Great Bend

City, seat (1872) of Barton county, central Kansas, U.S. Great Bend lies on the Arkansas River where the High Plains begin to shade into tallgrass prairie. Situated in the alleged locality of the mythical city of Quivira sought by Francisco Coronado in the 16th century, the site was visited by the American explorer Zebulon Pike in 1806 and became a stopping point on the Santa Fe