[4] It was the site of an 1867 confrontation between the Cheyenne and Sioux tribes and General Winfield Scott Hancock at the Indian Village on Pawnee Fork, where the fighting helped inform George A. Custer's tactics throughout his career.

[5] Ross Calhoun, the "Father of Ness City," arrived in 1877 or 1878, opened the first general store, and formally laid out the town in October 1878, inviting settlers to join him.

[5] A bitter county seat fight ensued between Ness City, Sidney, and Clarinda, lasting from 1880 to 1883, with accusations of bribery and fraud, before Ness City was confirmed as the county seat.

Ness County is presently overwhelmingly Republican, although it was won by Jimmy Carter for the Democratic Party as recently as 1976.

However, apart from Carter and Lyndon Johnson in 1964, no Democrat since 1940 has reached forty percent of the county's ballots.

Since Carter's win, however, Michael Dukakis in 1988 which was during a major drought in the Great Plains, had reached so much as 26 percent of the county's vote.

[14] Following amendment to the Kansas Constitution in 1986, the county remained a prohibition, or "dry", county until 2004, when voters approved the sale of alcoholic liquor by the individual drink with a 30 percent food sales requirement.