Clay Center, the county seat and largest city of Clay county, is located on the Republican river at the junction of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific and two lines of the Union Pacific railroads, a little northeast of the center of the county. The first settlement at Clay Center was made in May, 1862, by John and Alonzo F. Dexter and Orville Huntress. When it was proposed to make Clay Center the county seat, Alonzo F. Dexter donated the ground for a court-house—a fact which is inscribed on the corner-stone of the building erected in 1900. Soon after that court-house was completed, Mr. Dexter, having grown old and suffered financial reverses, was made superintendent of the structure, with quarters in the building. On June 11, 1875, Clay Center was incorporated as a city of the third class. In April, 1880, the population having increased to over 2,000, a petition was presented to the governor to make it a city of the second class, and in July Gov. St. John issued a proclamation to that effect.

According to the U. S. census for 1910 the population of Clay Center was then 3,438. It has broad, well improved streets, a fine waterworks system, an electric lighting plant, a fire department, sewers, a telephone exchange, 2 national and 3 state banks with a capital of $200,000, an opera house, lodges of the leading fraternal organizations, a number of fine church edifices, good hotels, a bottling works, a broom factory, grain elevators, foundries and machine shops, carriage and wagon works, planing mills, flour mills, an engraving company, brick and tile factories, and some well stocked and well conducted mercantile establishments. From the international money order postoffice of Clay Center eight rural delivery routes supply daily mail to the inhabitants of a rich agricultural region. The county high school is located at Clay Center, and the public school buildings of the city are as fine as those of any city in Kansas. The press is represented by one daily and three weekly newspapers, a monthly fraternal magazine, and a religious quarterly.