welcometoFlyovercountry

Little House on the Prairie April 2011

2011-06-19T17:07:00.006-05:00

Just South of Independence,Kansas one finds a sign inviting travels to turn for Little House on the Prairie.If you pass it,another sign tells you so and suggests to turn around. We traveled South of 75 through Burlington,Yates Center. The last time we traveled this direction, it was instinctly foggy, so we didnt see the Nuclear Power Plant, I was pleased to note we could see it this time. We considered stopping or at least seeing the lake , but didnt.

On to Little House on the Prairie,what you find is a collection of old post offices, One room school houses and the cabin. Laura Ingals Wilder wrote several books detailing the Prairie life of the 1870's and 1880's. The books and the TV series are iconic. Personally I would rather have the book as what Kansas is, or was than the Wizard of Oz, which I am over and most Kansans have either a love or hate relationship with. As the Summer of 2011 wore on, The Wizard of Oz was shown at the Capital Building as part of Movies on the Lawn series, I told a co worker, I'd have to be paid a lot of money to willingly see it. Little House on the Prairie, William Inge ,Buster Keaton yes, Wizard No !

Anyway, my question was how do we known the Cabin was there. Census work, The Ingals family is listed in the 1870 census in Montgomery County, the book talks about a hand dug well and this spot was the only one that fit the bill. So the log cabin is recreated as it was in the book.

The brounche warns you not to trust GPS and that is correct. The GPS will take you about a half mile down the road.

Traveling through Kansas, you run into a lot of Log Cabins and one room school houses,they all tend to be the same. This one has the rules of conduct that teachers had to live by. This Cabin because of the connection to this great book just feels different.

Kansas at 150

2011-01-30T15:57:00.003-06:00

Kansas Statehood was 150 years ago yesterday. Due to budget problems the celebration officially was restrained. No Parades and fireworks that came with Kansas 100 in 1961. The Kansas State Historical Society Musuem charged $1.50 for entry and had bands,food and crafts. Upon entering we could see Dorothy,The Good Witch,scarecrow and the Lion mixing about with men in Civil War uniforms and couples in period pieces. I know similar events went on through out the State, at Fort Scott for example and else where.

The history of Kansas going like this . Coronando came here and found plain Indians,Lewis and Clark spent several days here. The Great Trails of Westward Expansion go through here, Kansas became a territory in 1854 and became known as Bleeding Kansas. Statehood occured and 3 and half months later the civil war began.Kansas had the highest death rate per capita of any state in that great conflict.

Until recently It had become a leader in Progressive politics. As I will talk about woman had the right to vote long before the Suffragettes ,in fact the first Female Mayor of any town was elected in Argonia,Kansas in 1887, 33 years before the Constitution got around to the issue.

Pictures of my two favorite items at the Musuem, the first is items discarded on the trails. It's not the chair and clock that interest me as much as it what they represent. They are dreams of those who crossed the country, as some point they had to dump them on the side of the road in order to continue, the destination itself was certainly a dream as well. I can only imagine the conversation about what item to discard. The State motto of "Ad astra per aspera" is on full display here.

The other is the exhibit about Susanna Salter who in 1887 was elected Mayor of Argonia,Kansas. The first woman to be the Mayor of a city.Kansas Progress thought more than 30 before Women got the right to vote.

As always for as much of Kansas is found in Topeka, you have to go outisde of Topeka to find Kansas. The town of Burlingame is about 20 miles South of Topeka and hosted a 2 day Kansas Day event with a Ham and Bean lunch at the old High School,now a Musuem. We found girls dressed in Pioneer clothes,Butter Makers,we missed the Cow Milking Contest, arts and crafts on display. We came to listen to a Harvey Girl lecture from a professor at K-State. It was really an enjoyable time.

Ending the day at Williamsburg, a town that maybe has 10 people on a good day, the old railroad station has been converted to the town library. Main street has about 2 buildings on each side of the street and a wonderful little BBQ Tavern Resturant called Guy and Mae's. It is one of the 8 wonders of Kansas-Cusine and offers some good BBQ.

Small Business in Small Towns

2010-12-13T05:34:00.003-06:00

A personal story here. In Junior High I walked to school to school, down a block to pick up Richie, then we walked to a couple of blocks to sometimes Juniors house and then to Gary's house, then across the lawn of Highland Park South over the tennis courts to Eisenhower High School. Sometime in 1980 or so Gary moved to Bennington,Kansas. Richie moved across town to Washburn Rural, I last saw him when he brought over a Record ,Men At Work as my Graduation gift. I have fond memories of those warm and cold days walking to school,going to movies. The Parents picked us and took us to the mall and several movies, sleep overs, the good times everyone hopes for,the true time of innocence.

Gary went with us on a trip to Texas,we stopped several places on the way, I think that was the trip to Astrodome, I remember Galveston Island pretty well, I'm not sure what we did in Oklahoma that trip. I slept a week in Bennington the summer of 1980 and remember 3 things, a tracker pull, seeing "The Muppet Movie" at a downtown movie palace and going to a drug store on the main street that had a soda fountain.

I had passed by Bennington several times over the past few years,going up 81 or connecting to I-70 in Salina. The cut off seemed familiar,but I never stopped. So this trip seemed the time. A couple of factors at play, 1) personal memories, I wondered what I would remember from 30 years ago,never holding out much thought Gary could still be there 2) I always came back in my memories to the Soda Fountain,It was probably the memorable part of the trip.and 3) as I have been though so many small towns,what was the state of this small town.

On the Soda Fountain, I was sure the place was an Alco,Duckwalls or woolworth,that is how I remember it anyway. Soda Fountains are so much of a by gone era that you can mostly only find them in Museums, I have seen several the view years on my travels, the one that sticks out is the Old Train Station Museum in Ottawa. Topeka has a working one in Old Prairie Town. I sort of wish my Lunch would allow me time to go more often. In the end it is only open at certain hours. But I have been there.The Soda Fountain is definitely a prime piece of Americana.As I have looked at so many on display I recalled I have been to one. At 45 Museums now contain,not the memories of others but mine.

On Small towns.I'm not talking County seats with the court house squares filled with antique stores,rexall drug stores,the town or county newspaper site, I think of towns with a main street that at the most is 3 blocks long. In Wellsville, It's 2 blocks long with one stop light,2 antique stores,a BBQ restaurant, a pizza place and a flower shop. It's doing pretty good.

Onaga,where I have not been isn't doing good. The town grocery store burned down earlier this month. Shuttle buses twice a week take those who cant or wont drive to bigger towns until they decide what to do with the store. I think about myself in Topeka,waking up to find I need milk driving the 5 minutes to the Wal mart or Dillions to get what I need.

Lebannon,Kansas the town you can see in the distance from the Geographic Center of the US, by appearances is not doing well.The Main street has a gift shop along side boarded up buildings and other than a cafe isn't doing well. There is a Casey's general store,a locally owned pizza place, a bank, including a branch of mine in Halstead,Kansas, a town off the main drag and location for the movie "Picnic".

The newspaper in Topeka talks about the decline of small town America. The new Governor wants to establish Rural Enterprise Zones and I wonder about Soda Fountains, what ever happened to the Kid I went to see so many movies with and took a vacation to Texas with. So it was time to go back to Bennington,Kansas ....

The Main Street was vaguely recognizable to me,I thought the store was the one boarded up but a wooden wall and a mirror was visible from a corner store with a sign in the window saying "Loft Apartments available". A sign out front asked "Have you had a Green River ?" a sure sign of a Soda Fountain inside. The sign above said "The Linger Longer".

I had only to walk in and recognize the Mirror,the wood paneling, the counter and the chairs. I was pleasantly surprised, It was not in a museum somewhere. The lady behind the counter asked what brought us here and I told my story. She didn't remember Gary,but knew someone with that last night. She said you probably remember it as a Drug Store, the mention of comic books and I could visualize the creaky comic book stand and spinning it around when I was there 30 years ago.

She gave a history of the building, said the fountain was against the other wall she is a farmer and opened the store a month ago "for the community". We talked about Kansas Sampler Foundation, they had been there and it's going to be on the cover of the next book.As we drank coffee, which hit the spot on a cold,windy day she called Gary's mother. He was in Olathe,married and a couple of kids.I was pleased, not pleased to hear his mother is not doing well.I didn't remember the city swimming pool. We talked a lot about Small town schools versus Big Town school, graduation rates,quality of life issues and eventually we decided it was time to leave,Hamburgers at the Cozy Inn in Salina beckoned. She offered to take a picture of me behind the Soda Fountain and explained how it worked. Invited us to the Rodeo in June and the street dance.And we left.

Bennington had 625 people , is doing ok thanks to people with the vision of opening a Soda Fountain where one stood so many years ago. I was pleased to be in Bennington again and see what I remembered was still there, not ready for the Museum just yet. And so in love with Kansas and great Kansans that a phone was made and I got to hear what my Junior High School friend was up to.

In 2010 I was in all 4 states that surround Kansas and several places in between.I saw street named after Country Music Stars,saw about 20 Court houses,ate at local chicken resturants, saw Wagon Ruts of the Oregon trail and stood in the middle of the Road of the famous Route 66.

Winter in Kansas being what it is, I can't say for certain I will get out again before Kansas turns 150 on January 29th, so Happy Birthday Kansas !!! No place seems a more Kansas place than a 15 year kid in a Drug Store on a hot August day in 1980 or a 45 year man in the same place on a cold December afternoon.
Thank you for reading, whoever you are.

wind and one last journey of 2010

2010-12-13T04:54:00.004-06:00

The overwhelming summary I have of travel in 2010 is weather, the first to Fort Scott was delayed by snow and iffy when did make it. The fog was so thick on K10 in Olathe that a fire truck came out of nowhere,it cleared by the time we reached Fort Scott,but we missed the view of the power plant on the Military road the lines the east edge of Kansas.

In was cold and windy in Oklahoma City in February. I climbed a ridge in Ottawa in a light rain to see the Marais des Cygnes River in early May. It was over 100 degrees in July when I stood in Cawker City to take a picture of phone booth on a street corner.Coming back from Winterset,Iowa I watched a lightening storm over North Kansas City.As I stood looking at a sign explaining the fence some half mile in the distance was Colorado in October it was blustery and cold. A cold,grey day in November made thoughts of skipping the Veterans day parade in Emporia a good idea. This weekend the trip to Concordia on 24,down 81 to salina and then I-70 was defined by wind so bad it stopped you from walking at I walked north on the flat tree less plains toward a guard tower of a German POW Camp. It was a quite a year and very interesting trips.

We saw 3 court houses Saturday, In Clay Center,Concordia,and Salina. The Clay Center one was nice, in a town square with 2 teenage girls bravely manning a Salvation Army kettle,a painted sign for Coke was on a wall and our stay was brief. On the way we passed Riley County High School, at the intersection of 77 and 24,with its enrollment in 2008 of 221 students,the school can boast of 2 current players in the NFL,quite a feat. Jon McGraw of the Kansas City Chiefs and Jordy Nelson of the Green Bay Packers.

Concordia is the county seat of Cloud County. Home to the National Orphan Train Museum which is a visit for a another day. The Historical society annex features one of the more unique murals in Kansas, the side of the building has brick cravings of the counties history.I highly recommend the Museum nearby in the Carnegie Library building, It talks about the POW Camp,has an unusal collection of pencils with business printed on them,tons of milk bottles,old dressses,military uniforms and almost anything else you can imagine, truly charming

Cloud County was briefly the home of one Boston Corbett http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Corbett

Known for several things,being the man who shot Lincoln Assassin John Wilkes Booth, shooting up the Kansas House of Representatives during his brief career as a door keeper and generally being crazy. Concordia was also known for being home to some 5,000 German and Italian Prisoners of War. The Guard tower and and one of the building still stand outside of town.It was hear on the flat plains with no trees in sight that the wind stopped me from walking to the guest sign in sheet.

The Mother Road -Route 66

2010-11-18T11:01:00.002-06:00

Trip Date :November 13,2010

We spent most of our time in Missouri, just over the border in the Joplin Area. Visiting the Marlin Perkins statue in Carthage,another wonderful courthouse in Carthage. The George Washington Carver National Memorial in Diamond is of interest to Kansans as he Homesteaded in Ellis County.But the Kansas focus here is 13 miles of the great and legendary Route 66 that took millions from Chicago to Los Angeles from the 1920's to the 1970's.

Cherokee county touches Missouri to the East and Oklahoma to the South. The route of 66 takes from Joplin,Missouri the home of Dennis Weaver and one of Bonnie and Clyde most famous shoot outs through Galena,Riverton and Baxter Springs to Miami,OK where Mickey Mantle was born.Souvenir shops exist in each little with shot glasses,coffee mugs,T-Shirts and Maps. The main landmark is in Riverton where the Rainbow bridge,built in 1923 still stands on the Old Route 66 Road, the newer road is a few yards to the South. Few miles of the Old Road still exist. I traveled the old road in Seigleman,Arizona several years and now have seen the bridge.

Another Kansas Court House in Columbus on our way home and dinner at Chicken Mary's in Frontenac. To go back to a trip last year in Pittsburg, a chicken restaurant was started by 2 sisters to feed coal miners, the sisters feuded and Mary opened her own restaurant literally next door to her sister Annie. The Restaurants have been featured on the Food Channel and both are part of the 8 wonders of Kansas-Restaurants.

I have been to Hays House,Bobo's Drive in Topeka,the Chicken Restaurants of Crawford County and Brookville Hotel in Abilene. Trips scheduled to the rest soon.

High Plains

2010-10-23T06:49:00.005-05:00

Date of Trip:October 16,2010

I recall my first trip west last year and being fasinated by the wind farms, miles and miles of Tall, lean white windmills dotting farm lands between Salina and Russell on I-70. The overwhelming image I had on what would be the longest trip I have taken since the mission to explore Kansas,was not taken with a camera,but lives in the minds eye. The wind farms at night.It's really dark in that stretch of road, the towns are all miles off the highway and the dark sky has a beauty all it own. To the north they are dotted with red lights,obviously used for air travel, the funny thing was they blink on and off in what is almost a dance to no music. In the car we were listening to a biography of John Wayne, so that couldnt be it. Heading west we timed the first view of the sentenial like windmills at 10 miles. So it was a few minutes before we reached the farms itself and the cause of the blinking was revealed. The blades whirling around cut out the red light for a brief moment. It was beautiful to watch the ballet of red dots against the black night.

The weekend was also a time of Fall festivals,a corn husking contest at the Buffalo Bill statue near Oakley to the Maple Leaf festival in Baldwin.

As we have gone on this trips, a bucket list has emerged, County court houses. I love the town square feel to them,mainly because we in Topeka have the Capital Building, the court house is a gross looking 1950's look to it.Most of the courthouses are old,situationed in the town square with mom and pops stores around them. As we found in December in Yates Center,wonderful christmas lights, 3 hit county court houses, in Sharon Springs,Goodland and Oakley. Plus a beautiful court house in Cheyenne Wells,Co.

Mount Sunflower is the highest point in Kansas at 4 thousand feet. It is not a mountain at all by the high point of several hills. It lays 11 miles down this road and 2 miles up that road from US-40. Or you get there from I-70, same directions, 12 miles here and 2 miles there. Either way you pass farm land,cows grazing and occasionally passing the road.

The Summit includes a picnic area,a mailbox with a guestbook and stories about a wedding conducted there on a New Years Day in bitter cold, some iron works and a note that Colorado is at the first fence in the distance, about a half mile away.

Please to note I made it all four states in this calendar year and Jan 29,2011 is the 150th Birthday of Kansas Statehood.

Pictures US-36

2010-08-27T06:02:00.004-05:00

!. Skyline of Lebanon as seen from Geographical Center of the US Marker
2. Old Hotel at Center
3. Marker with directions to Center
4. Pony Express stable near Hanover
5. Oregon Trail Park, Pott County

Journey to the Center of the Country

2010-08-17T17:15:00.006-05:00

Trip Date : August 7,2010

I saw a little bit of all the historical crossroads of Kansas as I set out from Topeka on this hot August Saturday. I-70 for about 20 miles to 99 North on the way to 36 and then West. Between Wamego and Westmoreland (Westy) we came across a historical marker for the Oregon Trail. Within eye sight of the marker was Scott Springs,where as many 300,000 heeding Horace Greely's call went West you man. Wagon ruts are still visible as much as 170 to 180 years later. America's Roman Highways.The Park is small,contains several historic markers and a wagon and ox statue. Visitors are encouraged to sign the guest book,which is a composition notebook kept in a box.To whoever keeps of it, Topeka represents on the Oregon Trail. I cannot help but wonder how many days out from the Ward-Meade cabin in Topeka this spring is.

Up a very scenic byway,still in the flint hills,we hit US-36 which travels across the Northern tear of counties from Missouri to the Colorado border.The first town we came to was Marysville, the truck stops,hotels and everything is Pony Express. so in the span of a half hours drive,we have moved from the 1830's to that brief time when the Pony Express caught the world fancy.Four miles off 36 is the Hollenberg Station one of the few, if not only Pony Express Stations still standing. Riders changed horses every 10 miles or so on the trip between St. Josephs,Missouri and Sacramento,California. Riders were required to stop every so often as well and stayed at stations like Hollenberg,The site is maintained by the Kansas State Historical Society.

The Flint Hills are gorgeous even in the faded brown grass, as you come out of the flint hills, the area is truly flat.You can gauge the distance as Grain elevators dot the skyline.We pasted Home,Washington,read historic markers near Scandia on the way to Lebanon,Kansas and eventually Smith Center,where we encountered a minor course correction.

Lebanon,Kansas had a population of 303 according the 2000 Census. I would guess it sees more than that passing in a summer. The object of interest is a stone obelisk with an American flag planted on it. It's a representation of the geographic center of the Continental United States. An old hotel that is now used as a hunting lodge stands behind it, also a small 1 room chapel stands near by.The few minutes we stayed a couple of guys on motorcycles came by as did a car from Florida. People do visit nowhere.

Smith Center,Kansas in 2000 had a population of 1,931.Now the town has at first look 2 sports bars,1 burger joint and a Pizza Hut and 3 Hotels. The reason for the hotels is the population explodes during hunting season. Not far is the home of the man who wrote "Home on the Range", the state song of Kansas and sung by Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby among others. It is also the home of the Smith Center High School Redmen,a high school football dystany who had been undefeated for 6 seasons going into the State Championship game last November when the Nation tying winning streak came to an end. It was the subject of a wonderful book "Our Boys" by Joe Drape. It's a great book about Rural Kansas,High School sports and life in general.

Here we found out that our plans to go an hour down the road to Logan would have to be changed. Those it was 2:30 in the afternoon there was no way we could eat and make it to Logan before the Museum we were planning to go closed. A word about how these trips are planned, Topeka's PBS station has a wonderful show called "Sunflower Journeys", a friend had seen an episode about Logan, I said sure. Now I have no idea what the Museum is about,I could look on the internet, but that seems like cheating. So I did not make it to a Museum and have no idea what is about. Logan has been reschedule, the mystery remains.

Interesting side note,the book about Smith Center mentioned how far Smith Center was from the nearest McDonalds, we looked for it on GPS,Sitting at the county court house, It's almost 80 miles away in Holdrege,Nebraska. Wow. We plotted a trip home that took us through Cawker City,Beloit and Salina then home on I-70.

Small Town Kansas.

2010-05-16T13:51:00.004-05:00

I have traveled this year, Interesting how weather has been a factor this year. It was sooo cold in Oklahoma City, and a cloudy gray day in Omaha. I decided a while ago unless there was a definite Kansas connection,I wasn't going to write.

I was in Lawrence briefly and then Franklin County. In Lawrence I took the Whiote Glove tour of the Robert J Dole Institute of Politics. It was a real behind the scenes look at the stacks of Papers and Gifts Dole recieved as a US Senator and Presidential Candidate. I'd encourage anyone to go and if you have an interest in Archival work, how things are preserved, the White Glove tour, offered once a month or so for Free is very good, as are any of the lectures I've been to since the place opened in 2003.

The point of the day lay Southward, about 20 miles south is Ottawa,Kansas, the county seat of Franklin. the town is cut in half by the Marais Des Cygne River, more about that and a wonderful song in a minute. There is a Museum called the Old Santa Fe Depot. It features history of Victorian Living Rooms,Soda fountains,old train stuff. Stuff that is pretty standard in my almost 2 years of wondering around.

Special attention is paid to th Pottawatomie Massacre, discussed briefly here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pottawatomie_Massacre.

We walked on a dyke by the river, which floods often, giant flood gates surround a bridge over the river.

going North and East up I-35 we find outselfs in Wellsville,Kansas. Population around 1200 and hometown of country music singer Chely Wright. She made headlines a couple of weeks ago by announcing she's gay. I first heard her a couple of years ago on an AM station and see did a song that really moved me,called "The River". I didn't know who she was, bought the album based on the one song and because she's a Kansas girl.

Here are my impressions of this small town

I've been in a lot of small towns in Kansas. Wellsville has about a 3 block main street with a dentist office,a casey's general store. Every small town in Kansas seems to have a Pizza place,a bar, an American Legion Post. If it's a county seat it will have a subway and town square.Wellsville has a BBQ place, a burger place "Big Bopper's burger and ... See MoreVideos"

On this rainy,cloudy saturday we went to the Pizza place, Buzzard's Pizza. It had about 8 tables, a hand written sign saying this months special is "Road Kill Pizza". A flat screen on a wall next to saturday night beer specials. The 2 kids working the place were watching the history channel. After we were done eating we stayed to watch the end of "Pawn Stars", we had to know how much the civil war stamp sold for, the waiter asked us if we needed anything else. I said " No, we just want to know how much the stamp sold for." He "Yeah, it's a pretty interesting show."

The stores on main street all said "open till 4" but seemed to be closed by 3:30. The most modern looking building is the bank , I turned a corner and saw the high school so I walked the two blocks to see it. past some houses, one had a kids bike on the sidewalk. As I crossed the street a truck went by, the old man waved at me.I smiled and waved back.

The inscription on the sign at the school stopped me cold in my tracks.After asking yesterday about the truth in the song "The River" here was a sign in loving memory of ...

Before you turn onto Chely Wright Way, you pass a sign with the school state championships ,Boys basketball Chely's Junior (?) year.Which is typical of most small towns in Kansas, that along with FFA.

The nearest wal mart is either in Ottawa,15 miles or Baldwin, 15 miles in another direction. I am suprised with as many small towns in Kansas as I find myself that Wellsville is near a creek or a river, at least not the way we came in.If I had a dime for everytime I crossed a bridge to get into a small town.....

The neighborhoods are tree lined,churches almost every corner,farm fields on the outskirts. I'm guessing not much has changed since 1989. As Garrison Keillor says as he opens his monlogues "It was a quiet week in my home town of Lake Wobegon, the little town that time forgot and the decades cannot improve. " I thought it cool to be there, I'm glad I went.

Here is the song:

Last from Fort Scott

2010-01-18T15:46:00.003-06:00

These always send chills down my bones. The bill of sale for slaves.

Interior pictures

2010-01-18T15:32:00.002-06:00

a couple of Cannons, a field medical kit,dolls with hickory nuts used as heads,a jail cell in the brig

Fort Scott Jan 16,2010

2010-01-18T15:26:00.004-06:00

Some pictures walking around the parade grounds. The Long white building is the horse stable. The buildings with Greek Columns are Officer Row.

Return to the Road

2010-01-12T16:38:00.004-06:00

The last entry I did was in early December and a trip to St. Joe. Outside of the Casino were we ate on the bank of the Missouri River I took a picture of a Wonderful sunset. I posted it on some message boards I am on and got good comments. I had a feeling as I looked at the river that day,I was the last good day of 2009. I knew snow was in the forecast for Tuesday and the river would be snow packed if not iced up. Little did I realize how right my thoughts were.

We did have snow and icy conditions on that Tuesday. It was nothing compared to the three weeks that began on Christmas Eve.Told to go home at Noon on Christmas we at work scraped our wind shields and wondered how bad the slide home would be. Stopping at a quick shop near a hill,I watched a car slide backwards to flat land. It really had not yet begun to snow. 3 days it stopped. 13 inches with epic snow drifts. Someone wrote of driving an hour and half in the blizzard to go 20 miles. I noticed an area where because of the drifts you could see the ground, right next to two feet of drifts. At some point I had to laugh, one because the multude of people of who urn for a white Christmas got what they wanted and then some, and two I picked up several books on my stops in 2009 dealing with the frontier and the trials that ran through Kansas. True I was in a heated home and not out in the wilds, but I got the story of what they saw. When we were in Lincoln,Nebraska one of the glass painting depicted the Blizzard of 88 or some year.The guide asked if Kansas had any stories of the blizzard, I didn't think so, but I can now say , We remember and aren't likely to forget the Christmas Blizzard of 2009. Just to set the record, more snow fell the week between Christmas and New Year and more fell the first weekend of 2010.

Later that week, we were visited with bitter cold and wind chills in negative 20 range.That having passed, 40's and certain snow meltage and we could dream of more trips.... That has now come to pass.

Fog warnings did not stop us. So we went to Fort Scott,Kansas. The heaviest fog seemed to burn off the further East we went.and turning south on 69 it wasn't bad.

On to the Fort.

Fort Scott opened in the 1840's as part of a chain on the Indian Frontiers, the guidebook says the intent was to keep the Indians on one side and the non Indians on the other side. Dragoon fought in the Mexican-American War. Fort Riley,near Junction City opened in the 1850's and Fort Scott closed. Here is where the story gets interesting.

The buildings were sold and one of the officers quarters became a Free state hotel and one, on the other side of the parade ground became a Pro Slave hotel. The guide books speaks of many a drunk brawl. One of the signs contains a quote from a woman whose fiancee had been killed. She wrote in a letter:

"But remember this,I am a girl, but I can fire a pistol and if ever the time comes I will send some of you to a place where theirs 'weeping and knashing of teeth ..." that is one of the most powerful statements coming from Bleeding Kansas I have ever read.

As several battles took place in Kansas and Missouri took place, Fort Scott reopened and was the home of the First Kansas Colored,an infantry unit of Freed Slaves. This unit per dates the unit featured in the movie "Glory", though they haven't gotten a movie about them. This goes to the long held historians belief that the Civil War only took place East of the Mississippi.

The Fort closed in the 1870's,however it took a century to become a part of the National Park system.

The Town of Fort Scott is the County seat of Bourbon County, 2000 Census listed the population around 8,000. It always amazes me the eating opportunities.I've noticed a lot of these smaller towns have a locally owned pizza join, a bar and a subway. GPS gave us about the same eating opportunities in Fort Scott. Mostly we were pointed a half hour down the road to Pittsburg.We ate at a sports bar and watched the first half of the K-State/Colorado basketball game.I noticed almost everyone who came in brought kids. I also noticed the town Christmas decorations were still up, a testament to how bad the winter has been, the epic Christmas snow, the snow just after New Years, the record wind chill and now the fog.

The Fort itself is mostly refurbished buildings, but you do get to see what the Fort looked like. On of my favorite exhibits is a series of photos. The first from the 1860's of the powered explosive building, the next showing evacuations of the site and rebuilding the building. It the round building on the parade ground in the pictures that follow.

Many exhibits talk about the man who designed the fort,Captain Tom Sword,a West Point graduate who wanted to make the Fort the "Crack Post of the Frontier", he favored Greek Archtexture,which can clearly seen in the Posts on the Officer Quarters. The building are unique to anything else I have seen from the time.

On to the Pictures ...

Winter Sunset on the Missouri River

2009-12-08T19:59:00.003-06:00

On the Missouri Side , facing Kansas (where else).

Have a great Holiday. I do hope if you somehow found this blog, you've had half as much fun reading it as I have doing it !

Rick

See Ya in 2010

Pictures -St Joseph

2009-12-08T19:48:00.005-06:00

Sacajawea guarding the Casino.

The Bullet hole at Jesse James house.

Outside of Jesse James House

A cockfighting ring broken up. They put these around the cock's legs.

Christmas decorations on a train

old time speakers

Unused Hang mans gallows.

The Motel is no longer there, but they kept the sign.

Pony Express stables

Pony Express -Eastern Terminus and a strange place

2009-12-08T18:58:00.005-06:00

St Josephs,Missouri

Date of Trip: December 5,2009

Trip are now weather dependent, as I watch a beautiful snow fall out of my window. I have to think this is the last one of what has been an amazing year. Last week the Trails were the story,Independence,Missouri, the shoving off point for so many going west. I managed to cover Lewis and Clark,Oregon,Santa Fe,California and the Mormon Trail.About 35 miles north is St. Joseph, home town of Walter Cronkite,Jesse James and the eastern point of the Pony Express. The Patee House serves as a Museum for the city and I shall write of it shortly. One of the exhibits in the Museum is a newspaper article from from January of 1864,It announces Lincoln is running for re election and just below it a famed actor named John Wilkes Booth was in town and convinced to give a performance of Shakespearean monologues. Probably the first and not last time the two names will be linked.

We came from the Pony Express Museum. It's a nice,very interactive place were you can sit on saddles and pump water from a well into a horses trofe. Lots of maps of the Trail,artifacts and a D.A.R. Museum outside marking the stable. It is worth noting 2010 is 150th anniversary of the Express brief run.

Next was the Patee House which I thought was going to be the Pony Express office, which it was , but was so much more.

-Lincoln stayed there in 1859

-Mark Twain stayed there

-William Seward gave a speech from the balcony

-Military trials after the civil war occurred there

-An episode of "Ripley's Believe it or not not" was filmed there.Jack Palance was there and someone kept his cigar butts

-Walter Cronkite was there, as his father the dentist has artifacts in the museum.

-Next door you can find the house Jesse James was shot, which had been moved from it's original location, the sign out front says "See the Bullet hole" and we did.

Downtown is wonderful statue of a Pony Express Rider. I'll warn you if want to eat anything other Taco Bell or Hardees, you might be forced to eat at the casino.We did anyway. We have missed something else along the way. I'm going to fill the next entry with pictures from Patee house. The last picture taken at the casino is a beautiful sun set on the Missouri River. The leaves on the trees are going and I couldn't help but wonder how soon snow would cover the ground, Ice fill the river and wonderful is this was the last day of 2009 that the river would flow .

This is probably the last trip of the year, but don't worry. I sat down with a sheet of paper and came up with 19 trips,mostly in the state of Kansas that can all be done in a day. Last year was Bleeding Kansas for the most part, this year Trails ,who knows what will catch my eye in 2010. I went to Fort Leavenworth,far Western Kansas, saw such oddities as the World Largest Ball of Twine,a giant shovel,a Monument of the National Park System that told the story of my family history . In this, Lincoln's 200th Birthday , Steps were he spoke have been preserved, and a hotel where he stayed stands. Last year I was enchanted by the story of the Harvey Girls, this year I saw the way of life,Conestoga Wagons, that the trains ended.

Last year I remembered talking to a gentleman who said "If take a pins and stick in a map at Emporia,Kansas and draw a circle 200 miles around it, you will find more US History than almost anywhere in the Country." The 13 Colonies may argue that point but between the Labor Unrest of the Amazon Women in Pittsburg ,the Trials,The Homesteaders,Fort Leavenworth,Bleeding Kansas,Brown v BOE,William Allen White,Harry Truman,Dwight Eisenhower and so many others. He makes a good case.

We remember Hays House where Custer and Jesse James dined. We remember the choice Chicken Annie's or next door Chicken Mary's. We remember the Casino in St Joe with the statue of Sacajawea in front of it. We ate well,saw some amazing and frankly strange things.

So Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. We put away the GPS and the smart phone,give K-tag a rest, read all the brouchures I picked up and plan and plot for 2010. See you on the highways.....

Shawnee Indian Mission

2009-11-29T18:33:00.004-06:00

Date of Trip:November 28,2009 ,last stop of the day.

Somewhere buried in the suburban landscape,where what city you are in seems to change block by block is the Shawnee Indian Mission.Originally a large tract of land it has been shrunk and shrunk to where it now only occupies a couple of buildings, you have to walk across a busy street to get to one of them.

The history of the site is enormous, from frankly teaching Indian Children the white ways, and that is covered in the film we saw to the meeting house of the bogus legislator of Bleeding Kansas fame. Because in October we visited the Mission in Council Grove and because Council Grove is a long more interesting than the burbs,I enjoyed Council Grove more.Maybe I was just feeling the ghosts of Pro Slavery leader Rev. Tom Johnson and his son about the place. It is a nice little piece of land. Note for National Park Stamp collectors, you can get a Trails stamp here.

Lewis and Clark Statue in Case Park.

2009-11-29T18:26:00.002-06:00

I'll just say this may be not newest favorite place in Kansas City.Beautiful statue,beautiful park. A place where true happened.

On the Lewis and Clark Trail

2009-11-29T18:08:00.006-06:00

Date: November 28,2009

Case Park-Kansas City,Missouri

The words of the corp of discovery speak for themselves.Top left/center you see where the Kansas River heads West.

Tuesday June 26,1804

from the journal of Patrick Gass:

We embarked and set out at five o'clock in the morning; passed a creek on the south side, called Blue-Water. This afternoon we had some difficulty in passing a sandbar, the tow-rope having broke; but by the exertions of those on board, the boat was brought to shore without injury. We encamped on the south side on a point at the confluence of the Canzan, or Kanzas river with the Missouri. It was agreed to remain here during the 27th and 28th where we pitched our tents and built bowers in front of them. Canzan or Kanzas, is 230 yards and a quarter wide, and navigable to a great distance. Our hunters killed 4 deer, and a young wolf, and caught another alive. In the afternoon of the 29th we again proceeded on our voyage, and encamped on the north side of the river.

Monday-September 15,1806

from the Journal of William Clark:

we set out early with a Stiff Breeze a head saw Several deer Swiming the river soon after we Set out. at 11 A. M. passed the enterance of the Kanzas river which was very low, about a mile below we landed and Capt Lewis and my Self assended a hill which appeared to have a Commanding Situation for a fort, the Shore is bold and rocky imediately at the foot of the hill, from the top of the hill you have a perfect Command of the river, this hill fronts the Kanzas and has a view of the Missouri a Short distance above that river.

Pictures National Trails Center

2009-11-29T17:55:00.003-06:00

Poster of the Chicago-Alton Line.Note the detail of the map of the route on the bottom of the lounger all the way up to her head.

This is an amazing photgraph, I wish was available in post card.A wagon train and a steam train meet.A Clash of techonological advancement that made the wagon trains die off.

All Roads lead West

2009-11-29T07:26:00.006-06:00

Date of Trip: November 28,2009

I posted on my facebook status "Wagons West Pics to follow" and then headed out about an hour and half East to Independence,Missouri. Long before Independence was known as the hometown of Harry Truman it was one of ,if not the most famous portages to the great trails of the 19th Century.Blacksmiths,traders,wagons and supplies were in abundance for those going west. Santa Fe,Oregon,California and the Mormon trail.It all starts here. Thousands flock to Independence to see the Truman Library and the home in a quiet residential neighborhood on Delaware Street. The town square is a classic,a large court house and shops. We came for the National Frontier Trails Museum.

Maybe a mile from the town square,identifiable by the Conestoga Wagon and the statue of Jim Bridger is the National Trails Musuem. For those interested in National Parks Stamps, you can get several there. One of the more interesting feature is several of the exhibits come with narration,diaries and journals of the tens of thousands who made it west. Most interesting is Horace Greeley's famous "Go West young man" quote. What is not told about this famous quote is apparently he thought anybody making the trek was foolhardly. That was my favorite audio clip.

The exhibits have everything from stuffed Beaver when telling of the hundreds of new species that Lewis and Clark catalogs and sent back to DC to a general store. Many maps and paintings dot the walls. Several prints are available in the gift shop. As I have said before my favorite exhibit in the Kansas State Historical Society is one of clock,dishes and other things the travelers were forced to set aside on the road.I saw more here,including the story of a chair someone picked up and kept the rest of his life.

A funny tale told is the exhibit of the stuffed rattlesnake, the card said that a solider in the Mexican -American War was bit by a rattlesnake and the doctor gave him "all the whiskey he could drink".Soon other began showing up with the same claims. The Doctor told them they could get any whiskey until after he treated the wound, most claimed to get better on the spot. Love a good story involving alcohol.

On the grounds is a restored train depot on the Chicago-Alton line that was moved about 3 miles.One of the people we were in the tour with wanted to know if Truman traveled from the station. I have included a picture from an advertisement that hangs on the wall ,the painting is of the actress Lili Langtree

Biography from Wiki :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillie_Langtry

Exciting Tallgrass Prairie News

2009-10-31T08:37:00.003-05:00

When I went to Tallgrass for the first time last summer, the Ranger excitedly told us the Bison would be coming next year. The same information was given in September when I went. I pick up the paper this morning and they are here. Exciting News and a reason to return in the near future. To be sure there are Bison in Kansas already, farms near Salina and in Canton have Bison but it is a big deal to have them return to Tallgrass and roaming free in a National Park in Kansas

The story from the Capital Journal and some great pictures that were Top of the fold in the paper version of the Paper.

http://cjonline.com/news/local/2009-10-30/bison_return_to_prairie

Homestead National Monument of America

2009-10-23T19:09:00.008-05:00

In the mist of Civil War in 1862 Congress passed the Homestead Act. On January 1,1863 anyone who signed up was given 160 acres of land to farm.If they stuck with it,they could keep the land.Why go to Nebraska if this is a blog about Kansas ? Fair question. Soon after the Homestead Act was passed, Timothy Smith came from Pennsylvania to Pott County Kansas, a few miles from Manhattan and began to farm. 5 Generations later, the writer of this blog sits at a lap top writing these words. The land near Manhattan is still in use.Someone in my the family has the paper signed by Lincoln granting the use of the land.

Last summer and this , I have seen the tales of Bleeding Kansas,the Drive Western,stood on a bluff and looked down at a river where Lewis and Clark explored.I have seen the Industry that has built the state,the politics that have moved the state and the nation. The moments were the hairs on my arm stand up have been many. The tour guide at the William Allen White explaining "6 Presidents have eaten at this table." Here we going to Beatrice,Nebraska the site of the Homestead land of Daniel Freeman, and I know his story is also my families Story. The story of the American Farmer braving locust,lack of knowledge in Farming. As many people who kept the land into the 6th and 7th generation many more failed.

Beatrice is maybe a half hour from Kansas, the Monument is 4 miles outside of town.It sits on 160 acres land Homesteaded by Daniel Freeman who made his claim on January 1,1863, one of the first if not the first to Homestead. We visited the Heritage Center.For cancellation fans, you can get 4 Stamps, one for the Monument, the Oregon Trail,California Trail and Pony Express.I had the best time talking with the Ranger about stamps, where to get them, how many we've had and hidden stamps.She found out afterwards if you go to the top of Long's Peak, you can get another stamp. She called and had them send her one.

The Film talks about the history of Homesteading including the fact it kicked Indians off their land. The Museum exhibits include Farm equipment, a wonderful display of Newspaper ads for Homesteading. It's very multi media with several videos,including a discussion about the last Homesteader in Alaska ,who got his land in 1980's.The centerpiece is a wind mill with rises above the upper level.

The grounds also include hiking trails,a restored cabin and a one room school house just off the property. In talking about the multi media , they are also on Facebook. I am now a Fan. The website talks about Fiddle festivals,high school ecology field trips and controlled burns.I had high expectations because of the link to my family history. I was thrilled to be there, thrilled it exists.Homesteading is an important story in Manifest destiny. The Bill signed by Lincoln opened by opportunity for many.60% of those who made Claims failed, 40% suceeded beyond the 5 years.

Council Grove in Pictures

2009-10-02T20:21:00.005-05:00

Madonna of the trails and Council Oak

A dress made of newspapers used at a custume party in 1901, the Kaw Indian Mission.

The flag of the Vice President .Custer Elm

Custer Elm a 300 year tree that died in the 1970s. The ring.

Another Draft I never posted

Council Grove- A city that does it right

2009-10-02T19:51:00.002-05:00

A town with population of 2,321 in 2000 boasts 24 Historic Sites. The first site we came across on 177 was the remains of an Elm tree where Gen. George A. Custer and his troops stopped to rest in 1867. From there the wonders continue, a stone erected in 1902 marks the site the Santa Fe Trail headed South west. A Restaurant in town Hays House has been in Operation since 1857 and boost the same General Custer and Jesse James as patrons. The restaurant is the oldest continuously operated this side of the Mississippi and is named after a relative of Daniel Boone who was the first white settler of the town in 1847.

East of the Neosho River with it's wonderful River Walk is an Oak tree where in 1825 where the Army negotiated with the Indians safe passage from the thousands of wagons heading west. Between the Oak tree remains and the River is a statue, The Madonna of the Trails, depicting a Woman and her children braving the trail and an 8 foot bronze statue of a Kanza Indian, The Guardian of the Grove.

The weather this summer has been wonderful and on the last September weekend, the Green has not given way to the brown grass, and this year I don't believe it ever will. A teenager sat fishing on the banks of the river.This is truly Kansas.

The Kaw Indian Mission is run by the State Historical Society, one of the student in the school was Charles Curtis, the flag of the Vice President hangs in the staircase. Curtis was Vice President in the late 1920's and was the first Vice President west of the Mississippi and the first Native American Vice President.A Book sold at the Mission tells the story of Curtis running away from the school and walking the 50 some miles to Topeka. The book, published in 1921 tells only of Senator Curtis.Curtis statue stands in the US Capitol. The Charles Curtis story takes us from a school for Indians to the White House, truly an American Story.

I keep going back to the William Allen White quote "What starts in Kansas,ends in History Books." Council Grove embraces it's history and a town so small had left it imprint on the country.

Pictures to follow

The National Parks- America's Best Idea

2009-10-02T18:23:00.004-05:00

I hope anybody reading this blog has been watching all of or part of Ken Burn's latest masterpiece ,"The National Parks-America's Best Idea." With one episode to go,It has been a great series, with a few flaws. For as majestic as the pictures of Yosemite and the Grand Canyon have been, we have seen little if any of the Parks dedicated to preserving and explain our History,both the good and the bad. So the week of the series, I visited 2 National Parks, I have written twice about Tall Grass and in the middle of the week, I went to a National Historic Site,run by the Park Service that pass by sometimes twice a day on my way to work. This is probably the shortest distance I will travel in this blog, turning right on Adams , a few miles and a left on 17th street to the corner of 17th and Monroe. Maybe 5 minutes depending on how I hit the lights and traffic.

We find ourselves at a red bricked school house that opened with much fanfare in 2004.The old Monroe school, now the Brown v. Board of Education site. In the early 1950's the NAACP made headway in opening up the argument over Separate but equal facilities, this included bathrooms,restaurants,movie theatres and in some National Parks,camping area. In Topeka this meant 4 schools were opened for Blacks.Students had to walk miles out of their to attend schools,even when one was blocks away.

Brown is an accident of the alphabet,2o courts were bundled together for the Supreme Court to hear the case , the official title of the Case is "Oliver Brown,et. al v. ....." so Topeka gets the fame in the history books over people in South Carolina,Virginia and two other states. That being said the story of Oliver Brown is an amazing story,he attended school board meetings attempting to change the law, the school would hear none of it, even changing meeting time so he couldn't attend due to work.

The school contains two galleries ,a short film and a room to record your impressions. The galleries talk about the case, Jim Crow laws and the firestorm that proceeded the decision. For the most part I see school buses when I drive by, it does not contain the transcendent feelings you get at the Grand Canyon or Tall Grass.Yet it tells an important story.

Post script. Opps bad me, I left this as a draft. Ken Burns did briefly out that other National Parks,Mounments,Historic sites do exist,but he spent little time discussing it. That being said I watched most of the series.And it was fantastic, and caused me to do a little planning. We'll see if it comes off. Kansas has 5 spots under protection of the National Park service. Many more exist within a few hours drive, doable in day trips.

Fall on the Prairie

2009-10-02T06:52:00.006-05:00

Fall at TallGrass - September 26,2009

2009-09-29T06:16:00.008-05:00

When we were here last summer, we were told the grass doesn't really get tall until the Fall, so we planned a return. There are areas of the hiking trail where the Park Ranger assured us the Grass is over your head. That is a trip for another day. I wrote and posted a lot of pictures from the first trip, so I will be brief with this one. I was disappointed to find the park subject to budget costs, the house is now only open for Self Tours and they ask you to return the sheet of paper that is a guide after you are done. For the moment you don't get the experience of waiting on the front porch and having a park ranger in green uniform and smoky the bear hat open the door and greeting you. Also the bus tours have been cut to twice a day. The good news is Bison will be at the park by the end of the year. As if this wonder of nature needed any reason to return time and time again, we will go back.

The Prairie itself does look different, the blue stem grass shows a fall color that was absent the first time and adds to the subtle beauty of the place. The vast expanse of nothing ness is still mediative, you wish you can stay all day, and I guess if you want to leave the bus tour you can, as a group on our tour did.

I'll let the pictures of Fall on the Prairie speak for themselves.

Big Brutus, the pictures

2009-09-12T16:32:00.005-05:00

Stay tuned for the next entry . If you all the way back to the first trip, the bus driver at Tall Grass National Park, said we really had to come back when the grass was tall in the fall.Well I'm going , the next entry will be in a few weeks Return to Tall Grass ......

Big Brutus

2009-09-12T16:15:00.003-05:00

West Mineral Kansas lay just over the county line in Cherokee County, If you blink you might miss the town, I think I saw a bar. I can assure you drive down back roads you will not miss Big Brutus. The first view is Brutus towering over a line of trees. It reminded me a lot of a Godzilla Movie.

Brutus is the second largest electric shovel in the world.In hasn't been used in several years and a group of citizens saved it from being scrap iron in the 1980's.It you ever played in a sand box with a tonka toy shovel, I think maybe you could imagine Big Brutus.16 stories high and you can see from the picture just how small the people sitting up the stage for a concert that evening are . It was easily voted one of the 8 wonders of Kansas and would probably qualify for most any other state as well. As the map at the visitor center shows , people come from around the world to see it. The other two pictures are also from the visitor center and talk about Coal Mining. According to Pam Grout's book "Kansas Curiosities", this is the second time I've mentioned the book, so it must be good, Brooke Shields has actually visited the site. It's also available for weddings. I'll do a separate entry for pictures on the interior and the view from as high hope as we were allowed to go.

The Museum-Pittsburg

2009-09-12T15:50:00.004-05:00

Crawford county has 2 museums, one is the Crawford County Historical Musuem In Pittsburg and the other is the Museum of Crawford County in Girard. We were not able to make the Girard one because it's only open on Sundays from 2 to 4. The one in Pittsburg is off highway 69 and down an access road. By this time I am starting to think all these county museums look the same. The same collections of old telephones,military uniforms, a school desk dating back at least 50 years, seen one you've seen them all..... Maybe not.

The volunteer working this Saturday was 91 years young and spent a lot of time we were there working on the henge of an old medical supply cabinet from a doctors office. Oh Yeah, they all seem to have a supply of old medical equipment.He came up to each of us and shared a story about what ever we were looking at, I was impressed by the old Frank Sinatra albums. He had a story about the collection of old sports trophies from a high school,Arcadia High than hasn't been around since the mid 60's. I like the idea the trophies are still around, they mean a lot to the people sitting in the stands and gyms , they are well preserved and I say "Go Tigers !!!!". The volunteer told us his son lives in Lawrence, but he doesn't get up that way much anymore. He also told us every town has a story, I agree, read this blog.

The story here ranges from dioramas of dinosaurs and Indians, to coal mines to Miss America from 1965. Pictures contains here in

Girard Town square

2009-09-06T06:51:00.005-05:00

The first time see entering Girard is the giant American flag at the American Legion Post,Pam Grout in her book "Kansas Curiouties" says it's 30x60 and takes 20 men to hoist it up the 130 feet flag pole. The parking lot picture by the way is my attempt to be artsy,capturing the shadow.

On into town you encounter the Courthouse square,watched over by a grain silo.At one end is an impressive Vietnam Veterans memorial complete with a huey helicopter.Needing to make a pit stop we bypassed the Peppermint cafe and walked into the White Elephant,an antique store advertising "Old Stuff, and New stuff."

A note on the deer statue, town founder Charles Strong killed a deer on the site,one of the more unique statues I've ran across on a town square.

The Reds of Crawford County

2009-09-05T16:55:00.005-05:00

In travels over the past years, I've seen memories of John Brown, the great abolishist, The Library of an American President,I drive past a memorial to the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision. At the State Historical society displays talk about early women in politics,and of course the Newspaper man William Allen White.In Crawford which runs up against the Missouri border and a half hour or so North of Oklahoma, we find Labor Protests and the home of the Socialist/Communist newspaper "Appeal to Reason".

A brief history of the Magazine is presented ,courtsey of Wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_Reason_(newspaper)

The largest collection of "Appeal to Reason" can be found at the library of Pittsburg State University.

A Mural in the city library commerates a 1921 march by women against scab miners.Discussed in detail here. A truly remarkable story in the labor movement and frankly one that is not told as often as it should be.

http://amazonarmy.com/

Russell,Kansas and home on I-70

2009-09-05T16:44:00.004-05:00

First the essentials on Russell,Ks

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell,_Kansas

The amazing thing about Russell is it the boyhood home of 2 US Senators, from different states. Robert Dole (R-Kansas) and Arlen Spector (D-Pa). Age wise I don't think went to high school at the same time, but the sign on the highway proudly proclaims their hertiage in the town. The picture is just of main street on a lazy saturday summer evening.I found out later most of the people were at the county fair.One kid was on a bicycle riding just out of camera shot.

At Russell when turned home taking I-70, almost the way,maybe an hour on the highway we saw Wind farms,It was really a beautiful scene. They really add something to long ride home.

K-18

2009-09-04T06:36:00.003-05:00

The guy at Cottonwood told us, "You've seen 24,I-70 is boring, take 18, it will go to Junction City cuts across. There is a wonderful church in Damar which is better than the one in Victoria."

We must have been 5 miles away and Kansas in it's eternal flatness showed us the way to the St. Joseph's Church in Damar,population 155.

Skyways tells a lot about what we found

http://skyways.lib.ks.us/towns/Damar/index.html

The water town is located in Paradise ,near where we turned to head into Russell,Kansas.It was built as a WPA Project in the 30's. Just an example when I take these little trips, It is a wonderful combination of what we know we are going to see and some very pleasant suprises.

Studley and the Cottonwood Ranch

2009-09-04T05:28:00.004-05:00

a sad story in a bad economy, the Kansas State Historical Society has had to cut and trim like everyone else. Gone as of Labor Day 2009 is the Cottonwood Ranch in Studley Kansas. Well, it's not gone but the sheep have to go, the staff will take retirement after 20 some years and the tour will be self guided.

This is a 1890's ranch house built by an Englishman who raised sheep.The house has a nice collection of stained glass. One of the features the tour guide showed us is the work on the roofs was not always straight. One of the more entertaining stories is the roof on the front deck was painted blue, why blue ? Well apparently flies can be fooled into thinking the top of the porch is the sky and they have no place to land. Does it work ? The curator says he can sit outside of an evening and no flies bother him.

some talk about the ahh, semi closing. A large group trying to save the place made the argument that if you look at the tourist numbers per capta, it's a very popular attraction.Good news is it's still there, bad news is people will be missing out on a great guided tour. I really loved the discussion about the crooker roof and the shoody workmanship. People will still get the postcard view of Kansas Big Sky.

Osborne County Court house

2009-07-22T07:27:00.002-05:00

West on 24

2009-07-22T07:20:00.002-05:00

I discovered something interesting about my camera, if you have a memory stick, it only takes 10 pictures. leaving Cawker City the next order of business was finding a memory stick, and stuck in Western Kansas off of I-70.We ended up in Osborne and Hank's Hardware Store, down the street was the county court house.

Sat in a square with a wide lawn,sunflowers growing on the corner and some interesting designs on the stairs.

Largest Ball of Twine

2009-07-22T07:01:00.003-05:00

So what year was it ,in the movie "National Lampoon's Vacation" when Chevy Chase as the father of a family going cross country said "Hey kids, we are minutes away from the largest ball of twine". I remember my cousin being here and we were reading a AAA guide or something and he exclaimed "I thought that was just for the movie".

Salina is about 100 miles west on I-70, we peeled off north for a half hour to 24 and then west for about an hour to Cawker City,near Waconda Lake. The bourchure says the following. In 1953 a local farmer started the ball,it grew and grew and in 1961 he gave the ball to the city. In 1973 the Guiness Book of World Record certified the ball in 1973. On May 10,2007 it weighed at 18,032 lbs, and contains 7,839,327. And it grows every day even by own hand. 2000 Cencus gives the population at 521 . A sourviner shop with handmade salt shakers,coffee mugs and T-shirts contained a map and visitors are encouraged to put a pin in the map , all 50 states are represented and dozens of countries.I am sure it's not the states biggest tourist attraction but it's gotta be right up there.

It's also the childhood home of Silent Movie Actress Claire Windsor

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claire_Windsor

Thoughts on Western Kansas

2009-07-19T09:44:00.004-05:00

I was in the 8th grade and my best friend Gary Long moved from Topeka to Bennington, I went to visit him, I think I took the bus to Salina and was picked up,spent a week and had a blast. I remember seeing "The Muppet Movie" in Salina, going to a tractor pull, which was a blast and Bennington had a drug store with fountain drinks and you could sit there. I have never been further west than that point since then. I've flown west to Northern California and Arizona but Western Kansas has been a mystery to me. Knowing when I flew the plane made connections in Dallas, It's possible I've never flown over points West of Salina.

The legend is Western Kansas and all of Kansas is flat as a pancake, certain things prove that out,on a bright partly cloud unusually cool day, the towns identified by the grain elevators and church spires can be seen for miles and miles.At times it seems you are never going to get there.
Case in point to get to Russell, Kansas off highway 18, you turn onto 281 and soon see a sign saying 16 miles. a mile later on the horizon is the grain elevators of Russell. You do go over hills and valleys and lose the horizon,so Kansas is definitely not flat as a pancake but another hill and the grain elevator returns.

The towns are sparse, hooking up with 24 North of Salina,Glen Elder passes by in the blink of an eye, a lake that I had thought was called Glen Elder but is called Waconda, then Cawker City,home of the largest ball of twine. Downs passes by in the blink of an eye,then Osborne,Alton Bluffs,Stockton,Hills City,Nicodemus and our destination the Cottonwood Ranch, just outside of Studley.The self guided tour tells us the Ranch is in the valley of the South Soloman River. If Kansas is so flat why is there a South Soloman River Valley.

If you want to eat in one of these town, you take what you can get. None of the multiple exits of Salina and Abilene on I-70. I didn't plan on eating at Pizza Hut in Hill City, I might have been surprised there was a Pizza Hut in Hill City.It might serve as the town salad bar,it seemed to as 2 different people came in just to get a salad while we were there.

I noticed a time line in the State, Leavenworth,Lawrence,Lecompton,Topeka,Mission and towns/Cities in the Eastern part of the state were founded in the 1850's and found themselves embroiled in Bleeding Kansas and the Major National Issue of the Day.Cawker City was founded in 1870 by 4 people who ended up in the wrong place.The founders of the town decided on the name over a poker game. E.H. Cawker won.

The Cottonwood Ranch was settled by John Fenton Platt,who emigrated from Yorkshire in 1880,he farmed Sheep and the area was soon populated by his family members.The history of Nicodemus is more storied, as described here:
http://www.nps.gov/nico/

Damar has yet another history,In 1884 President Grover Cleveland signed a document entitling Francis St. Peter to 160 acres sold for $400.My educated guess is Homesteaders ? French Canadians followed, they began to call the town "Acadia of the West" , the St Joseph's church was built in the early decade of the 20th century.

Russell has totally different story, 60 families from Ripon,Wisconsin came to a water stop on the Union Pacific Railroad in 1871. Unlike other towns in the area, It was not settled by Volga Russian,Czech,Germans,Swedes, England or French Canadians.Russell,Kansas is the home of two US Senators,Robert Dole and Arlen Spector of PA.Signage of I-70 reminds you have the heritage of the area settlers,Czech festivals in Wilson,Little Sweden in Lindsburg.The Cafe in Damar sports a French flag,the melting pot of American is all around you in Western Kansas and doing very well. Now on to the specifics of the trip, but no matter what I saw, these thoughts of the flat lands, or not and the little communities are what stays with me.

Seeking the Good Life in Johnson County and the Edge City

2009-06-27T09:18:00.004-05:00

Date of trip:June 20,2009

Last Saturday on the way to watching a Rain Delay and 8 Innings of decent baseball between the Royals and the Cardinals I went to one of the buildings at the Johnson County Museums. We did not make it to the All 1950's electric house. That is a trip for another day.

Edge City is defined in Wiki as:

"Edge city is an American term for a concentration of business, shopping, and entertainment outside a traditional urban area in what had recently been a residential suburb or semi-rural community. The term was first used in Tom Wolfe's 1968 novel The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and popularized in the 1991 book Edge City: Life on the New Frontier by Joel Garreau, who established its current meaning while working as a reporter for the Washington Post. Garreau argues that the edge city has become the standard form of urban growth worldwide, representing a 20th-century urban form unlike that of the 19th-century central downtown. Other terms for the areas include suburban activity centers, megacenters, and suburban business districts."

As Johnson County could be a textbook example of suburban sprawl,much of the museum is dedicated to how farm lands became the burbs, whether you use the term the burbs,bedroom communities,or as the museum frequently uses the term Edge Cities.

After a brief introduction film in the first room, a couple of rooms are dedicated to early Indian settlements, the Mission at Shawnee and Bleeding Kansas. These rooms were interesting because the origins of some of the street names can be found. I always wondered why there was a street named Black Bob. The explanation is:

(again from Wiki, but it explained at the museum)

"Black Bob/Wa-wah-che-pa-e-hai is the name of a Native American Chief. He was the chief of a Shawnee band, originally a part of the Hathawekela division of the Shawnee. Known as the Chaliawa in French term Chalaqua. About the year 1826 they separated from their kindred, then living in eastern Missouri on land granted to them about 1793 by Baron Carondelet, near Cape Girardeau, then in Spanish territory, and removed to Kansas, where, by treaty with their chief, Black Bob, in 1854, they were given rights on the Shawnee reservation in that state. Under Black Bob's leadership they refused to remove with the rest of the tribe to Indian Territory in 1808, but are now incorporated with them, either in the Cherokee Nation or with the Absentee Shawnee or in Ohio with Morning Star Shawnee Nation/Chaliawa who are documented in 2007 as Blood Decent. (From the Access Genealogy website And the Ancestry Book of the Family of Decent.)"

Strangline comes from a train that linked the area, another odd name for the streets.

Once Statehood came and Bleeding Kansas was put behind the area, we see the growth of suburbia,pictures of Victorian Houses,families and into the 1950's.Highways , as the county is the meeting point between the great I-35 running North and South Border to Border and I-70 linking the east to the West.Shopping malls are celebrated and as the museums people came to the area whether farmers to bed room community dwellers seeking The Good Life.

The Museum didn't make much of an impression on me at first, only as I began to think about it and what a prime example Johnson County is of the whole suburban boom of the post war era.Fittingly it's across from a park and close to apartments and strip malls and easily accessible on the I-35 loop that circles the Kansas City Metropolitan area.

US Displinary Barracks- Fort Leavenworth

2009-06-04T05:54:00.004-05:00

some links about the USDB and cemetary

http://usacac.army.mil/CAC2/CSI/faq.asp#2o

http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2008/may/25/german_pows_buried_prison/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Disciplinary_Barracks

There is a new USDB but it's off the driving tour. The Cemetary is fasinating,over 200 people are buried there whose bodies were never claimed by family. The graves are pointed in North/South direction as opposed to the National Cemetary were the graves are pointed in East/West seeing the rising and setting sun. It does not take a complex internet search to see what they did to earn a stay in the barracks.

The last row is prehaps the most interesting one, 14 German POWs.They have their own row and interesting were the only graves decorated this week after Memorial Day. The flowers as shown in the pictures are Red,Yellow and Black, the colors of the German flag.

So ends the visit to Leavenworth

Fort Leavenworth

2009-06-04T05:32:00.004-05:00

To continue the journey through Leavenworth.

A brief history of the Fort from Wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Leavenworth

It had been a long time since I've been on a Military base and it is it's own little city. Coming in the gate to the right was the commissary which looks like a box store ,big parking lot and Commissary spelled out in big letters on the side of the building. First to get in you got to have ID and the driver needs insurance. We had to get out of the car, step away from the car and open the trunk ,hood and all the door. It was no big deal, took but a few minutes and the reason is obvious.

The bluff overlook the river is beautiful (shown in the Lewis and Clark entry). There is a Musuem with the carriage used by Lincoln when he visited the area. The book store had a wide variety of stuff,I came away with a coffee mug, a couple of books about ghosts who enhabit the fort and a postcard of the Federal Prison that is next door.

There is a driving tour available which hits 16 spots ranging from the parade ground,driving by the Command and General Staff College, the National Cemetary and the old US Displiary Barracks and the Buffalo Solider Monument. I know the Buffalo Solider story first from the song by Bob Marley. The second group was formed at the fort.

When we went to the Monument we saw a group of bikers, must have been over a hundred from the Buffalo Solider Motorcycle club also visiting the Monument.

Park Downtown Leavenworth

2009-06-02T07:10:00.001-05:00

Leavenworth-The city

2009-06-02T06:54:00.003-05:00

Leavenworth honors a favorite daughter Melissa Etheridge, the Grammy and Academy Award winning musician and gay rights activist. She Rocks.

We ate lunch downtown at Dusty Roads BBQ, It's downtown and has a wonderful decor, award winning BBQ ribbons on the wall, plenty of bottles for sale, a combination of wooden picnic tables and round metal tables and no A/C but thats ok, the tea comes with free refills. The BBQ was very good by the way.

To the left is the Fred Harvey house. Last summer I became enchanted with the story of the Harvey Houses that excited in almost every railroad stop on the AT&SF. They are trying to turn the house into a Musuem but as always it's so hard to raise funds for such a worthy cause.

The Carroll House is a Victorian Manison that serves at the County Musuem as well.

Lincoln and Lewis and Clark

2009-06-01T16:50:00.005-05:00

The first couple of photos concern Lewis and Clark. The Corp of Discovery passed by in July of 1804 heading west. We will let the journals speak for themselves:

http://www.lewisandclarktrail.com/section1/kansascities/history1.htm

Then we move to Lincoln, the Brochure of "A Driving Tour of Abraham Lincoln's 1859 visit to Kansas tells us,Lincoln spent 8 days in Kansas from November 30-December 7,1859.He spoke in Leavenworth,Elwood,Troy,Doniphan and Atchison. Pictures above are of the steps he spoke from and the Carriage he used ,which is housed at the Musuem at Fort Leavenworth. Two months after his visit to bleeding Kansas he gave the Cooper Union speech is credited with launching his Presidential Campaign. The rest is history.

Kansas first city

2009-06-01T16:34:00.002-05:00

Has December really been the last time I wrote here or went someplace. I remember a good weekend in February and thinking that would be a good day to hop in the car and travel, but then I realized one of the things I enjoyed about last summer was the rich green color of the trees and decided to wait till spring.

Spring found me in the hospital and now doing well, so I finally returned to the road. About 45 minutes east of Topeka on the turnpike and North of highway 7 about 20 miles. Here is the demographics from Wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leavenworth,_Kansas

Lets check off what makes an interesting city

1. Part of the Lincoln story.

2. Bleeding Kansas.

3. Lewis and Clark passed by on the Missouri River

4. Buffalo Bill was there, Melissa Etheridge, Grammy and Academy Award winner grew up there.

5. An above average BBQ place

6. An army base with Nazi POW buried there and a Memorial to the Buffalo Soliders.

7. Victorian Manisons

8. Home of Fred Harvey of Harvey Girls fame , if you remember last years I'd run into Harvey Girl history everywhere I went.

Picture wise I'm going to divide this into several entries, so much happened here.

Christmas on Prairie 12/06/08

2008-12-07T07:44:00.005-06:00

I've always thought when Garrison Keillor ends his Lake Wobegon monologues by describing the town as place time forgot and decades can not improve he must have been talking about Abilene,Kansas.Located off I-70 about 100 miles west of Topeka,It can seem like a town wonderfully and blissfully lost in time, stuck somewhere in it's most famous residents President Dwight David Eisenhowers era of the 50's. Taking the turnoff and heading south you pass ALCo department stores,a Sinclare gas station with the big green dinosaur on the roof,a Victorian Mansion offering tours, the Eisenhower center with it's Museum,Library and final resting place of the General and President, just to the south is a wax museum of WW2 generals,the international Greyhound museum and a cow town celebrating the wild west and the Chisholm trail which ended in Abilene. And that's just on the main drag.

The population of the town in 2000 was listed as 6,543.To get off the main drag you find a Musuem of Telephones,2 more Victorian Mansions and a resturant called the Brookville Hotel that is so renowned for it's Chicken dinners that if you tell someone you ate somewhere else you'll get frowns of disappointment. There is too much to do in 1 day in this little town, too much history to take in a day. I've been to Abilene many times before and will go back.

In 1900 the population was listed in the 3,000 range. In the 1860's the population of cattle could be listed in hundreds of thousands as the cattle drives from Texas ended at the stockyards before they were loaded on the trains to points across the globe. See the wonderful movie John Wayne movie "Red River". In the 1870's Wild Bill Hickok worked briefly in Abilene as did John Wesley Hardin.

On to this visit, In was a beautiful slightly chilly,partly cloudly Saturday afternoon in December. We found out we had arrived in town the same weekend of the Holiday Festival with included a festival of homes, tree lighting at one of the train depots. The resturant we were planning eating at had a tea party which seemed to have brought in an invasion of the Red Hat society. We ate a local Pizzaria instead.

First stop was the Lebold Mansion, this from the Chamber of Commerce website gives a brief history of the Mansion:

"Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972, this Italianate Victorian mansion was built in 1880 by Conrad H. Lebold, one of the early founders of the city of Abilene. He was also a banker, land agent, mayor, politician and entrepreneur.

This 23-room mansion built to showcase Lebold’s success, has been completely restored and furnished with period antiques typical of the late Victorian era. The interiors are a showcase of the Victorian decorative arts and your tour guild will explain the history of the mansion and the many unique artifacts essential to the Victorian lifestyle.

See Timothy Hersey’s dugout, the first home in Abilene, located on the first floor of the mansion, below the tower. From this location, Mrs. Hersey served the last “square” meal to the passengers of the Butterfield Stage Coach Lines and the Overland Freight Company as they traveled west.

The museum collection displays furnishings, textiles, artwork, silver, mechanical automations, pianos, organs, melodeon, victrola, period lighting, and much more. "

Almost every room had a Christmas tree and it was just a stunning place to visit, especially during the holidays. What I love about guided tours of house is how people join the tour they progress, we started in the 3rd Room, a group of Red Hat Ladies joined us the basement and a couple joined us somewhere upstairs.And the tour guide working through 23 Rooms managed to keep track of who joined when and where. Pictures to follow in separate posts.

After lunch we went to the Eisenhower center which is built around the small childhood home that stands 5 feet on the "wrong side of the tracks" a distance away from the "right" side of the tracks and stately Victorian Mansions of Bankers and Cattle Barons of the 1880's. The Eisenhower family is truly one of the most amazing in Kansas. The little 2 story house was home to a successful pharmacist,a banker and a college University President. That's not even talking about Dwight David Eisenhower ,West Point Graduate,Supreme Allied Commander of World War 2,President of Columbia University and President of the United States.It says something about the wrong side of the tracks.

The Center includes a Visitor Center,Childhood home,Museum,Library,Statue in the middle of the grounds and Place of Mediation with Eisenhower ,his wife and young child are buried.

I can count 5 times that I had been there, as child, the 9th Grade class of Eisenhower Middle School,the 50th Anniversary of D-Day where I attended events moderated by Eisenhower Biographer Stephen Ambrose and the grandson of either Churchill or Montgomery. A Scot who played the bagpipes while wading through the water at Normady also spoke as did a German Panzer Commander Col. Hans Von Luck, who wrote one of the best war books I've ever read,a most read for anyone interested in Military History

http://www.amazon.com/Panzer-Commander-Memoirs-Colonel-Hans/dp/0440208025

My fault with the Museum is it really doesn't cover enough of Ike's Presidency. He was President during one of the most amazing times in our History. The 50's were the seed of the Civil Rights Movement,The age of Television,suburbia,fast food,the construction of I-70, the space age and a wide range of social,economic and personal change that the country had never really seen. Those topics are covered to be sure.A telegram from Arkansas Governor Orville Fabus arguing against sending in the National Guard to Little Rock is included in the collection.

Highlights of the collection include:

The Note Eisenhower wrote and was prepared to deliver if D-Day had failed

Planning for the secret service for a visit to a Major League Baseball game by the President

The pen General Smith used to sign the Unconditional surrender of Germany.

My Favorite is a Telephone Book from SHAFE headquarters with a stamp declassifying the document in the mid 1970's.

The Generals Staff car

and a collection of plates from George Washingtons Bicentennial that he gave to his parents.

on to the pictures.

Pictures of Old Prairie Town- Part 1

2008-10-08T05:59:00.004-05:00

I visited Old Prairie Town in July according to the day stamp on the first 3 pictures.It probably has a better and clearer view than the pictures I took at the Festival mainly because no one was there than Sunday afternoon.

At the Apple Festival the One room school house was packed, some was playing Laura Ingalls who stopped briefly in Kansas as a child and wrote a book about those experiences called "Little House on the Prairie". The TV series was based on events later in the series of that happened in Minnesota.

Last two pictures come from the festival in October, I hope the picture of the gold fish in the fountain are visible.

29th Annual Apple Festival

2008-10-05T15:15:00.005-05:00

One of the least publicized places in Topeka was buzzing on Sunday. It's hard to get to, the signs are vague and it's pretty well hidden. Even though it boards I-70,thanks to foloage ,you can't see it from the highway. I can't think of any signs on the Highway for the place. If your from Topeka and talk about Old Prairie Town you might blank looks or the question "Isn't that in Abilene ?" Topekans might now it better as Ward Meade.

Old Priarie town has a one room school house, an old church, a train depot, a log cabin,a botantical garden ,a drug store with an actual soda fountain,an old doctors office and the Ward-Meade Mansion.

The story is the Wards are one of the first settlers of Topeka,built a cabin on the River and fairied people across the river. A Candle was lit in the windown which was a sign to traveled the house was open to travelers on the Oregon, yes we are back on that trail. Oregon trail on the Kansas River, 20 miles South ,yesterday the Santa Fe Trail. Again all came through here, and some stayed.

Parade Pictires from Overbrook

2008-10-05T10:01:00.003-05:00

Those who went west came through here

2008-10-04T16:40:00.005-05:00

A couple of weeks ago I drove about 30 minutes to the North and West and ran across the Oregon Trail. Today I drove about 14 South on US 75 and then 6 miles on 56 and found the Santa Fe Trail. The Trails for the most started in Independence,Missouri and whether they ended up in Oregon,California ,Utah or New Mexico, hundreds of thousands passed through Kansas, fairly close to Topeka. Wheel ruts of the 6 foot tall wagons can still be seen in fields,and parks in this part of the country. One of the speakers I heard today spoke of the covers of Conastoga wagons as far as the eye could see.

This week the town of Overbrook with it's 900 or so residents celebrated "Santa Fe Trail Days" a two day celebration at the fairgrounds which are doted with 4H barns and advertisements for next weeks Demolition Derby. Yes, the sign on the water tower does say "Don't overlook Overbrook".

At 11am there was a parade which the next entry will detail in pictures. It went down a residental street near the fair grounds past a guy with a home speaker system discribing the enterants and announcing the winners of yesterday Coloring contest. He interviewed some of the marchers, my favorite was a couple from Oklahoma who announced themselves as "from the terriotory of Oklahoma, soon to be a state". The parade was all horses or horse drawn wagons, except for the final marcher a golf cart with a man scooping up the horse droppings, I resisted the urge to photograph that. The Costumes were amazing as were the horses.

The fair itself had historical speakers,horse riding contest,re enactors doing bull whip demostrations,gun fights, a tent served as a Salloon with girls in period costume playing Scott Joplin rags and served Pop in a bottle, Root Beer,Orange and Grape Nehi.

Lower Pott County 9/6/08

2008-09-08T07:03:00.006-05:00

One of the charms of this time of the year is Sunflowers , the state flower is everywhere.Beautiful,majestic,taller than me at 6'1'' .They line the highways, grow in back yards adding a Yellow and Brown color to the green fields and grass.

I crossed the new bridge and hooked up with US Hwy 24 in North Topeka and headed West. Highway 24 runs 1,540 miles from Clarkston,Michigan to Dowd,Colorado. You pass the Goodyear plant and Cargill Grain elevators. Further down the road is a Television station,and the small town of Silver Lake. I began to notice something interesting, Cars parked on both sides of the 2 lane highway.A garage sale was in progress, then another house on the highway and another.

The particulars of Silver Lake are 1,358 poulation and 568 households according to 2000 Cencus. On this day I think I can say the population has tripled and most ,if not all 568 were having garage sales. I stopped at a couple. I am looking for a couple of specific DVD/VHS and I'm always up for Expanding my Frank Sinatra CD collection. Came up with nothing at the 4 or 5 places I stopped.

5 miles down the road is Rossville,covered last month and maybe 10 miles down the road was St Mary's. St Mary's may be worth it's own entry for an Indian Pay Station and the Academy and College.The Pay station wasn't opened yet so I continued on. Maybe another 5 miles down the road was a sign advertisng the Oregon Trail Nature Park.

http://www.naturalkansas.org/oregon.htm

I'll be honest, I had no idea this place existed and it's about 1 mile off 24 and not visible from the highway. It is a bunch of walking trials, there is not any historical markers, nothing says this is on the Oregon trial. It's a pretty area with a couple of hills that are pretty heavy climbs,one promised a view of the Jeffery Enegry Center, a steep climb,I did not attempt. A silo with portraits greets visitors in the parking lot. The lower left picture has the town of Belvue in the background, if you can see it.

Labor Day

2008-09-06T15:00:00.003-05:00

There were more options than time over Labor Day. Indian Pow Wows, Train festivals in Baldwin, the start of Football season in Topeka,Emporia,Lawrence or Manhattan. I choose on Saturday to attend Railroad Days at the Great Overland Station, the former Union Pacific Station that has been restored. The Station itself is worth it's own blog entry, which I will do sometime.

Railroad days is a return to a tradition that happened from the late 80's to the early years of this century.It would last the whole weekend and attract big name entertainment. It basically was a County Fair, midway,arts and craft,a lot of exhibits dedicated to Topeka Railroad history.It went away from several years and now returned in a much smaller format, with great hopes of bigger and better things. I was there early and could have returned for a concert in the evening,but was torn away by the start of Football.

Monday evening brought the return of Hockey Season in Topeka and a inter squad came played on a foggy ice at the Expocentre. Blue beat White for the season year in a row ,2-1 in OT.

August and Beyond

2008-09-06T14:47:00.004-05:00

Has it really been over a month since I wrote anything. It's been a busy month, The Olympics and back to back Political conventions. A thing or two didn't pan out, maybe in the fall I'm told.I did take in "Wheat stock V" a day long bluegrass festival in Topeka , held at a hotel on a hot Saturday afternoon, I think the first one was held in the park,outdoors in August. Moving it indoors was a wise choice. It was a fund raiser for the Jayhawk Theatre, which is in desperate need of repairs and refurbishing. If restored to original glory it would truly be one of the great movie palaces of days gone by.The possibilities are endless.

http://www.jayhawktheatre.com/

I didn't know this story until I read the flier,but it's believed that Gypsy Rose Lee started her career right here in Topeka and at the Jayhawk.

I made a short journey to Rossville,Kansas.Located maybe 15 miles North and west on US Highway 24, the Population is about 1,000,smaller that Wasilla ,Alaska by several thousand. The Baseball diamond is in the city park which has a shelter area,a swing and a slide and a new swimming pool. The wood grandstand was featured in the 1976 Bicentennial issue of Sports Illustrated. A creek runs through the western edge of the town and a walking bridge runs across it , in the distance you can see the train tracks and the highway before it.

A River runs under it -Part 2

2008-08-03T21:32:00.003-05:00

The Levee was built as a response to the flood of 51. I was intrigued to see the water marker. It came close to being breeched in 93 but the levee held the water in.

View of South Topeka from bridge,Capital Dome peeking up to the right of the bridge tower.

I love these next two pictures,looking West,you can see the bend of the river and the Omnipresent grain elevators.

View of Downtown and the police impound yard.I always wondered where it was, and knock on wood, glad I have never had a need to know.Again Capital Dome is hiding from this angle.

A River runs under it

2008-08-03T21:06:00.003-05:00

A couple of years ago a chunk of Topeka Blvd Bridge fell off. The Bridge was closed down, Congress and money from the Sales Tax was used for construction of a new bridge. It opened today,August 3. A ribbon cutting or something happened at 5. I wanted to go,but as yesterday entry suggested It's too hot. So I went out with a friend later in the evening. Tomorrow it will be opened for car traffic, but tonight belonged to bicycles,dog walking and the curious.
Getting a chance to walk over the bridge solved a problem for me, This is as close as I've ever been to the Kansas River. Topeka was founded by people ferrying wagons ,horses etc on the various trails. The first settlers of Topeka lived near the river. Today it's hard to get close to it. I spent some time driving around a couple of weeks ago thinking there might be a park or something on the North Side that I hadn't known about.

That trip did get just on the other side of the Levee near the Kansas Avenue Bridge, but not on the river itself.Looking on line I was able to find 2 boat ramps in Shawnee County. Now that I think about it,I was foiled looking for the Kansas River in Lecompton as well. There is a log cabin about a mile from the Territorial Capitol that sits on the river, a forest of tree obstructs the view.I know there a river park in Lawrence and further opportunities to get close to the Kansas River exist elsewhere. So Much to see, no independent means to take a year off and see it.

A train went by,which was cool.Note below the engine , that is the old railroad bridge,It didn't survive the 1951 Flood,yet remains in the river.

I like the bridge, you'll see the Limestone towers that support the clocks that are on both side.I know from reading about the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge and Golden Gate,similar opportunities to walk the bridge existed before it was open to traffic.

Nice way to spend a hot Sunday evening and something that doesn't happen that often.

Heat Wave

2008-08-02T16:46:00.003-05:00

The Car is air conditioned, The Prairie is not. Travels and fun sites on hiatus.

Signatures

2008-07-21T14:41:00.003-05:00

Kim Novak
Bill Holden

Arthur J Connell,Rosalind Russell

Kim Novak was here

2008-07-21T14:14:00.003-05:00

To show you how random my travels are, I noticed a few weeks ago "Picnic" was on TCM.I recorded ,one because my mother talked about knowing extra, and William Inge author of the Play is from Independence. He also wrote "Bus Stop" another wonderful play that takes place in Kansas. So last Wednesday I got around to watching "Picnic" and I loved the look at small town Kansas on a hot Labor Day. I wondered where it was filmed, quickly found the answer 5 small towns in Kansas between Hutchinson (Hutch as we call it) and Salina:

Courtesy of Wikipedia:
Halstead's Riverside Park is where all the Labor Day picnic scenes (some of which are semi-documentary) were filmed. The park and many landmarks still existed at the time of the movie's fiftieth anniversary.
Hutchinson, with its huge grain elevators.
Nickerson is the location of the two adjacent houses where Madge (Kim Novak) and her family live (with "old Mrs. Potts" next door), also where Hal (William Holden) "jumps a freight" to go to Tulsa and where Madge boards a bus in the last scene.
Salina, where Hal jumps off a train in the opening scene and meets Allen (Cliff Robertson) at Allen's father's large house, also where Madge kisses Hal by the Salina River and where he escapes from the police by running under a waterfall.
Sterling, where the pre-picnic swim in the lake was filmed.

In my randomness I described to visit one of the film sites and Halstead seemed to be the best choice.

The Museum had a corner reserved for the movie and even has the DVD for sale in the gift shop. Their were two prizes of the collection, one is the swan that Kim Novak was on that sailed down the river when she was awarded Queen of Neewollah and a board that cast and crew members autographed. I'm giving the board it's own entry as the signatures may be hard to see.

Halstead Historical Society

2008-07-21T13:45:00.004-05:00

The story on the train depot is it was in use until 1970 when the passenger trains stopped coming through town, It was in disrepair and threatened with being torn until it was discovered it was located 500 yards from a building on the National Historical Register and couldn't be torn down.Towns people got together and re stored the building.It's opened 3 hours a day on weekends and staffed by volunteers.

Yes we have more trains and more Harvey girls, this exhibit comes from a woman living in Halstead who sometimes shows up on Sunday to hang out. In fact I was asked if I wanted to speak with her. I didn't really know what to say and so I didn't ask for the volunteer to call her to see if she'd come by. I should have I suppose.

Halstead was the home of Adolph Rupp the legendary basketball coach of the Kentucky Wildcats,winner of 5 National Championship and really the start of the Kentucky Tradition. Kansas has an interesting Basketball history. The first coach of the University of Kansas was Dr James Naismith, the inventor of the game, he is buried in Lawrence. Another Basketball Powerhouse in University of North Carolina. Carolina had success before Dean Smith of Topeka showed up, but a lot more after he did. Ralph Miller,Gene Keady,and Lon Kruger all Kansans who have coached in College and Pros. Many,many others as well, Kansas has a proud Basketball tradition that it has exported through the country.

A 1910 horse drawn fire hoses. The Museum also features an exhibit on barb wire,artifacts from the local bank ,train stuff and stuff from old churches. I have to say this is one of the best little Museums I've been to. It's not everyday an offer comes along to talk to someone who donated stuff in one of the corners comes along.worth much more than the donation I put in the box. I loved the display of train spikes. Next why I came to Halstead .....

Halstead -The Biggest Little City in Kansas

2008-07-21T13:18:00.003-05:00

There is a specific reason I went to Halstead, but you'll have to get to that later. What I didn't expect and this shows I am a city boy is the way grain elevators of these towns tower of the plains as sentinels. Halstead has 3, but the first I saw was in Pauline, I'd seen it before we have a couple.

To a weary traveler the Grain elevators are beacons of the town on the road, whether they be Walton,Newton,Moundridge,McPherson,Bridgeport (I think, from checking the map)Soloman,Abilene,Salina,Hesston and yes here in Halstead.

Halstead is a beautiful little town 1,873, several parks rustic farms houses, you should be able to see 1 of them in the picture to the left raising up over the levee and the road leading into town.

http://www.halsteadkansas.com/

Halstead sits on the bank of the Little Arkansas River (R- Kansas) not (R- Kan-saw) like the rest of the world pronounces it. If you want to grab a bit to eat, there is a local owned pizziria which I am noticing a lot of small towns have, a bar, or subway.Subways seem to be every where. I remember a college friend telling me of a re occurring dream of all that was left after a nuclear war was the golden arches and societies believe they were places of religious services. If he had the dream today I think it would be Subways. After dinner I visited the Halstead Historical Society in the old train depot.

Harvey County Historical Society

2008-07-20T20:16:00.003-05:00

We begin with a couple of pictures of the dresses of Prostitutes. Yes, we are in the wild west after all. I am remained of a town in Arizona called Jerome. It's a beautiful town on the side of a mountain. It was a mining town ,turned ghost town that was taken over in the 60's by artists and hippies. I was in a gift shop and ran across a postcard of 2 women standing in front of a doorway.I turned it over and yep,they were ladies of the evening.Called in the Wild West "Soiled Doves". I bought a book about the town and discovered the Madam was one of the richest persons in town, the first one with a paved sidewalk and paid to rebuild the school when it burned down.

I wondered,certainly such things went on in Kansas, We know what Miss Kitty did for a living on "Gunsmoke" even if the times were too tame to tell the story on TV.Well Newton apparently hasn't forgotten and tells the story of a shoot out, one of the underplayed great shootouts in the history of the wild west:

http://www.legendsofamerica.com/ks-hideparkgunfight.html

If I was reading the cards in the exhibit right,the gunfight involved one of the ladies of the evening. Or the article linked could be something different.

I told the volunteers at the library this was my first time in town. Not exactly true. When I was 7 and 9 I passed through Newton about 4 O'Clock in the morning on the train.We took the SuperChief to Temple,Texas to visit family. Newton is a train town and it was the first stop on the trip, It was sound asleep every time we went through. About half of one room of the Museum was dedicated to the train history of the Santa Fe railroad. The Station is down the street, I didn't make it there.

One of the major parts of the Santa Fe Railroad has got to be the Harvey Restaurants and the Harvey Girls.The need on the western lines grew for restaurants.The trips were long and hard and people needed a break, enter an Englishman with an idea. Quality food at an affordable price with smiling ,cheery,hard working waitress. Books tell the food was amazing the waitresses in starched white and black dresses more so.

Women were hired from around the country for 6,9,12 months contracts, they left home at a time when most had not been very far from home. The girls lives in Dorms often on top of the restaurants and worked hard shifts when ever the trains passed through. The Restaurants were immaculate,linen and silver ware represented the finest dinning anywhere.The girls often stayed for years and settled down in new territories and in doing so helped populate the west.The Call was not only "Go West Young Man" but Go West Young Women. I recently read a book on the subject and I will get to a review of it soon. We will meet more of the Harvey story in Halstead.

At one time Kansas was an Ocean and at one time Dinosaurs walked the state.Here is the tooth of a wooly mammoth found in 1966 during the building on 135 Highway.

Thoughts on the Museum, It was well organized,stories told with an incredible passion.Schools as always were celebrated, as were the experiences of the trails westward. I loved the stuff about churches, the 1959 prom dress, and state championship banners.

Newton Kansas

2008-07-20T19:59:00.005-05:00

Newton is town Worth going back to .According to the 2000 census about 18,000 people live in Newton, It's the county seat, and a colorful history. Many of the threads of Kansas run in Newton, wild west,railroad,early trials and strong Mennonite ties. I only got to visit the County History museum and walk a little through downtown. You can tell it's rail road as during the time I was in the museum I heard 4 trains rumbling through.One of the museum exhibit even mentioned the right side of the tracks and the wrong of the tracks.

A 300 Mile Lap around the Flint Hills

2008-07-20T19:01:00.008-05:00

Where I started and how I got home. My points of destination took on a lap through the flint hills.I knew in my planning I'd covering ground already covered, so I went a different. On the trip to Cottonwood Falls and Tallgrass we took the turnpike ,getting off in Emporia and Highway 50 to our destinations. I had to go through Emporia and Highway 50 again, so I took a different route.

Topeka Blvd past Forbes Fields becomes US 75 South.It will take you through farm land and past exits for Carbondale ,Overbrook and right through Lyndon. Lyndon is going to have to be it's stop due to the fact it's the County Seat,boost several historic homes and a Carnegie Library still in use.It's own stop because Frankly, It's Sunday and the Library is not open. The highway passed right by the City Park and what do I find that makes me stop off the road bur this Log Cabin. It was the home of one Wells P. Bailey.The very beat up sign explains that the Cabin was purchased by the city in 1997 and they are trying to restore it.

After passing by Melvern Lake Dam and coming to Beto Junction Truck Stop,by linking to us-35 you find yourself in Emporia.The picture of the Bowling is where memory serves me that a Staking Rink used to be in the late 70's and early 80's. Then 15 or so,I met a tall,curvy blond named Kathy Hylton.We kissed and dated as much you could long distance.She was working as maid at hotel.She was the first.

When we were on Highway 50 a month ago we passed a historical marker ,today I stopped, this is the view and it says:

"The vast prairie, which surrounds this site is typical of the Bluestem pasture region, more commonly known as the Flint Hills. Named for its predominant grasses, the area extends from Oklahoma almost to Nebraska in a narrow oval two counties wide which covers some four and a half million acres. "

I was on highway 50 for about 80 miles west to just past Newton,Ks to the the town of Halstead where I turned off onto 89 which to took me to my destination. 50 goes coast to coast and it is a beautiful barren stretch of road. The towns have little population between Emporia and Newton ,so rest areas and signs of life few and far between. A website described 50 in Kansas:

http://www.route50.com/kansas.htm

When I reached Halstead I decided to take another,more used route home. 135 North to Salina about 60 Miles and then 99 miles once you turn East to Topeka and home. The distance was about the same with more rest stops.Some of the signs I saw and other Impressions of the Trip

-The Chase County 4h wants you to know "we help feed the world"

-K State Athletic boosters want you to know Salina and Junction City are "Powercat" county

-Lyndon,Newton,Neosho Rapids and a couple of town are proud of their State High School Championships

-There is a giant Adult Super book store outside of Abilene , some one who knows the next to it put a sign saying "Jesus Saves,Pornography destroys". Here I'll note I wish I was bold enough to pull off to the side of the road and take a picture while Traffic is buzzing by at 80mph (70 because we know no one speeds !).

-the last time I was in the area of Junction City, I ran across the Dreamland Motel. Timothy McVeigh spent the night there with the Ryder truck before going to Oklahoma City and bombing up the Federal Building. FBI got a description from the night manager which led to his arrest. I was looking for the hotel and couldn't find it, It was right off the highway. It must have been torn down, I saw several hotels in the area where I thought it was.

-A Historical Marker near Walton,Ks tells the story of Turkey Red Wheat:

"Children in Russia hand-picked the first seeds of this famous winter wheat for Kansas. They belonged to Mennonite Colonies preparing to emigrate from the steppes to the American prairies. A peace-loving sect, originally from Holland, the Mennonites had gone to the Crimea from Prussia in 1790 when Catherine the Great offered free lands, military exemption and religious freedom. They prospered until these privileges were threatened in 1871. "

A sign on 135 outside of Assaria,Kansas reads "If you lived here,You'd be home now"

-a alone the way,I saw hay bails rolled up and even encounters a controlled burn that blacked the sky for miles around. I reminder, no pun intended.... ok pun intended. This areas bread and better is Farm land.Harvest time for something just past.

a Wiki article on Controlled burning of farm lands:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_burn

It really can be quite beautiful at night.

Finally the third historical marker I came upon. Now on to the stops of the day. Close to home, maybe 9 miles out a sign told me this was the first 9 miles of I-70 the great interstate highway system that runs coast to coast. Dedicated in 1956 by President Eisnehower it lays west heading toward Ike's hometown of Abilene. It's good to have a President from your state and a big time building project.

Rest of the Museum

2008-07-12T19:54:00.010-05:00

The train takes us into the 20th Century.Time is paid to famous Kansans like William Allen White,Jazz great Charlie Parker,General and President Dwight D. Eisenhower,The multi talented author,film director and photographer Gordan Parks. One dark spot in Kansas History is also covered, in some ways worse the the fact Missourians burned Lawrence twice in a 10 year period, worse than the crime waves of the Daltons,James, gangsters of the twenties. A grim episode , Carrie Nation achieved notoriety going into bars and smashing Kegs of Beer and alcohol. A Talk show host in Topeka expresses my feelings "who would want to hurt and innocent keg of beer." Indeed. I've probably spent more time on this sad episode and sad woman that it deserves, needless to say if in my travels I run across any Museums,murals,statues or childhood homes, I'm passing that one by.

Kansas is the home of the first female mayor of a US City.
Biography of Susanna Salter here:
http://www.kancoll.org/khq/1954/54_3_billington.htm

Kansas also featured one of the first female State officials in the country,Lorraine Elizabeth Wooster
http://cjonline.com/stories/010602/kan_wooster.shtml

http://www.kshs.org/portraits/wooster_lorraine.htm

A section of the Museum covers the 50's to the 80's. Kansas contribution to fast food is chronicled,Pizza Hut,Taco Tico,White Castle,Tony's Pizza and Red Baron Pizza are all Kansas Products. Anyone who lived in Topeka from the 50's to the 80's recognize the sign in the picture. McDonalds on Topeka Blvd (Ave) , long story on whether it's a Blvd or an Ave.It was one of the last of the drive ins in the McDonalds chain, you could order and go back to the car to eat. If it had indoor seating I don't recall.I remember the picnic tables to the east of the restaurant. It was a sad day when the restaurant modernized,but the new restaurant does pay tribute to the old and the sign of course is still with us.One of the original Golden Arches. To go back to the items discarded on the Trials , there is an exhibit with fast food wrappers discarded on highways as well.

A Pop Culture exhibit has everything from a pong game to one of the first home computers. A Newspaper and cups document the Kansas City Royals World Series win in 1985. A George Brett for President bumper is there.TV Camera from the 50's, a plan made by Boeing in Wichita and many,many other things are there. There is a CD from the group Kansas, local boys who made good in the 70's with hits 'Carry on my Wayward Son','Point of No Return' and 'Dust in the Wind'. They are duly honored, but the CD is for "Power", one their worst albums and worst selling.If anybody knows any of the members, couldn't they donate a Gold Album or something from "Leftover" or "Point of No Return" or "Best of ..."

The temporary exhibit is Natural Disasters of Kansas and features an amazing video of Storm Chasers in Mulvane,2004. Some of the best unedited footage I've ever seen of a Tornado dropping from the clouds. The rest of exhibit covers major Tornadoes,flood, fires,snow storms.Pretty interesting. You can go into a booth and record your own stories which the Achieves will have on file.

The Museum is only 1 arm of the Historical Society, I've linked to on line sources, William Allen White's house visited last month is run by the society,they have a wonderful site on Territorial Kansas :
http://www.territorialkansasonline.org/cgiwrap/imlskto/index.php

So It rained, I would have rather been in Pott County looking for Wagon Ruts but it was a pretty good afternoon.

Rainy Saturday

2008-07-12T18:02:00.008-05:00

I will admit on these adventures that I am a wimp.The Plan for today was for me to visit at least 5 little towns in Pottawatomie County, the County that borders Shawnee County to the North and West.Possible areas of exploration included a 290 year oak tree,a WW1 doubghboy statue,several building in desperate need of restoration that if the websites I was looking at are out of day,they may not be there.Wamego is the home of an incredible looking (from the pictures anyway) park anchored at one end by a Dutch Windmill.

It rained in the morning and didn't stop afternoon,it was an inch in my mom's rain gauge and that was before it stopped.It wasn't a threatening thunderstorm,it was more like a fall rain.I envisioned myself in a few hours at the Oregon Trail Nature Park looking for wagon ruts in a muddy field. Everything plans was outdoors,so I went to Plan B, a local attraction of building that had been moved to a site, a bluff overlooking 1-70 here in Topeka.That seemed to be a lot of time walking around outdoors and that suddenly seemed to rate 0 on the fun scale. So I went to Plan C,which I made up on the fly.I visited the Kansas State Historical Society Museum.

Located off the 1-70 Wanamaker exit,for some reason Topeka had decided to build almost every store and theme restaurant on Wanamaker,so they Museum sits tucked away from Shopping paradise in a small valley set against the first miles laid of 1-70 in the 50's.The grounds occupy a Nature Trail (Rain,didn't go), a Pottawatomie Mission and the State Achieves and Museum.

I had seen this several years ago,but among the donation is the desk used by Lou Grant in "The Mary Tyler Moore Show".Lou Grant was given life in several Emmy winning performances by Edward Asner,a Wyandotte County native.
http://www.kshs.org/cool3/asnerdesk.htm

The desk is not current in display. They feature a themed exhibit every year,previous years included Bleeding Kansas in 2004 (sesquicentennial year), Kansas in the Movies ,Sports in the movies, and this year Natural Disaster (more later).

The regular part of the Musuem is divided into Rooms covering in order the History of Kansas from Indians,Coronado to a display of Pop Culture from the 70's and 80's.Indian Artifacts include a life size Ti pi and Mud Hut. Arrowheads,broken pots,hatchets and maps detailing the migration forced and otherwise of Indian Tribes.

From Coronado to Lewis and Clark to the Santa Fe/Oregon/California Trails with a Life sized Conestoga Wagon to a Buffalo which as the display case says "What they saw". An exhibit tells of how travels had to discard what they were carrying along the way, a house clock, a chair and tea cups are enclosed in the display , I always wonder if the settlers throwing out something that meant so much to them could have ever imagined it would end up in a museum some day, and for that matter why some else didn't pick it up.

Then of course we come to bleeding Kansas, after reading so much lately about the bogus elections,It was a thrill to see a wooden ballot box and the multi colored ballots used. In the picture we see a hopeful flag pleading for Kansas to be the 34th Star "Admit Me Free" it implores.The Cannon was used in the sack of Lawrence in 1856and a tombstone of someone who didn't make it out of Bleeding Kansas.

The display also features a Chair John Brown sat on,various flags ,banners and guns of course.The display focusing on the Underground features a barrel where a runaway slave hid for 6 Weeks.Then we move into the Civil War ,the Immigration wave and the railroad.

To anyone who can't tell the train pictured below is indoors,It was a major media story when it was brought inside in the late 80's or early 90's.It's an actual train engine and two or three cars.With good reason it's one of the most popular exhibits in the museum,you can walk beside the train and look in. The back car is a passage car and you can walk through that car.I wish they would allow you to walk through the sleep or the engine. Along the side are various displays talking about Harvey House restaurants, train depots, conductor uniforms and other exhibits detailing the train experience of the late 19th and early 20th Century.

To be continued ....

4th of July

2008-07-07T20:15:00.003-05:00

I spent the noon hour on July 4th in Collins Park, a neighborhood in what I suppose would be called Central Topeka attending the World Famous (or soon to be) Collins Park July 4th Parade . The park is about 2 blocks long as for about 40 years the residents near the park have paraded around the park .Children in decorated wagons,old cars, several politicians made this one stop as Topeka erupts every July 4 in about a dozen similar parades. I could have been in College Hill,Potwin,Lake Sherwood.Elected office hopefuls could hit Sherwood at 9,Potwin at 10, then choose College Hill or Collins Park at 11.

This, I think was my favorite,a man on a trailer being lead around with a pick up truck playing the best of Sousa on the Keyboards.As I took this picture he was being filmed by a French Film doing a documentary.At first I thought the Film crews were local media.The boom mike trying to catch up with the ad hoc marching band at the start of the parade should have been a clue this wasn't just local media.

Of course what is any parade without a beauty queen, Miss Capital City.

Other that the Keyboard, this guy had to be my favorite.Dressed at Former President Richard Nixon.I noticed in reflection he was one of the few if any participants not throwing candy for kids.hmmm. Not a totally comment on Nixon, I read once when he lived in New Jersey he used to greet Trick or Treaters at the door in person, presumably not in the mask,but one can only hope,instead of candy he'd give out pens,replicas of the ones he'd use for Bill Signings. The man in the mask will have to work on the pens for next year...... I'm just sayin'

Coleman Hawkins

2008-07-07T19:57:00.006-05:00

Enough of Bleeding Kansas ! Lets have some music please. Here's a biography of Jazz Great Coleman Hawkins

http://www.redhotjazz.com/hawkinsaticle.html

He has a Topeka Connection as explained local Jazz Historian Dan Kozac:
"Coleman Randolph Hawkins was born in St. Joseph, Missouri, on November 21, 1904. Musically precocious from an early age, he played both piano and cello in childhood. Feeling that he would receive a better quality education, his mother arranged for him to attend school in Topeka, Kansas, and live with her sisters at 603 W. 8th Street.

Hawkins attended the old Topeka High School and apparently received extensive private musical tutoring through Washburn University while attending THS. In Topeka at some point early in time, Coleman also began playing the saxophone, which quickly became his instrument of choice. By the age of 14, Hawk was playing professionally around eastern Kansas, Kansas City, and St. Joseph, which probably accounts for his academic ambivalence at THS in everything but music.

Sometime between the ages of 17 and 18, Hawk left Kansas when he hooked up with Mamie Smith’s touring jazz group. This led him to New York, which would remain home base for most of the remainder of his life. Soon after his arrival in NY, he joined the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra. It was with Henderson that Hawk's unique sound and advanced harmonic approach to improvisation began to flower and attract the attention of musicians, fans, and critics. Within a very short time his playing had elevated the tenor sax to an unprecedented level as an instrument to be reckoned with. In 1934 Hawk left the US to pursue a more profitable professional path playing jazz in Europe, where he achieved near superstar status. However the winds of war and the rise of Nazism made it imperative for him to return to America in the late 1930s.

Through the '40s, '50s and '60s, Hawkins worked and recorded prolifically. His 1939 recording of "Body and Soul" became a standard for jazz ballad improvisation, and remains one of the milestone records in the history of jazz to this day. The jazz luminaries with whom Hawk recorded during his career is a veritable "who’s who" of the first half century of recorded jazz. Although rooted in the swing tradition, Hawk remained very open-minded to new stylistic developments. He certainly was one of the most beloved figures of his time.
Coleman Hawkins died on May 19, 1969, at the age of 64 in New York City."

One of the Great Topeka Festivals is the late May or Early June Coleman Hawkins Legacy Jazz Festival.

http://www.hawkinsjazzfest.org/

Note :The house at 603 W 8th still stands, it's owned by Topeka Friends and hosts a Quaker Relegious Service on Sunday Mornings. I was in there once, several years ago when the nieghborhood hosted an open house.Nothing spectacular about the house,no markers .Just a house on the corner presently across the street from a parking lot with a view of the Capital Building.

Pictures Lecompton 2

2008-06-28T20:17:00.004-05:00

Me
Midway
Spoon Collection
Lecompton exhibit .The desk is from the hall 2 blocks awat, In the plastic slips above the desk are copies of speeches given in Congress .
RR tracks Lecompton

Pictures Lecompton 1

2008-06-28T20:11:00.004-05:00

Parade
Parade
Constitution Hall exhibit
The room where Pro Slavery Legislator met

Lecompton Territorial Days

2008-06-28T19:17:00.004-05:00

Today we took a drive about 21 miles east on 6th in Topeka which turned into US-40 into Douglas County and then at the Historical Marker turned North 3 miles on E 600 Rd into Lecompton,Kansas. As so much in this part of the State, It has Bleeding Kansas ties and one of the reasons I wanted to go on this day.

The town population is 608 (2000 census), actually I know the population is at least 609, a co worker gave birth to a baby in December and lives in Lecompton, so I will record that one addition even if the Census Bureau doesn't pick it up until 2010.Probably more, but I can verify the 1 addition. The significant to Bleeding Kansas is a white building that sits on 3rd and Elmore Street. It is I believe the 3rd Territorial Capital of Kansas.

The story goes that in 1854,as a result of the Kansas-Nebraska Act,the fate of whether Kansas would be Free or Slave was left to the Voters, thousands pured in on both sides of the issue.The elections were rifewith fraud and intimidation and eventually the Pro Slave forced won the day.The issue was hardly settled ,violence followed as 1858 brought a Slave Constitution which was never approved, the building later hosted a Free Convention and eventual Statehood in 1861. The actions of the Pro Slave Government led to National Debate particularly in a Senate Election in Illinois between Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln.

We arrived in the quiet town and found parking and followed the crowd. A city park seemed to be the focus of most people so we claimed our spot and watched the parade.It had almost everything 4H,old cars, those tiny Shriner cars,politicians with volunteers handing out flyers, kids got candy.

The main of the town was the site of the midway with Rides,Toss a ball and win a prize, several food vendors and people selling jewelry and baseball cards. I was drawn to pictures painted on saws, these included landscapes and pictures of cows and windmills. I got to a Bision Burger, It's a little dry but good and since Buffalos aren't bred with steroids ,are a lot better than Hamburgers.

Another Museums advertises itself as the Territorial Museum and part of one room does deal with Bleeding Kansas, an exhibit has a desk from Constitution Hall that was used in the 1850's. One of things I am finding so charming about these small Museums is how people just donation things like spoon collections and plates from the Bicentinental. The Museum is in one of the 2 building left from Lane University which existed from 1865 to 1902.

Upstairs in the Chapel is a little bit of Dwight Eisenhower history as his parents were married there. We got to see History Re enactors present "Bleeding Kansas" which recreated a Town Hall meeting,Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of 'Uncle Tom's Cabin', a seminal event in the end of slavery was represented, as was James H Lane. The Slave cause was represented by Rev. Thomas Johnson,Mahala Doyle, a Tennessee settler who was made a widower at the hands of John Brown and the Sheriff of Douglas County at the time Samuel Jones. The last speaker was John Brown , the actor walked out of the auditorium in the pose of the John Stuart Curry Mural that is in the Capitol Building in Topeka. It was brilliant, well acted and very moving.

Before the start of the program the auditorium was divided in two, this side Pro Slavery, that side Free State, we were encouraged to Boo ,Heckel and really involve ourselves in the presentation. I think it was hard for the Pro Slave side of the room to get involved, but we Free Staters got very involved in Booing, as the same went on a number of people heckled and cheering.

The events will go on into the night, a band, ice cream social,softball tournament, 3 legged race and on and on.

As always ,next up is some pictures

What starts in Kansas ends as History

2008-06-27T06:37:00.005-05:00

We are in Topeka tonight, home. According to a radio interview I heard today there are 20 attractions in Topeka, ranging from a cemetery with a Vice President and one of the founders of the Atchison,Topeka and Santa Fe railroad to the State Capital, something called Prairie Town and several stops on the Underground Radio.

Tonight we are at the Corner on 5th and Topeka, In 1854 the civil war almost started here , that the west side of the street, on the east, the former home of the US District court, a decision was made on the 2nd floor that was appealed to the Supreme Court as part of the Brown v. Board of Education.

History is made on the lowest margin of error possible. D-Day in 1944 would only have happened if the weather was right, the Germans were totally convinced Patton in Northern England would lead the invasion , the intell the Germans had suggested strong 2 other landing points which may have been better spots , the German command at Normandy has to be on it's way to Paris for a party and several other margins. If any of those happened history would have been very,very different.

So a readers digest version of Bleeding Kansas. The Kansas -Nebraska Act left the issue of whether Kansas would come into the Union Free or Slave.Thousands on both sides of the issue moved to the state.Several state Constitutions were made, voted on, votes invalidated, It was a bloody, tension filled mess by July 4, 1856.
http://www.cjonline.com/stories/020203/our_consthall.shtml
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2006/jul/05/topeka_incident_built_freestate_support/?print
a more detailed description of the events of July 4,1856
http://www.kancoll.org/books/cutler/terrhist/terrhist-p38.html

The slightest margin of error comes in the fact, if the Federal had followed through when Cannons, had the convention not broken up, the Civil War may well have started out at the corner. The Federal coming into the war on the side of Slavery. Some of idea discussed that day made into the State Constitution and Kansas was admitted to the Union as Free State in January of 1861,Lincoln takes office in March of 1861, the shots at Fort Sumpter were fired in April of 1861 and the rest is history. But the events at 427-429 Kansas Avenue played a central role in what was to come.

Across the street is the current Post Office and former US Federal Court building, the early Brown Cases were argued there. William Allen White spoke the words in the title of this entry before he died in 1944, the words rang true in 1954 with the Brown decision.

I had written this entry about a week ago by me,I thought since the events of Kansas occured on the 4th of July, I'd save the entry for that day.But a suprise opprotunity happened and now is as good as time as any to tell this story.

A history professor from the University of New Mexico ,Durwood Ball was in town. He is working on a biography of Col. Sumner,the man faced with the task of telling the gathering in Topeka to go home that July 4th morning.A reception was held at a Microbrew and we loaded onto a bus for a "Hertiage Tour" sponsored by Ghost Tours of Kansas, a Bank, and a society to restore the hall,with hopes of turning it into a museum. Ball described the actions of that day along with several local historians.Afterwards I sat and had a beer with the group where talk turned to a city councilman and crime and whatever else is going on in the city today, not 152 years ago. It was a great evening.

The picture is of a mural at the site. Some information learned:
-while the troops stood outside the hall ready to level it by Cannon fire if the convention did not break up, John Brown was in the woods waiting to join the action. He left disappointed.
-among the crowd gathered watching was a 10 years boy named William Cody, better known years later as Buffalo Bill Cody.
-In Brown news, It had never occurred to me, the school Brown wanted to attend was named for Charles Sumner , one of the more vocal abolitionist in Congress in the 1850's.An irony exists that a school named after Sumner would be all white and deny an African American attendance,forcing her to attend school on the other side of town.
-I had know this but before but sitting at the corner and having it explained was exciting. President Franklin Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act and as Topeka named the streets after the Presidents, Pierce was skipped in favor naming a street after Henry Clay.The bus stopped on the street not named for Franklin Pierce.

It really was a special evening. There is a small but determined group committed to bringing this history to life.One of the more interesting moments was when someone asked how well known the events of Bleeding Kansas were.Local Author Deb Goodrich said she and her husband were researching at the Library of Congress and came across the London Times in 1856 with the headline "War in Kansas", which lends credence to the William Allen White quote that titles this entry.

This was a chance to see living history, the bus took us to the back of the building where delegates to the convention jumped out of the window and ran into the woods. When the story was first told to me some years ago, the encampment of troops was placed across the river to the North. That story was corrected to the Train tracks and creek near 11th and Kansas. The army of 250 marched west and then North down Kansas Avenue to the Hall.

July 4, 2008 postscript:

We know the troops arrived at 10 am and Col. Sumner gave a 2 hour deadline. We know a couple hundred familys gathered around to celebrate the fourth.I came home from a parade on his July 4th and couldn't resist the temptation to visit the mural, I drove north down Kansas Avenue, which of course is different, shops,businesses, resturants and bars line the street. Being the business district on a holiday morning it was empty, unlike 152 years ago. My ears still ringing from the marching band of the parade,It was easy to imagine a drum and buggle corp accompanying the troops on the 7 block walk they took that day.

The weather was different, It was a cool morning today, hot,sticky humid then.The empty streets of today left the tension of that day too the imagination.But there I was ,looking and hoping to feel the ghosts of that day.Opening this building up and telling the story, this chapter of bleeding Kansas seems to important, though the woods have been replaced with I-70,It possible to imagine John Brown and his blood thristy followers lurking over there NW of the Law enforecement center ready for action.

Had shots been fired, what would have happened. The Nation would have been outraged, the Union would have come into the conflict on the side of Pro Slavery movement, would the North have left the union to the Pro Slavery adminstration of Franklin Pierce.What would Edwin Sumners place in history be ? a man with strong feeling against Slavery,carrying out orders to squash an illegal Free State meeting. Interesting questions to ponder.

Roadside Markers-Bleeding Kansas

2008-06-21T19:50:00.001-05:00

Even though the classic Bleeding Kansas stories take place 50 miles plus away in Lawrence,Lecompton,Topeka,Osawatomie.

Between Holton and the Sac and Fox Casino lays one of those History Markers where you learn so much.

The Text reads "Battle of the Spurs:

Just before Christmas 1858, John Brown "liberated" eleven slaves in Missouri. He hid them in a covered wagon and circled north on the underground railway toward Nebraska and freedom. En route a Negro baby was born. Late in January they reached Albert Fuller's cabin on Straight creek a mile and a half south of this marker. Here a Federal posse barred their way. Both sides sent for reinforcements. Help for Brown arrived first, Topeka abolitionists leaving in the midst of Sunday church.
Declaring he would not be turned "from the path of the Lord," Brown, though still outnumbered, crossed the creek in spite of high water and the enemy entrenched on the other side. Demoralized by his audacity, the posse mounted and spurred away–thus giving a name to the bloodless battle. This was Brown's exit from Kansas. In December, 1859, he was hanged for his treasonable attack at Harper's Ferry.
This sign marks the site of Eureka, a trading center on the Parallel Road which ran from Atchison to the Pike's Peak gold fields. "

Thus ends the adventures in Kansas for June 21,2008. Till next time ......

Hiawatha Pic Page 2

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Hiwatha pics page 1

2008-06-21T19:37:00.001-05:00

The City of Beautiful Maples-Stop 2 6/21/08

2008-06-21T19:06:00.000-05:00

I wish I could tell you Hiawatha meant "The City of Beautiful Maples" in some Sac or Iowa Indian Language but I can't. Oh well.

Again the Courthouse sits in the middle of the town square, a coffee shop, a signature clock tower,built in 1891 on the bank. The picture to the left is the Veterans Memorial, the statue of the helmet,rifle and boots is a tribute to a citizen of Brown County who died in Afghanistan,2006. The bricks around it have the names of the fallen in other wars.It's a powerful site. Each town and city do in their own way, but this one tugged at me.

To the west is the Brown County Historical Society and Musuem. Now everything on the internet told me it's not open on Weekends. I saw some cars on the street and knocked on the door, and got the tour.

The buiding is amazing,it used to be the Memorial Auditorium. The literature talks about the lower level seating and serving 600 people and the home of dances,commencement exercises,dinners and meetings. The Auditorium with balcony sets 1,200 people and has hosts theatre companies, Opera diva Madame Schumann-Heink and William Jennings Bryan.In the 20's it showed silent movies and later talkies.In 1975 a referendum authorized 1.25 million to restore it. So the building is amazing, but what's inside it:

A General store,the bedroom of a newspaper publisher, Wedding gowns dating back to 1860, a school room, a western union station, a soda fountain from the 50's (unfortunatly not working,but I've craved a Root Beer Float all day),a dentist office ,doctors eqiupment and a military room with arm bands from Nazi Germany.People donated pop bottle collections,tons of peroid dresses ,banners from state winning basketball teams,band uniforms ,victorlas the list is endless and the highlight of the day as the picture page will show.

what I really came to see is the Sarah Davis memorial. A state wide contest a few years ago named it one of the 8 wonders of Kansas.The link here reprints the brouchure and tells the story better than I:
http://www.cityofhiawatha.org/visitors/what-to-see-do/davis-memorial

I like the last line why ?

Hiwatha with population of 3,147 in 2000 also hosts one of the longest running night time Halloween parades in the country.

Pictures of Holton 6/21/08

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Cannon on Holton Courthouse square
Court house
Jackson County Museum
Telephone Operators desk

6/21/08 Stop 1 The Holton Recorder

2008-06-21T17:59:00.001-05:00

My travels today

took me North 60 miles or so and another 10 miles east into Jackson County (Holton) and Brown County (Hiawatha). about 150 miles through smally populated farm country. The destinations revealed themselves for the most part with water towers that could be since 5 or 6 before reaching the towns.

For a state with significant Oil reserves in the South,Cattle ranches population the whole state, this could be considered the money belt of the state and I passed by 3 Indian Casinos before reaching my destination. I also drove through 1 Indian Reservation and skirted the borders of another. Hard core smokers for years have gone to the reservations for years to buy cheap off brand cigarettes. I was curious about the cost of gas on the reservations as they didn't have to deal with the state taxes. It was high $3.94 a gallon, I got gas on the way home of my 150 mile sojourn for $3.85 off the reservation. The view from the road was farm land,farm land and more farm land. A driving hazard can be getting stuck behind slow moving farm equipment on the highway where it's just impossible to pass. I was lucky today.

Holton, the county seat of Jackson County sits right on US -75. Burger King,multiple gas opportunities and Wal Mart line the road , a sign announces this stretch of highway through town is a Memorial Highway for a Purple Heart winner 1970.One disappointment is a restaurant advertised "The Biggest Cinnamon Rolls in Kansas" and "Home of the 150 Cinnamon Roll". It was closed , looked like it had been for years.

The court house sits on the town square and had a small farmers market in the corner of the square. Antique shops,barber shops ,auto stores surround the Court house that was built in the 20's. Across the street and I almost missed the sign was the Jackson County museum .The museums sits off the square in a red brick building,the museum opened for about 4 hours a day on weekends is 2 storefronts long and is filled with WPA Dolls,military uniforms,old school desks and a telephone operators station.

The joy of Holton came from the 75 cents I paid for the newspaper, It's published Semi weekly and sure there is the top of the fold story on whether to have a .05% sales tax increase for a community center and the letter to the editor from a former sheriff's deputy responding to an article about the Sheriffs department being investigated as a hostile work environment.

The true charm of this county wide newspaper was an 8 paragraph article on the big baseball game between Sabetha and Holton versus Legion Post 44,The Post team lost 15-9 and it sounds like it was an epic struggle. Sports page also contained pictures of girls summer volleyball league and scores . The editor wrote an article about how great Tiger Woods was in winning the US Open earlier in the week.

The paper serves Circleville,Delia,Denison,Effingham,Goff,Havensville,Holton,Hoyt,Larkinburg,Mayetta,Muscotah,Netawaka,Solider,Wetmore and Whiting. Populations by 2004 estimates are:

Holton, 3,345 (county seat) Hoyt, 587 Mayetta, 342Denison, 227 Whiting, 211 Delia, 184Circleville, 183 Netawaka, 169 Soldier, 123

To a person who grew up in a town of 125,000, these towns seem more like places that have names to the area than towns. But they have identities through schools,churches and if you think I just made a negative comment about small town America. They are places people call home and I think that is an important thing.

According to the paper in Whiting

"Abbey Bray spent one day last week at Grandma Brey's.They made sugar cookies and had lots of fun."

"Adam Bray hit the winning ball to the send the Whiting Boys over Wetmore last week."

"Gay Schumaker and Kallie Schumaker went to Topeka ib June 13 to attend the retirement of Debbie Schumaker from the Kansas Highway Patrol.She served the State of Kansas for 33 years.Happy Retirement Debbie."

If you don't think that type of news is important, I'd be willing to bet those notices and the notices about the White family going to Banner Lake for Father's day were probably clipped out of the paper by at least one person and given to the Brey,Schumaker and White's.

All that was missing was a whimsical,melancholy monologue from Garrison Keillor or playing a John Mellencamp CD while reading. And yes, un important stuff was covered, a editorial from Iola about how the Republicans voted for Big Oil Companies last week (and this is Red State American here) and Kansas ranks 10th in child care. I liked the paper a lot.

Last stop of the day. Emporia Kansas

2008-06-15T18:55:00.000-05:00

6 Presidents sat at this table.

In a quiet tree lined neighborhood of Emporia, not far from the campus of Emporia State University is the home of one of the important figures of late 19th and early 20th century. William Allen White, publisher of the Emporia Gazette.

A couple of Biographies:

http://www.emporia.com/waw/williamawhite.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Allen_White

I'd like to show you a nice outside picture of the house ,but can't, the batteries started going down on the camera.I can't show you the bed the 3 Presidents who spent the night in the house slept in,notably Theodore Roosevelt. Or the cheetah skin that Roosevelt gave White.That was on the second floor. The camera gave out on the first, oh well, It was the last stop of the day anyway.

It was a good start to my personal Kansas Tour. Next stop in a week or two. I did do a couple of dry runs I guess you'd say around town. The visits to the Train station and the Combat Air Museum are part of what gave me the seed for doing this, I'll cover those stops later. But it begins

Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve -Pic page 3

2008-06-15T18:49:00.001-05:00

There really can only be one caption for these pictures. The Park ranger turned around to us on the bus before letting us out and said " How do like my office ?"

Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve Pics 2- The Bus Tour,1

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Left to Right: 1. Stone Fence 2.It rained earlier in the week

Tall Grass National Preserve Photos 1-Ranch House

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Top Left to Right
1. Barn and Visitors Center 2. Ranch House

Middle Left to Right
3. View from the Front Porch 4. Root Cellar
Bottom
5. Your Blogger

6/14/08 Stop 3: Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve

2008-06-15T11:55:00.000-05:00

Tall Grass is a joint public/private partnership between the National Park Service,The Nature Conservancy and Kansas Park Trust. 10,894 acres of Park land have been preserved. The Park area includes a Ranch house ,built out of Limestone in 1880. The guide speaks of 450 species of Plants,150 kinds of birds,39 types of reptiles and 31 species of mammals. Several hiking trails are available to those who get permits.

At 12:30 we waited on the front porch of the ranch house.The front door opened and we were greeted a tour guide from The National Park Service complete with the Smokey the Bear hat. She gave a tour of the 11 Room Ranch hour. It was build by a Cattle Rancher named Stephen F Jones.The most interesting part was the Root cellar and several of the underground rooms.

Afterwards we took a bus tour of the Prairie , we went about 7 miles into the pastures of the Preserve. We saw cattle and several of the plants and birds mentioned above. The tour guide I think knew all of them and then some. The bus stopped twice, one at a field of limestone where we saw a bird that flew onto a plant and stayed around, not bothered by the company at all.I must have heard the names of a hundred flowers,weeds,grass types. Most of it went right over my head.

The second stop the bus made was up a hill, with a few 18 miles in any direction. The amazing thing about the view was you could see no modern conviences in any direction. No Highway, no elecritcal poles, no phone poles, nothing except the bus. The amazing thing about the view is had been unchanged since stone fences had been built in the 1880's. It was easy to imagine 40 years before that the land would have been filled with hordes of Bison Buffalos roaming the Priairie, the view Kansa Indian must have seen or people in wagon trains of the Santa Fe Trial. Simply stunning and so hard to leave.

2 Reasons to return
-To see the Tall Grass in the Fall
-The Bison maybe in 2009 will return, plans to introduce Bisons to the Prairie (or Re-introduce).They will start with 25 and watch it grow through the years.

As always National Parks are national treasures. For anyone who thinks all government is bad, visit a national park.

Next few posts will be pictures

6/14/08 Stop 2: Cottonwood Falls

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One of the most amazing things to this city boy about these small towns is the serenity.When we got out of the car the only noise was the wind blowing and the sound of an auctioneer about a block away. The serenity was repeated in Cottonwood Falls only with someone playing Rock and Roll.

Cottonwood Falls is the county seat of Chase County, known for a Limestone Court house built in the 1870's.Were it not be restored it would be oldest courthouse still in use west of Mississippi.The back of the post card I bought says "It was built in 1871-73 in the renaissance style of the Louis XIII period. The 113 foot tall,three story structure is of native limestone, with mansard roof and native walnut spiral staircase and balustrade."It sits on the town square with a brick road leading up to it past another downtown ,this one filled with restaurants,antique stores,art galleries and the Chase County Museum. We were able to peek in the window and see the staircase, I put the camera to the door but the picture didn't work out, unlike the train depot. The Museum wasn't open until 1 and we had places to be so we missed it.

On the court house square was a cannon, a memorial to those who had died in World War 1,World War 2 and Vietnam.On the right corner was an abandoned gas station, we'd see these old gas stations a lot on our journey.

We ate at a restaurant/souvenir store. The menu was written on a dry chalk board it read ham and croissant, Turkey and croissant or Roast beef and croissant with salad bar $7.95.Water was served in a Mason jar. a couple of tourist came in as did a local who only wanted Coffee and a Cinnamon roll.The roll was huge,defiantly a meal in and of itself.

The Front Porch of the Flint Hills- 6/14/08 part 1

2008-06-15T06:14:00.002-05:00

Trip Date: June 14, 2008

Emporia is 50 miles south and west on Turnpike from Topeka, Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve is maybe 20 miles west on Hwy 50 to k-177 and maybe 2 or 3 miles North. The Preserve is part of the National Park System. The purpose of these journeys is to get there eventually but we have a few stops to make before we get there.

On a technical note this is the first time I've played around trying to put pictures , I'll work on it, so the blog may look clunky until I figure it out. I took 87 pictures yesterday in 4 places, learned if you are going to take about 30 the night before at an indoor football game and 87 the next day it's going to drain the batteries and a a set of batteries will be as necessary as a good map.

Before you turn to K177, you can turn south and enter the town of Strong City, Kansas.Just before the turn is a dinner with a sign painted in the window reading "Good Eats and Ice".Sorry to say we passed that up, I love Good Eats.

The road that cuts through Strong City and eventually takes you to Cottonwood Falls is flag lined, a church and some of the houses are limstone , one of the real attractions of the region is the limestone buildings. You'll see these in the Chase County Courthouse in the Cottonwood Falls entry and the Jones Ranch house in the Tall grass entry.

Downtown Strong City as a website dares calls it, is 2 blocks long and contains at least 2 bars, for a population of 581. The polls in the street all have flags, not a holiday, I image those flags are there everyday. It's what we do in fly over country, not a something that was discovered on 9/11.You'll find a bit of romantic about my home state. The state motto is "Ad Astra per aspera " a Latin phrase:Through the Stars with hardship. Yes we do bake in the summer,blow away in the spring and freeze in the winters .And our history...... William Allen White said "Things that begin in Kansas,finish in History books." So I found it somewhat comforting to drive down this main street and American flags on the street lights.

Our mission in Strong City was to see the Santa Fe Train Depot, we found it behind a caboose and a gravel parking lot. A red bricked building with several windows boarded up, we could peak in one some of the windows and see the wooden benches. Money is being raised to restore the building.

http://skyways.lib.ks.us/towns/StrongCity/depot.html

Cottonwood Falls is a couple miles down the road,but first we had to wait for the train.

Uncreativly titled First Post... or the introduction

2008-06-14T06:57:00.002-05:00

I recall a couple of years ago a regular caller to a local talk show said he visited all 105 County seats in Kansas , It took him about 2 1/2 years but he managed to visit the state border to border, from the Missouri River to the Colorado line ,The Oklahoma line to Nebraska line and everything in between. The Rolling Prairies to the hills. The host said he should start a project of visiting saloon in all 105 counties, that would be a fun adventure as well.

Well gas prices suck, not as bad as the coasts but still not good.The prospects of a big time vacation are dim at the moment. I don't have a job that requires travel, so why do this ? I'm 43 have seen very little of my home state. I do think Kansas along with Texas and the 13 Colonies have the most important origins to the country.

The trails west started passed through here, Texas Cattleman drove herds to the railroads in Kansas. The list of Famous Sons and Daughters include Walter Chyrsler,Amelia Earhardt,Baseball pitcher Walter Johnson,General and President Dwight Eisenhower,The First Native American Charles Curtis,founder of the Atchison,Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Cyrus K Holliday came to Kansas during the Territorial period.Progressive News Paper editor William Allen White called Kansas Home.Tiger Woods was born here, the Creator of the game of Basketball is buried here.The nation and the world watched Kansas Bleed from 1854 to 1860 as the precursor to the Civil War. John Brown and Carrie Nation came to Kansas .And there was a little Supreme Case involving a young girl denied entry to her neighborhood school based on her sick color,a spark to the Civil Rights movement of the 1950's. William Allen White ,editor of the Emporia Gazette , known as "The Sage of Emporia" wrote "What starts in Kansas ends as History." This is no sleepy fly over state.

We Kansans can freeze in the Winter,blow away in the Spring and boil in the Summer and think October is just about right.

Let us part the curtain,think of the Prologue to Shakespeare's Henry V and say:
Admit me Chorus to this history;Who prologue-like your humble patience pray,Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.