Kansas Historical Museum Is Educational Tool
By Kevin Gray
As the school year, once again, kicks into high gear and families prepare for school functions, games of one sort or another, especially the Friday Night Lights variety, keep in mind how fun educational pursuits can be taken in doable weekend day trips.
One such outing could be to the Kansas Historical Museum in Topeka. For the affordable price of an adult ticket, $6, and children, $4, visitors can explore 150 years or more of how Kansas became an influential state. Admission for children 5 and under is free.
Either as a starting point or the ending point of guided or a self-guided tour, the 150 Things I Love About Kansas special gallery commemorates Kansas’ birthday celebration that began on Jan. 29, 2011. When walking into this room, there is no doubt Kansas is the theme.
Visitors of all ages are drawn to objects, books and figures from the Wizard of Oz. Black and white television shows like The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp (1955-1961) and the long-lasting Gunsmoke (1955-1975) draw viewers to the nostalgia of Dodge City and the old west.
Even the clock used in the fictional WJM television newsroom of the Mary Tyler Moore show is on display. Ed Asner, known as Lou Grant, the producer in the show, was born in Kansas City, Mo., but raised in Kansas City, Kan., and attended Wyandotte High School.
The land, the wheat and sunflowers, the weather for sure, and Kansas symbols and stereotypes are also on display in this one of a kind display.
In the main exhibit, known as Real People, Real Stories, life for the first people to inhabit Kansas comes alive, as does stories about the Populist Party around 1900 and their uncanny reminders of the more timely Tea Party of today.
An early pueblo called El Cuartelejo – filled with adobe buildings – sprang up when the Pueblo Indians fled Spanish rule in the southwest about 1650 to live among the Apache tribe in Kansas. This, the northernmost Indian pueblo, can be found in Lake Scott State Park and north of Scott City, but the museum’s presentation tells a story that few Kansans may have ever heard.
For children who might ask about “the funny sounding” names of rivers, towns, cities, counties and the state of Kansas itself, the lives of the Kansa, Pawnee, Osage and Wichita people, called in the exhibit The Hunters, have been brought to life through a grass lodge and tepee, their weapons, dress and tools.
Intermixed with the Indians are the trappers and explorers who mapped out the Santa Fe and Oregon-California Trails, as well as other routes.
Younger children may not grasp what Bleeding Kansas stood for but the flags, cannon and weaponry of the era will grab their attention. The Free State Howitzer on display had been used by anti-slavery forces to defend Lawrence in 1856.
Considering how voter fraud has become an issue with the current Kansas Secretary of State, honesty in elections became a real problem in 1856. One image on display shows men circling from voting box back to saloon and back to the voting box in the presidential election of 1856.
By the time visitors see the small Confederate flag dropped in Olathe during a raid by “… the notorious Confederate guerrilla William Quantrill,” in 1862, the Civil War in the West is upon them. The story of robbery, threats and murder had already been a staple of border activity in Kansas and Missouri before the larger conflict erupted in 1861.
By this point of the tour, the terror brought to Kansas and the battles that would continue during war time are all around in display one after the other.
And, then, there sits a boot worn by George Armstrong Custer on the western frontier. Custer had called Kansas home for five years, as he commanded the 7th U.S. Cavalry at forts Riley and Hays. His boots – one is on display at the Kansas Historical Museum, the other at the museum at Fort Hays – had been worn at the Battle of the Little Big Horn.
Finally, war and battles end and opportunity begins. Near a full-sized restored Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe steam engine and train cars, town development includes a run-down of how people earned livings or socialized: police and fire, telephone, schools, health care, sports and entertainment, brotherhoods and lodges, culture including theaters and libraries, fairs, mechanics and machinists, the retail trade, mining and drilling, manufacturing, grain storage and milling, and the railroad.
Life in Kansas still contained the unexpected or the outrageous. Right along with the right to vote and women’s suffrage came the question wet or dry and the question of alcohol. Carry Nation’s “mason’s hammer” used in anti-saloon crusades is on display near the story about the Populists and their “Stand Up for Kansas,” slogan.
Or how the Speaker of the Kansas House used a sledge hammer to break down the door to the chambers being used by the Populist Party, when both parties had claimed victory during the 1892 elections. A real conflict arose in January 1893 when the Populists locked themselves in the House Hall.
The museum opens at 9 a.m. and closes at 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. It opens at 1 p.m. on Sundays and close at 5 p.m.
Also available on site: the State Archives and Library, the restored Potawatomie Mission, the Discovery Place (a hands-on gallery for young children), a 2.5 mile nature trail and the Stach School (programs available by appointment).
The Stach School offers a school program for fourth and fifth graders in an authentic one-room school house.
The Kansas Historical Society is located at 6425 SW Sixth Avenue in Topeka, which has an easy access from Wanamaker Road. An abundance of restaurants can also be found on Wanamaker.
For more information, go to: http://www.kshs.org/ or call (785) 272-8681.
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Posted by admin
on Aug 25 2011. Filed under News and Updates.
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