II. KANSAS BECOMES A PART OF THE UNITED STATES 16 III. EXPLORATION OF THE KANSAS COUNTRY BY THE UNITED STATES 20 IV. KANSAS AS A PATHWAY 29 V. KANSAS AS AN INDIAN COUNTRY 45 VI. KANSAS ORGANIZED AS A TERRITORY 55 VII. THE COMING OF THE SETTLERS 62 VIII. THE FIRST TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT 72 IX. RIVAL GOVERNMENTS IN KANSAS 78 X. THE PERIOD OF VIOLENCE 83 XI. THE PERIOD OF POLITICAL CONTESTS 94 XII. PIONEER LIFE 102 XIII. KANSAS IN THE CIVIL WAR 109 XIV. THE PERIOD SINCE THE CIVIL WAR 115 XV. THE INDUSTRIES OF KANSAS 142 XVI. TRANSPORTATION IN KANSAS 174 XVII. EDUCATION IN KANSAS 187 XVIII. KANSAS MEMORIALS 207 XIX. THE KANSAS SPIRIT 217 APPENDIX 223 QUIVERA――KANSAS In that half-forgotten era, With the avarice of old, Seeking cities he was told Had been paved with yellow gold, In the kingdom of Quivera―― Came the restless Coronado To the open Kansas plain, With his knights from sunny Spain; In an effort that, though vain, Thrilled with boldness and bravado. League by league, in aimless marching, Knowing scarcely where or why, Crossed they uplands drear and dry, That an unprotected sky Had for centuries been parching. But their expectations, eager, Found, instead of fruitful lands, Shallow streams and shifting sands, Where the buffalo in bands Roamed o’er deserts dry and meager. Back to scenes more trite, yet tragic, Marched the knights with armor’d steeds Not for them the quiet deeds; Not for them to sow the seeds From which empires grow like magic. Thus Quivera was forsaken; And the world forgot the place Through the lapse of time and space. Then the blue-eyed Saxon race Came and bade the desert waken. ――EUGENE WARE. A HISTORY OF KANSAS CHAPTER I THE BEGINNING OF KANSAS HISTORY =Introduction.= More than four centuries have passed since Columbus discovered America. During that time the hunting ground of three hundred thousand Indians has become the United States with its more than one hundred million civilized people. In the center of this great nation, which occupies nearly half the area of the continent, lies Kansas, a rectangle four hundred miles long and two hundred miles wide.