24/7 Trauma and Biohazard Cleanup in Fredonia, KS

Fredonia is the county seat of Wilson County in southeast Kansas, located near Fall River at the junction of U.S. Route 400 and Kansas Highway 39.

Fredonia was laid out in 1868 beside a large natural mound along the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway and named after Fredonia, New York; its first building was a general store on the town square, and its post office opened in August 1868.

After eight county-seat elections between 1867 and 1873 — in which Coyville, Clifton, Neodesha and Center each won at least once — Fredonia finally secured the Wilson County seat for good in 1873.

Fredonia incorporated as a city on May 5, 1871, and the Gold Dust Hotel, completed in 1885, still anchors its historic town square.

On July 18, 1936, Fredonia recorded a temperature of 121 degrees Fahrenheit, which stands as the Kansas state record high (later tied by Alton).

A cement plant opened in Fredonia in 1907 and employed local workers for more than a century before closing in 2012, making it one of the town's defining industries.

In May 1913 a large vein of semi-anthracite coal discovered near Fredonia was said to be of better quality than any other coal found in Kansas at the time.

Archer Daniels Midland operated a soybean processing plant in Fredonia from 1928 until 2003, and the town was also a hub of oil and natural gas development; its population peaked at 3,954 in 1920.

The 2020 census counted 2,151 people in Fredonia in 933 households.

Fredonia students attend Fredonia USD 484, whose school teams are the Yellowjackets, and the district is the city's second-largest employer after A-Lert Construction Services.