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Fairway, Kansas is a small, affluent residential city in northeast Johnson County — about 4,170 residents (2020 census) — just west of the Kansas–Missouri state line and minutes from the Country Club Plaza. Incorporated in 1949 and nicknamed “The City of Trees,” it sits within the broader J.C. Nichols-shaped Country Club District corridor and is home to the Shawnee Indian Mission state historic site — the surviving 1839 buildings of the Shawnee Methodist Mission that gave the “Shawnee Mission” name to the area.

Overview

Fairway is a primarily residential, upper-income community of roughly 4,170 people (2020 census) — the city describes itself as having “nearly 4,000 residents and nearly 1,800 homes.”12 Incorporated in 1949 and nicknamed “The City of Trees,” it lies in northeast Johnson County “within minutes of the Country Club Plaza and Downtown Kansas City,” just west of the state line near Mission Road.2 Its name comes from its proximity to the fairways of the nearby Mission Hills Country Club.1 The city is markedly affluent — a 2020 median household income around $120,000, with more than half of adults holding a bachelor’s degree or higher.1

Fairway lies within the broader Country Club District corridor that developer J.C. Nichols extended west across the state line (whose Kansas portion reached to Mission Road, alongside Mission Hills, Westwood Hills, and Mission Woods).3

Shawnee Indian Mission

Fairway is home to the Shawnee Indian Mission Historic Site at 53rd Street and Mission Road — the surviving buildings of the Shawnee Methodist Mission, established by Methodists in 1839 as a school for Shawnee children (later the Shawnee Indian Manual Labor School), which operated until 1862.41 A National Historic Landmark owned by the Kansas Historical Society and operated by the City of Fairway as a museum, the site is the source of the “Shawnee Mission” place-name used across the surrounding suburbs.15

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Footnotes

  1. Wikipedia — “Fairway, Kansas.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairway,_Kansas — asserts: 4,170 (2020 census); incorporated 1949; named for golf fairways; 2020 median household income $120,162; Shawnee Indian Mission a National Historic Landmark, KS Historical Society–owned, City-operated. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  2. City of Fairway — Community. https://fairwaykansas.org/community — asserts: ~4,000 residents / ~1,800 homes; incorporated 1949; “City of Trees”; minutes from the Country Club Plaza; Shawnee Indian Mission at 53rd & Mission Road. ↩ ↩2

  3. Wikipedia — “Country Club District.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_Club_District — asserts: J.C. Nichols’s Country Club District extended into Kansas to Mission Road (Mission Hills, Westwood Hills, Mission Woods). (: whether Nichols personally platted Fairway specifically vs. the surrounding corridor.) ↩

  4. Shawnee Indian Mission — History. https://shawneeindianmission.org/history/ — asserts: Shawnee Methodist Mission established 1839 as a Shawnee school; closed 1862. ↩

  5. Kansas Historical Society — Shawnee Indian Mission. https://www.kansashistory.gov/p/shawnee-indian-mission-programs/18588 — asserts: state historic site; mission history + programming. ↩

See also

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