Kanwaka is an unincorporated community in Douglas County

Douglas County, Kansas

Douglas County is a county located in northeast Kansas, in the Central United States. As of the 2010 census, the county population was 110,826...

, Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

 located 4 miles west of Lawrence

Lawrence, Kansas

Lawrence is the sixth largest city in the U.S. State of Kansas and the county seat of Douglas County. Located in northeastern Kansas, Lawrence is the anchor city of the Lawrence, Kansas, Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Douglas County...

. Kanwaka is a portmanteau of the Kansas

Kansas River

The Kansas River is a river in northeastern Kansas in the United States. It is the southwestern-most part of the Missouri River drainage, which is in turn the northwestern-most portion of the extensive Mississippi River drainage. Its name come from the Kanza people who once inhabited the area...

 and Wakarusa

Wakarusa River

The Wakarusa River is a tributary of the Kansas River, approximately long, in eastern Kansas in the United States. It drains an agricultural area of rolling limestone hills south of Topeka and Lawrence.-Description:...

 Rivers. Kanwaka was first settled in 1854 and had a post office from 1857 to 1870 and again from 1897 until 1900.

Kanwaka is located at the intersection of U.S. Highway 40

U.S. Route 40

U.S. Route 40 is an east–west United States highway. As with most routes whose numbers end in a zero, U.S. 40 once traversed the entire United States. It is one of the original 1920s U.S. Highways, and its first termini were San Francisco, California, and Atlantic City, New Jersey...

and Stull Road although the name Kanwaka refers to an area, not a town.