Historical or just offensive? Johnson County’s Negro Creek is long overdue for a new name
This idyllic creek in Johnson County doesn’t attract a lot of attention. Most people don’t even know its name.
But the stream that flows through Ironhorse Golf Course, just south of 151st Street, between Mission Road and Nall Avenue in Leawood is actually called Negro Creek.
And it’s long past time to change that.
Negro Creek first appeared on a map of eastern Kansas in 1856, according to local historians. The derogatory name appeared on the U.S. Geological Survey map in 1956.
The origin of the creek’s name remains a mystery. Exhaustive searches have yet to yield a consensus.
White settlers could have given the creek its name, researchers at the Johnson County Museum say. The county was organized in 1855, and Kansas didn’t enter the Union as a free state until 1861.
“So, (the) 1856 map falls at the beginning of when predominantly white people begin legally settling in the area,” researchers wrote in a presentation earlier this month to the Johnson County Board of Commissioners.
Some researchers suggest the stream was named for Black families who settled in the area after the Civil War. Others say the creek was used as part of the Underground Railroad to help slaves escape from Missouri into Kansas, which was a free state.
Spanish settlers, who use the word “negro” for black, could have named the creek.
At this point, though, there’s no clarity on how this stream came to be known as Negro Creek.
What is clear is that it must be renamed.
Any change should recognize the history of the area in a way that respects all people. Citizen input will be vital. Elected officials should take the lead.
The waterway, which is part of the Blue River Watershed, runs south through Johnson County and the cities of Leawood and Overland Park.
“I really want us to research the history and tell the story, whatever the story is,” Becky Fast, a Johnson County Commissioner, said. “Any name should reflect that history.”
A coalition has held a series of discussions about the proper way to rename the creek.
Potential names include Freedom or Free State Creek, but a formal request has yet to be made, said Ivan Weichert, the information officer for the Kansas Geographic Names Authority.
Only the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, a federal body created in 1890 to establish and maintain uniform usage of geographic names, can approve a change. The process takes six to eight months.
Community engagement is crucial, said Jennifer Runyon, a senior researcher for the U.S. Board of Geographic Names. Local buy-in is needed. After a series of public hearings, county and state officials must submit recommendations to federal authorities.
“We want to know what the local people want,” Runyon said.
Incredibly, the names of at least six other geographical features and one oil field in Kansas also reference Negro, Runyon said. Cowley County’s creek actually included a more offensive term until the n-word was ordered scrubbed from all federal maps in the 1960s.
Johnson County and Kansas now have an opportunity to right past wrongs, said Kenya Cox, executive director of the Kansas African American Affairs Commission.
Collaboration and conversation are paramount, she said.
“It’s not just about African Americans in Kansas,” Cox said. “It’s about all Kansans. What do we want to be known as?”
Negro Creek is one of thousands of places across the country that are still saddled with names meant to demean ethnic or racial minorities. But some other communities have taken corrective action.
Last year, at the request of the Georgia Senate, Savannah’s Runaway Negro Creek was renamed Freedom Creek. Colorado’s Negro Creek was dubbed Clay Creek following a naming contest conducted by a local high school.
These so-called tributes were originally recorded on official government maps. Historical context is important, but times have changed.
Regardless of the history behind the creek’s name, Negro is pejorative term today. And it needs to be wiped off the map in Kansas.