Urbana's name carries a settler thread inside Dallas County

Dallas County history is not only Buffalo. The State Historical Society of Missouri’s Dallas County place-name file identifies Urbana as a town in Lincoln Township with a post office since 1867. It says the town was named after Urbana, Illinois, by settlers who came to Dallas County from there.

The same entry notes an older name thread: Urbana was originally called Andersonville after a Dr. Andrews who lived there. That is the kind of local detail that can explain why older references, family papers, or local stories may not use the same name a modern map uses.

There is even a small unresolved wrinkle. The file says the reason it was called Andersonville instead of Andrewsville was not explained, even though the doctor was named Andrews. That is not a giant mystery, but it is exactly the sort of detail that makes a place-name file useful: it preserves what people remembered, and also what they did not fully know.

For a local reader, the point is simple. Urbana is not just a dot north of Buffalo. It carries its own settlement name story inside the county.