Kansas 100 Years Ago

Tabor College is celebrating its centennial this year. One hundred years ago a group of people with a shared faith and vision came together and opened an educational institution they hoped would shed light into a future they knew nothing about giving young adults the opportunity to prepare for that future.

It’s important to look back and recognize the lives that built up the world around us. We can learn from their mistakes, benefit from their successes, celebrate their accomplishments and reflect on their losses.

So what was Kansas like 100 years ago? Computer technology as we know it today was an unknown. The automobile was relatively new. Like 2008 it was a presidential election year. The wild days of cattle drives and bushwhackers were past. Kansas agricultural and small town society was at its zenith with many counties peaking in population in the 1910 census.

The Internet offers us a wonderful opportunity to look back at the past. Below are links to a mix of online books, gleanings, graphics and a even a bit of poetry…. glimpses of Kansas in 1908 as we leave 2008. The resources below come from government, educational and private sites.

EDUCATION

Tabor College Centennial Celebration
http://www.tabor.edu/about-tabor/centennial
http://www.tabor.edu/about-tabor/history

History of Wyandotte County Schools
http://www.kckps.org/DISTHISTORY/maps/bldgmapindex.htm
(Includes maps of school locations in 1908. Wonderful graphics of old school buildings. From a site created by the Kansas City Kansas Public Schools.)

Haskell Indian Institute Panorama
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pan.6a05440
(American Memory website, Library of Congress)

Haskell Institute, Lawrence, Kansas, Regimental Parade
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pan.6a27762
(American Memory website, Library of Congress)

Kansas State University [i.e., University of Kansas, Lawrence]
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pan.6a05418
(American Memory website, Library of Congress)

Information on Graduates, KANSAS STATE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE (Kansas State University) 1867, 1871-1913 (from a book published in in 1914)
1908-1910 GRADUATES
http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/education/ksu/ksugrads7.html
(What were the 1908 K-State grads up to four years after leaving school? From the KSGenWeb Project)


FLORA AND FAUNA

The Mound-Building Prairie Ant
http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/historicpublications/Pubs/SB154.PDF
(Some cool graphics and information of this insect from a publication issued by the Agricultural College. Part of a large archive of online publications held by K-State Research and Extension)

The Pocket Gopher
http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/historicpublications/Pubs/SB152.PDF
(The drawings of the pocket gopher make it look like a creature suitable for a 21st century science fiction film. Great artistry and information on an animal that still irritates plant growers)

Winfield Raspberry
http://www.ars-grin.gov/npgs/images/cor/pwc/rubus/winfield2.jpg
http://www.ars-grin.gov/npgs/images/cor/pwc/rubus/winfield1.jpg
(Received in June 1908 as Providence seedling from Winfield Nursery Co., Cowley Co., Kansas. Appeared as plate V in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Yearbook, 1909.)
watercolors in the USDA collection at the National Agricultural Library in Beltsville, Maryland.


FLIGHT

The Great Dream
http://library.pittstate.edu/spcoll/ndxhlcall.html
(A photo of a 1908 attempt at flight in Girard, Kansas. Part of the Henry Laurens Call Collection at Pittsburg State University)

DAILY LIFE
(Glimpses at life at the turn of the last century)

Riley County Ramblings – 100 Years Ago
http://www.rileycountyks.gov/Archive.asp?ADID=428
http://www.rileycountyks.gov/archives/41/RC%20Ramblings%2008-9.pdf
http://www.rileycountyks.gov/archive.asp?AMID=&Type=&ADID=467
(Gleanings from Manhattan newspapers provided by the county government of Riley County.)

Tihen Notes From the 1908 Wichita Eagle
http://specialcollections.wichita.edu/collections/local_history/tihen/pdf/eagle/Eag1908.pdf
(Research notes kept by Dr Edward N. Tihen, gleaned from Wichita newspapers he perused. They read like a diary of daily events that caught the eye of this reseracher)

McAdam's Rambler automobile, Dorrance, Russell County, Kansas, 1908
http://www.kshs.org/research/collections/documents/online/westerntrails/images/reference/D00001483.jpg (A photo from the L.W. Halbe Collection supplied by the Kansas State Historical Society)


Kansas Jayhawks Basketball Team, 1907/1908
http://t3.pacific.edu/pt3teams/2004/T0402112/bballhistory.htm
(part of a short history of basketball page)

Ninth Street, Coffeyville, Kansas 1908 (postcard)
http://www.familyoldphotos.com/8c/2n/ninth_street_coffeyville_kansas.htm

Belleville Kansas, 1908 (postcard)
http://www.bellevilleusa.com/pages/1908_JPG.htm

Decoration Day, 1908 (poem)
http://skyways.lib.ks.us/poetry/decorat.html
(Now known as Memorial Day Decoration Day began soon after the Civil War as a way of honoring those who have died in War. From the Poetry of Kansas website, part of Blue Skyways)

Little Sweden (Prelude to the Future: Multiple Faces of the Lindsborg Legacy)
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/legacies/KS/200003020.html
("Local Legacies" from the Library of Congress. Includes a 1908 photo of Lindsborg residents in folk dress)

E. L. Feagan's Drug Store, Norwich, Kansas, 1908
http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/213695
(From Kansas State Historical Society Kansas Memory site)

Independence Day Parade, Fowler, Kansas, 1908
http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/100383
(From Kansas State Historical Society Kansas Memory site)


POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT

Kansas Governor Edward Wallis Hoch’s 1908 Message to the Legislature
http://www.kslib.info/messages/1908.html
(Transcribed by State Library of Kansas staff. Banking, transportation, taxes and crime… things haven’t changed much in 100 years)

1908 Presidential General Election Results - Kansas
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=1908&fips=20&f=0&off=0&elect=0
(So how did the Sunflower State vote in the 1908 election?)

Kansas Delegation to the 1908 Republican National Convention
http://politicalgraveyard.com/parties/R/1908/KS.html
(Information on some of the movers and shakers in Kansas politics 100 years ago)

Breweries versus C.W. Trickett
http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/211926
(An account of how the brewers and saloon keepers caused the arrest of Assistant Attorney General C.W. Trickett, charging him with having "received a fee before it was due," and the subsequent clearing of these charges after an investigation was conducted by the Attorney General of Kansas. From Kansas State Historical Society Kansas Memory site)


FAMILY AND LOCAL HISTORY

1908 Deaths - Brown County, Kansas
http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/archives/brown/deaths/1908.html
(Genealogical information from KSGenWeb, part of the State Library’s Blue Skyways website)

Souvenir History of Lincoln County, Kansas / by Elizabeth N. Barr
http://skyways.lib.ks.us/genweb/lincoln/history/index.htm
(Transcribed from the 1908 edition, Farmer Job Office publisher, Topeka, KS, by Joan Stevenson. From the KSGenWeb Project)

BOOKS ABOUT KANSAS PUBLISHED IN 1908 HELD BY THE ATLAS LIBRARIES

ATLAS books about Kansas published in 1908
http://topekalibraries.info/search/X?SEARCH=d:(kansas)&searchscope=8&Da=1907&Db=1909&SORT=D