalized. It eventually was moved closer to town and nearer to the junction of U.S. highways 50 and 56 highways.

Travelers still often stop at the sign, stretch their legs and come into the museum to talk with Miller. They often say the same thing: “They say, 'We’re almost to San Francisco,' or, 'We’re almost to New York' … 'We’re halfway there!'”

This story was first published by KMUW.