Kansas

Kansas, officially the State of Kansas, is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka and its largest city is Wichita.

Home, home on the range,
Where the deer and the antelope play;
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day. ~ Brewster M. Higley

Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore. We must be over the rainbow! ~ *The Wizard of Oz*

Kansans have always taken their history seriously. The slavery controversy left an indelible mark upon the inhabitants, who were inordinately proud of the role their state had played. The heavy influx of veterans after 1865 served to keep that sentiment alive. ~ William Frank Zornow

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B

Although it is now covered with agriculture, Kansas was at one time very historic. It was the on-scene location of the "Wild West," where "longhorns" riding "six-shooters" used to "rustle up" some "varmints." This era eventually ended due to a shortage of quotion marks, but Kansans are still proud of their state's rough-and-tumble tradition, and will often greet a stranger by warmly breaking a chair over his head. Kansas also contains manufacturing and tumbleweeds, which are plants that form themselves into ginat balls that roll across the prairie and burst into your motel room at night, which is why the American Automobile Association recommends that uou always sleep with a weed whacker.
- Dave Barry, Dave Barry's Only Travel Guide You'll Ever Need (1991), New York: Fawcett Columbine, hardcover, p. 78

C

The state of Kansas was named after a tribe of Indians called Kansa or Kaw. This tribe arrived in what is now Kansas around 1720. They settled in temporary villages near the current cities of Leavenworth and Atchison. The tribe's name meant "People of the South Wind." Later, to be closer to the best bison hunting grounds, they established their principal village where the Big Blue River joins the Kansas River, near the present city of Manhattan. From 1492 to 1845, land that became Kansas was at various times claimed by six different countries. The first European to see this land was the Spanish conquistador Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, who explored the area in search of Seven Cities of Gold in 1541. French trappers and explorers came to this land in the late 1600s and early 1700s. The United States bought the land that is now Kansas from the French in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase.
Although the state's name honors the Kaw people, the first explorers to this region found it occupied by the Indians of Quivira, most likely the Wichita tribe and the Pawnee people. However, the Wichita spent most of their time in what is now Oklahoma and Texas. At the time when Spain ruled much of North and South America, Kansas was commonly called "Harahey." The people of Harahey were probably Pawnee. Native Americans played an important role in the history of Kansas and their heritage and influence will be apparent at many locations along I-70.
- Ted T. Cable & Wayne A. Maley, Driving Across Kansas: A Guide to I-70 (2003), Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, paperback, p. ix

Kansas is not crowded. It ranks thirteenth among the states in size but only thirty-first in population. That leaves plenty of space for nature. Kansas is home to almost 800 kinds of vertebrates, including 141 species of fish, 32 kinds of amphibians, 14 types of turtles, 53 different reptiles, and 87 kinds of mammals. More than 450 different bird species have been seen in Kansas. More than 2,000 kinds of plants grow wild in Kansas, including 200 types of grass. You can see many of these plants and animals along I-70.
- Ted T. Cable & Wayne A. Maley, Driving Across Kansas: A Guide to I-70 (2003), Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, paperback, p. ix-x

Manhattan is the home of Kansas State University, with more than 20,000 students from all over the world. Radio commentator Paul Harvey once called the university the "student scholar capital of America." Since 1986, KSU has been number one among the nation's 500 public universities in having students receive nationally prestigious scholarships. Its students have won ninety such scholarships compared with fifty-eight for the second-place public university. KSU's agricultural teaching and research programs are internationally recognized; its student livestock and crop judging teams have won numerous national championships and are consistently among the best in the nation; and in 2002 the university was selected as the site for the Food Safety and Security Research Center to combat bioterrorist threats on our agricultural systems. KSU's speech and debate teams have won several national championships in recent years. The College of Veterinary Science performs more rabies testing than any other lab in the world.
KSU is the home of Colbert Hills Golf Course. Developed by KSU alum and PGA golfer Jim Colbert, it successfully integrates nature conservation with economic development and university education. In 2002 it was one of only six golf courses in the world that met requirements to be designated an Audobon International Silver Signature Sanctuary.
- Ted T. Cable & Wayne A. Maley, Driving Across Kansas: A Guide to I-70 (2003), Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, paperback, p. 39-40

G

One after another, countries such as Spain and Greece, states such as Wisconsin, Michigan, and Kansas, and American colonies such as Puerto Rico-are becoming laboratories for how much pain can be inflicted on a population for the purpose of satisfying creditors and ideologues.
- Amy Goodman, Democracy Now!: Twenty Years Covering the Movements Changing America (2016)

Where did Kansas come from? From New England and the South, in a proportion of three or four to one. The abolitionists pumped in, armed with "Beecher's Bibles" (rifles) and the printing press, an equally important weapon, to keep the state free; they waged their own pre-Civil War with the Southerners already there. Everybody knows the story of John Brown of Osawatomie. After the war, emigration from the North continued; any federal veteran was entitled, after 1865, to settle on 160 good acres of Kansas land, and there came- as in Nebraska- a great influx of Grand Army of the Republic officers and men. The first New England stock became diluted with that of Iowa, Indiana, and Illinois.
Nevertheless, southern influence has always remained fairly strong, though not so strong as in Missouri, I say. As of today, there are Jim Crow theaters in Topeka. The remarkable thing is that Kansas did become so homgenous. It is an extraordinarily well-integrated state, overwhelmingly "Nordic," middle class, and Protestant. One factor making for homogeneity was of course the ineffable richness of the land. The soil of Kansas absorbed, colored, and made virtually identical the Methodist preachers from Iowa small towns, the younger sons of the Salem clipper captains, workmen from the Susquehanna, and even Ozark crackers from Arkansas. The Kansan is, as has been well said, the most average of all Americans, a kind of common denominator for the entire continent.
- John Gunther, Inside U.S.A. (1947), New York: Harper & Brothers, hardcover, p. 259

The various processes of assimilation, of wrestling a commodious life out of soil, of chaining new communities to the plains, weren't always easy. On one occasion a Russian grand duke came to Kansas to hunt buffalo. The lieutenant governor, honoring him at an official banquet, pointed to a banner on which was emblazoned the state motto, Ad Astra per Aspera, and explained, "Duke, them there words is Latin, and they mean to the stars after a hell of a lot of trouble."
- John Gunther, Inside U.S.A. (1947), New York: Harper & Brothers, hardcover, p. 260

Really Kansas is two states, or maybe even three. One line of division is of course that which cuts through the Dakotas and Nebraska too, the 98th meridian. Western Kansas is short-grass country, sparsely settled, with scanty rainfall and big mechanized farms, based on wheat. The east is moist, with thick alluvial soil; here we touch the corn belt. In between is an area more difficult to define, "central" Kansas, which is mostly (of course I am oversimplifying) alfalfa and grazing country.
South of Kansas is cotton, and north is spring wheat; Kansas grows neither, and its two great crops are of course winter wheat and corn. The gist of the Kansas "story" is, in a way, a struggle between wheat and corn, although plenty of farmers grow both. Corn is cultivated in every county now. It doesn't, however, come anywhere near the importance of wheat in the state's economy, and Kansas is the greatest wheat state in the Union by far.
Wheat, as we know, is a crop not without risks; also, in Kansas at least, it used to be called a "lazy man's crop." In the old days you planted it in September, whereupon there was nothing to do until you harvested it the next summer, whereupon you paid off the bank. Not now. Wheat farmers are busy all the year. They have hogs, soy beans, sheep, lespedeza, and sorghums like feterita, to lessen their dependence on wheat, and to provide an income all the year around. Above all, land planted in wheat (until it starts to "joint") may be used for grazing; the wheat is green before the snow comes, and then again in spring; a most remarkable thing in this part of the world is that the miore you pasture wheat, the better will be the wheat produced; it does wheat good to be eaten as it grows!- almost as cropping a beard in an adolescent makes the beard stronger. This technique of growing livestock on growing wheat means, in effect, that the wheat farmer gets two wheat crops a year, one in the form of meat.
I asked the Capper editors what distinguished Kansas farmers as against those of any other state. They replied: (1) aggressiveness; (2) willingness to experiment; (3) the gambling instinct, imposed of necessity by the risks of wind and rain; (4) modernity. It may seem a poor figure, but at least one-third of Kansas farms are electrified.
- John Gunther, Inside U.S.A. (1947), New York: Harper & Brothers, hardcover, p. 268-269

H

I'm as corny as Kansas in August
I'm as normal as blueberry pie
No more a smart little girl with no heart
I have found me a wonderful guy.
- Oscar Hammerstein II, "I'm in Love with a Wonderful Guy" (1949).

Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", first verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax. Various minor changes have been made in this popular Western song over the years, but the lyrics have remained largely the same as in Higley's original poem, which he wrote somewhere before or near 1874. "Home on the Range" was adopted as the official state song of the State of Kansas on 30 June 1947.

Home, home on the range,
Where the deer and the antelope play;
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", chorus of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

Where the air is so pure, the zephyrs so free,
The breezes so balmy and light,
That I would not exchange my home on the range
For all of the cities so bright.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", second verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

The red man was pressed from this part of the West,
He's likely no more to return
To the banks of Red River where seldom if ever
Their flickering camp-fires burn.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", third verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

How often at night when the heavens are bright
With the light from the glittering stars,
Have I stood here amazed and asked as I gazed
If their glory exceeds that of ours.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", fourth verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

Oh, I love these wild flowers in this dear land of ours,
The curlew I love to hear scream,
And I love the white rocks and the antelope flocks
That graze on the mountain-tops green.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", fifth verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

Oh, give me a land where the bright diamond sand
Flows leisurely down the stream;
Where the graceful white swan goes gliding along
Like a maid in a heavenly dream.
- Brewster M. Higley, "A Home on the Range", sixth verse of the song version, as collected and recorded in Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads (1910) by John A. Lomax.

K

Ad Astra Per Aspera
- To the stars through difficulties;" "a rough road leads to the stars;" or "Through hardships, to the stars," motto of the State of Kansas

Few Americans know how savagely the Civil War raged or how strange and varied were its issues in what is now Oklahoma and the neighboring states of Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas. Rifles for Watie was faithfully written against the historical backdrop of the conflict in this seldom-publicized, Far-Western theater.
- Harold Keith, Rifles for Watie (1957), New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, hardcover, p. xi

"I jined up fer a frolic," laughed a tall fellow from Republic County with warts on his face. He turned to his messmate, a blond boy from Fort Scott. "Why did you come in?" "Wal, by Jack, because I thought the rebels was gonna take over the whole country." "I joined up because they told me the rebels was cuttin' out Union folks' tongues and killin' their babies. After I got here, I found out all it was over was wantin' to free the niggers," complained another, disgustedly. "I decided I'd jest as well be in the army as out in the besh. Now I'm about to decide I'd druther be in the bresh," snorted another. They were nearly all frowsy-headed, boot-shod, and lonely-looking, fresh from the new state's farms, ranches, and raw young prairie towns. Before the war ended, Kansas furnished more men and boys to the Union forces in proportion to its population than any other state. And all of them were volunteers.
- Harold Keith, Rifles for Watie (1957), New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, hardcover, p. 22

"What's the farthest you ever walked on one trip?" Jeff asked. Noah gazed distractedly at the parched ground passing beneath their feet. Then his white teeth flashed briefly in his tanned, leathery face. "I guess it was two years ago when I hiked from Topeka, Kansas, to Galveston, Texas. Why?" Jeff shrugged. "Oh, no particular reason. I just wondered." They tramped fifty yards more in the broiling sunshine. "How come you walked clear from Kansas to Galveston?" Noah turned his somber face seriously toward Jeff. "You probably won't believe me, youngster, but I wanted to see the magnolias in bloom." Jeff caught his breath in surprise. Estimating fast, he reckoned it was roughly about nine hundred miles from Topeka to Galveston. If a fellow could stand all that walking, it would take about a month and a half to hoof it down there and another month and a half to hoof it back. Eighteen hundred miles just to see some flowers. Jeff stole another look at Noah. If anybody would do it, Noah Babbitt would be the man. Jeff said simply, "I believe you. Did you get to see them?" Noah nodded solemnly. "Shore did. An' they was worth every foot of the trip."
- Harold Keith, Rifles for Watie (1957), New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, hardcover, p. 43-44

Restless, he climbed through the open window to keep from awakening his family and spread his blankets on the Bermuda outside. Sleeping outdoors on the ground was a habit he would have for many years. He settled back comfortably upon the blanket. The Kansas sky was spangled with blazing stars. They shone so brightly that he imagined he could almost hear the crackle of their fires. Down in the corral a cowbell tinkled faintly. He felt a slight movement at his side and saw that Ring had joined him and was lying close by, his head upon his forepaws. Reaching over with his hand, Jeff gave the big dog a couple of pats. Then he closed his eyes. Soon he began to breathe deeply and regularly.
- Harold Keith, Rifles for Watie (1957), New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, hardcover, p. 332

L

Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore. We must be over the rainbow!
- Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, The Wizard of Oz (1939). [Note: This line is ranked #4 in the American Film Institute's list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema].

At the People's College in Fort Scott, Kansas, my mother met Arthur Le Sueur, who with Helen Keller, Eugene Debs, and Charles Steinmetz had founded the greatest workers' school in the country. Thousands of farmers and hillbilly men, miners, and other workers took correspondence courses in workers' law and workers' English and workers' history.
- Meridel Le Sueur "The Ancient People and the Newly Come" (1976)

Kansas suffers from two great robbers, the Sante Fe railroad and the loan sharks. The common people are robbed to enrich their masters.
- Mary Elizabeth Lease, "The Red Dragon of Wall Street Vs. the Farmer" (1891)

N

Kansas, however whittled down, was still a giant in size and potential productivity. Conceived in cold calculation, born in a rending hatred, she was to be baptized in blood. It was not a christening. It was a deep-river baptism.
- Alice Nichols, Bleeding Kansas (1954), New York: Oxford University Press, hardcover, p. 254

The Civil War was fought, and won, in the East by accepted rules, by chessboard maneuvers to gain position through surprise flank movements and well-planned and well-executed frontal attacks, and to hold position through fortification, troop placement, and anticipation of enemy moves. Many men from Kansas went off to be chessmen in those important plays, far more per capita than from any other Northern state. Every quota sent by the Union Kansas met doubly, for the new state was peopled by men who had come there to fight against slavery.
Many Kansans were assigned to formal fighting, but others were incorporated under local commands and fought the war out in the same roles, now legalzied, that they had played in the curtain-raiser. Men who had been raiders were now authorized to wear the uniform of the Union Army. Many of them did not bother, any more than did their brothers across the border bother to don the gray of their Confederacy. Frontier dress lent itself well to guerrilla tactics.
- Alice Nichols, Bleeding Kansas (1954), New York: Oxford University Press, hardcover, p. 254

Kansas was four years old when the Civil War came to an end. And in that brief time she had suffered not only four more years of blood and thunder but also a bond-issue scandal and an impeachment trial. Horace Greeley had in a way predicted it all on his visit in 1859. "The twin curses of Kansas, now that Border Ruffians have stopped ravaging her,' he said, 'are Land Speculators and One Horse Politicians." These were her twin curses from the beginning. They remained her twin curses throughout the war, and afterward.
- Alice Nichols, Bleeding Kansas (1954), New York: Oxford University Press, hardcover, p. 258

Land Speculators and One Horse politicians. Blood and thunder, drouth and exploitation. Certainly no new state ever chose a more fitting motto than did young Kansas. Ad Astra per Aspera. It had been and would always be 'To the stars by hard ways.'
- Alice Nichols, Bleeding Kansas (1954), New York: Oxford University Press, hardcover, p. 258-259

S

I grew up in Kansas, General. I'm about as American as it gets.
- Zack Snyder (director), David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan (writers), Man of Steel (2013)

W

When liberals' presidential nominees consistently fail to carry Kansas, liberals do not rush to read a book titled "What's the Matter With Liberals' Nominees?" No, the book they turned into a bestseller is titled "What's the Matter With Kansas?" Notice a pattern here?
- George Will, column, September 14, 2006, "Dems Vs. Wal-mart" at jewishworldreview.com.

Z

Kansans have always taken their history seriously. The slavery controversy left an indelible mark upon the inhabitants, who were inordinately proud of the role their state had played. The heavy influx of veterans after 1865 served to keep that sentiment alive.
Early writers concentrated on territorial days and sought to interpret Kansas history solely in terms of a highly idealistic struggle to save not only the territory but the whole country from slavery. The careers of early residents were eulogistically written; Kansas developed its own hagiography.
- William Frank Zornow, Kansas: A History of the Jayhawk State (1957), Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, hardcover, p. xi

Contrary to popular belief, men were drafted in Kansas, although it really was not necessary. Under Lincoln's final call of December 19, 1864, the state was asked for 3,636 men, but it was discovered that the adjutant general's figures were incorrect and the number was reduced to 1,222. A re-examination of the figures still showed that Kansas had a surplus on all earlier calls, but by then more than 100 men had been conscripted. Several towns paid a total of $57,407 in the form of enlistment bounties, which was the smallest sum paid in any state. There were 8,498 casualties, and Kansas had the highest mortality rate of any of the states in the Union.
- William Frank Zornow, Kansas: A History of the Jayhawk State (1957), Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, hardcover, p. 108

During the war prominent Kansans continued to be critical of federal policies. The "unconditional surrender" goals of Roosevelt and Morgenthau's plan to reduce Germany to a potato patch after the war drew savage criticism from Landon. At the beginning of the war he had denounced Roosevelt's "guess and be damned" approach to international affairs, and in 1944 before a Sabetha audience he scored the Big Three meetings and the President: "It is a delusion to say he has been holding his own with either Stalin or Churchill, to say nothing of both."
- William Frank Zornow, Kansas: A History of the Jayhawk State (1957), Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, hardcover, p. 348

V-J Day was hailed with prayer and rejoicing in Kansas, and the people prepared to enjoy the fruits of victory. Would the spirit of isolationism return to Kansas? Many felt that it would, but a new spirit seemed to be sweeping the prairies. On June 26, 1949, an article by Kenneth S. Davis appeared in the New York Times Magazine in which he spoke of the "burgeoning internationalism" in Kansas. Eisenhower hailed the new Kansas spirit, which, he claimed, was of world significance. Kansas, geographically and spiritually the heart of the United States, stood balanced at the midpoint of a nation, which faced toward Europe and Asia. He predicted that Kansas was in a decisive and strategic position to determine national policies. Along these lines, Milton Eisenhower became an important figure in UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), and it was through his leadership that Kansas became the first state to call a conference and establish and organization for the advancement of its work.
- William Frank Zornow, Kansas: A History of the Jayhawk State (1957), Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, hardcover, p. 348

External links

Encyclopedic article on Kansas on Wikipedia