For many millennia, the Great Plains of North America was inhabited by nomadic Native Americans.

In 1802, Spain returned most of the land to France, but keeping title to about 7,500 square miles.

In 1803, most of the land for modern day Kansas was acquired by the United States from France as part of the 828,000 square mile Louisiana Purchase for 2.83 cents per acre.

Like all of Kansas outside the eastern cities, Brown County is overwhelmingly Republican, although its history of Yankee settlement means it has been thus for longer than certain other parts of the state.

Brown was Alf Landon’s strongest county in his home state during his disastrous 1936 presidential campaign.

A mortally divided Republican Party allowed Woodrow Wilson to win a plurality in 1912 with under 37 percent of the county’s vote – nonetheless since 1968 no Democrat has reached even that percentage.

† means a community is designated a Census-Designated Place (CDP) by the United States Census Bureau.

The cities of Hiawatha, Horton, and Sabetha are considered governmentally independent and are excluded from the census figures for the townships.