Davis - Kansas: a bicentennial history

THE STATES AND THE NATION SERIES , of which this volume is a part, is designed to assist the American people in a serious look at the ideals they have espoused and the experiences they have undergone in the history of the nation. The content of every volume represents the scholarship, experience, and opinions of its author. The costs of writing and editing were met mainly by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, a federal agency. The project was administered by the American Association for State and Local History, a nonprofit learned society, working with an Editorial Board of distinguished editors, authors, and historians, whose names are listed below.

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD

James Morton Smith, General Editor

Director, State Historical Society

of Wisconsin

William T. Alderson, Director

American Association for

State and Local History

Roscoe C. Born

Vice-Editor

The National Observer

Vernon Carstensen

Professor of History

University of Washington

Michael Kammen, Professor of

American History and Culture

Cornell University

Louis L. Tucker

President (19721974)

American Association for State and Local History

Joan Paterson Kerr

Consulting Editor

American Heritage

Richard M. Ketchum

Editor and Author

Dorset, Vermont

A. Russell Mortensen

Assistant Director

National Park Service

Lawrence W. Towner

Director and Librarian

The Newberry Library

Richmond D. Williams

President (19741976)

American Association for State and Local History

MANAGING EDITOR

Gerald George

American Association for

State and Local History

Copyright 1976

American Association for State and Local History

All rights reserved

The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

Davis, Kenneth Sydney, 1912

Kansas : a bicentennial history.

(The States and the Nation series)

Bibliography: p. 219

Includes index.

1. KansasHistory. I. Title. II. Series.

F681.D37 978.1 76-21674

ISBN 0-393-05593-0

ISBN 978-0-393-30179-3

ISBN 978-0-393-24373-4 (e-book)

Published and distributed by

W. W. Norton & Co., Inc.

550 Fifth Avenue

New York, New York 10036

www.wwnorton.com

In Memory of

Lydia Ericson Davis and Charles D. Davis

My Mother and Father

Hay bales near Hardtner.

Garvey grain elevator, Wichita.

Feed lot at Ingalls.

Cessna airplane plant, Wichita.

Topeka skyline.

Downtown Wichita.

Cathedral of the Plains, Victoria.

Cattle on the prairie in central Kansas.

Clothes drying in the wind near Independence.

Boys standing in raindrops after a drought, El Dorado.

Feed mixer for cattle, Garden City.

State Capitol in Topeka.

Young people in Salina.

Amish wagon on road near Yoder.

Ranch near Tipton.

Three institutions and fifteen individuals have contributed to such merit as this book may have.

At the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts, was researched much of the material on Eli Thayer and the New England Emigrant Aid Company. The Kansas State Historical Society, in Topeka, not only lent me several hard-to-get books and other publications but also, through its highly professional staff, answered promptly, patiently, and with detailed accuracy my numerous specific questions. My greatest institutional debt is to Kansas State University, my alma mater, in Manhattan. Most of the actual writing was done in an Eisenhower Hall office on the KSU campus during the 1975 spring semester, when I had been named visiting professor of history.

Three KSU administratorsDean William L. Stamey of the school of arts and sciences, Associate Dean William E. Carpenter of that school, and Joseph M. Hawes, head of the history departmentare among the individuals whose help I here gratefully acknowledge. Homer E. Socolofsky, an outstanding authority on Kansas history, biographer of Arthur Capper, and currently (1976) president of the State Historical Society, actively aided my understanding of my native state as the work proceeded. So did William E. Koch of the KSU English department, an outstanding authority on Kansas folk lore and folk music.

Dr. Homer Socolofsky was among those who read the original draft of this work in manuscript and whose critiques and corrections of error have improved the works quality. Others were of the staff of the Kansas State Historical Society: Nyle H. Miller, executive director; Edgar Langsdorf, deputy director; Robert W. Richmond, state archivist and author of