 |
 Topeka
is the seat of Shawnee County, and
the capital of Kansas. It was established by
anti-slavers in 1854, who intended the city to be
the capital of Kansas. |
 Susanna Madora
Salter was elected by Argonia as the
first woman Mayor in Kansas in 1887. Ironically,
she was initially nominated by a group of men
hoping to discredit the Woman's Christian
Temperance Union. |
 Brewster Higley
was a retired doctor living in Smith Center when,
in 1872, he jotted down a poem he called Western Home." A visitor to his
home convinced him to set the poem to music, and
the resulting Home on the Range became
on the most popular western songs ever published;
it became the State Song of Kansas in 1947. |
 Nicodemus
is an unincorporated community of
about 50 inhabitants in eastern Graham County,
Kansas, and the only remaining community west of
the Mississippi River established by
African-Americans after the Civil War. |
 The
Battle of
Black Jack, which was fought between
forces led by John Brown and by Henry Pate near
present-day Baldwin City, Kansas, on June 2,
1856, is considered by many historians to be the
first true battle of the Civil War. |
 Benjamin
Sanford Paulen was a successful
banker who served as Governor of Kansas from 1925
to 1929. During his term, a state
gasoline tax was enacted, cigarette sales were
legalized and taxed, etc. The most popular action
during his administration was establishment of a
kindergarten system in the state in 1927. |
 The
Wyandotte
Constitution, ratified by Kansas
voters on October 4, 1859, was the one under
which Kansas was admitted to the Union. The
constitution outlawed slavery, gave women equal
rights in divorce and child custody cases, and
set the boundaries where they are now. |
 Kathryn
O'Loughlin McCarthy was the first Democrat ever elected to the
U.S. Congress from her district, as well as the
first Kansas woman ever elected to that body. In
Congress, she fought for emergency assistance for
schools, supported the "New Deal," and
was an advocate for relaxing the 18th Amendment. |
 Annie Diggs
was a supporter of the Populist movement,
temperance, and women's suffrage. She wrote
articles and lectured extensively on behalf of
each cause and served with many national
organizations devoted to them. |
 Joseph Geating
McCoy bought land on the Kansas
Pacific Railway in 1867, where he built a hotel, stockyard, office and bank.
Between 1867 and 1881, over 2 million head of
cattle were sent from Abilene to Chicago. |
 Official
Symbols of Kansas The Kansas State Flag, adopted by the
Kansas Legislature as the official state flag on
March 21, 1927, is a rectangle of dark-blue silk
with the state seal at its center. Above the seal
is the state crest, a sunflower resting on a
twisted bar of blue and gold. The word
"Kansas," added in 1961, is below the
seal in gold, block lettering. |
