Sedalia | Railroad Town, Historic Site (2024)

Sedalia, city, seat of Pettis county, west-central Missouri, U.S., 75 miles (121 km) east-southeast of Kansas City. Established in 1857 by George R. Smith and originally named Sedville for his daughter Sarah (nicknamed Sed), it developed along the Missouri Pacific Railroad right-of-way. It became a Union military post during the American Civil War and was raided by the Confederate general Sterling Price. Generals Nathaniel Lyon and John C. Frémont outfitted Union forces there in 1861. Renamed Sedalia, it was an important railhead for the Texas cattle drive of 1866. With the arrival of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad, large railroad shops were built in Sedalia. The city was devastated economically when that railroad closed during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Today Sedalia is an agricultural shipping and distribution point and has diversified manufactures, including structural steel, aluminum products, commercial food-service equipment, air compressors, automotive wheels, insulation, tool-storage equipment, and home appliances. Tourism is also important. Composer Scott Joplin wrote and played “Maple Leaf Rag” at the town’s Maple Leaf Club, and the ragtime craze is supposed to have begun there. Sedalia is the site of the Missouri State Fair and the State Fair Community College (1966). Whiteman Air Force Base (1942; originally Sedalia Army Air Base) is nearby to the west. Bothwell Lodge State Historic Site is to the north. Katy Trail State Park, a rail-to-trail conversion that stretches 234 miles (377 km) across Missouri, winds through the city. Inc. 1864. Pop. (2000) 20,339; (2010) 21,387.