[3] On November 29, 1864, more than a decade before Colorado became a state and long before Kiowa County was formed, a massacre of Native Americans—a group of old men, women, and children—occurred on Sand Creek that initially was greeted as a victory in the Colorado War against hostile Indians; within months, Congressional inquiries revealed a different picture, and a national scandal erupted.

Currently, the facilities include a small visitor center, two walking trails, signage, and monuments overlooking the massacre site.

In the late 1880s, eastern Colorado attracted a lot of attention by farming interests that did not yet know that long-term agriculture was unsustainable in this arid landscape, and the railroads were snaking west across the plains towards the gold fields of the Rocky Mountains during the Colorado Gold Rush.

Agriculture in eastern Colorado collapsed in the Dust Bowl days of the 1930s; today mostly dry-land farms and some ranching interests survive.

Colorado's Front Range cities and agriculture interests upstream have acquired most of the water rights, and the groundwater aquifers are drying up.

It is conceivable that much of the county will eventually revert to its original sparse grassland and prairie conditions of the pre-1880s.

Sheridan Lake does have a combined junior-and-senior high, and still surviving in some form are the towns of Towner, Arlington, Brandon, Chivington, and Haswell.

The draws tend to be intermittent, however Adobe, Rush and Big Sandy creeks have small continuous flows during wetter years.

[7] The Great Plains Reservoirs south of Eads and along both sides U.S. Highway 287 are a group of four larger reservoirs and several smaller ones that supply irrigation water to local farms and offer hunting, fishing and wildlife viewing in the Queens State Wildlife Area.

The past six Democratic candidates for president have not surpassed 22% of the county's vote, and both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden barely reached ten percent.