city, seat (1860) of Geary county (until 1889 designated as Davis county), northeastern Kansas, U.S. It is situated at the confluence of the Republican and Smoky Hill (Smoky Hill River) rivers. Junction City was founded in 1858 and named for the river confluence. It developed as a trading centre for nearby Fort Riley, a U.S. military post since 1853 and the headquarters of Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer (Custer, George Armstrong) and his Seventh Cavalry. The fort is also the site of the first territorial capitol building (1855) of Kansas and is now maintained as a museum. The Kansas Vietnam Veterans Memorial, located in the heart of the city, commemorates the nearly 800 Kansans who died in that war.

Junction City is now the wholesale and shipping centre for a grain and dairy area and has railroad shops, feed mills, and dairies. Limestone is quarried from surrounding bluffs. Milford Dam impounds the Republican River. Milford State Park and Geary State Fishing Lake are nearby. Inc. 1859. Pop. (1990) 20,604; (2000) 18,886.