After the Civil War many in the west were sympathetic to the situation of Blacks in the south. Kansas had always had an abolitionist population and they invited southern Blacks to move to Kansas and in many occasions helped them get established. Towns, such as Nicodemus, were created as a place to start a new life. Nicodemus was the man in the Bible who asked Jesus how a man can be born again, it seemed a fitting name for the ex-slaves.
Historically Speaking 