Journey to the Center of the Country

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.

Rainy Saturday

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 ....