Akron: a railroad town on the high edge of the plains

If you drive into Akron and wonder why a town is here at all, the answer is the railroad. In 1882 the new Burlington line pushed across these open plains, and surveyors filed a plat for a town along the tracks. The story goes that a railroad official’s wife named it for her hometown of Akron, Ohio — a fitting choice, since “Akron” comes from a Greek word for summit, and this stretch of track sits high.

How high? The town reports an elevation of about 4,663 feet, which it describes as the highest point on the line east of Denver. That makes Akron one of the loftiest places on Colorado’s plains, even though the land here looks flat and easy.

A railroad town needs water and coal, and Akron supplied both, roughly halfway along the run toward McCook, Nebraska. Around that work grew a depot, a roundhouse, stockyards, and grain elevators, and the town settled into the farming and ranching it still does today. Later, sleek Burlington Zephyr trains rolled this same Denver-to-Chicago route.

It is an easy thing to miss while passing through. For the town’s own account of how it began, read the Town of Akron’s history page.