Medium: Text
Date: November 16, 1867
This drawing by J. Howland, originally printed in Harper’s Weekly, depicts the council between representatives of the U.S. government and the Kiowa and Comanche tribes at Medicine Creek Lodge, Kansas,…
Medium: Text
Date: July 19, 1934
The Water Conservation Program was designed to foster the construction of wells, farm ponds, lakes and “other devices” that could conserve water in Kansas. This pamphlet, published by the Kansas…
Medium: Text
Date: 1935
The twenty-ninth biennial report of the Kansas State Board of Agriculture includes this short article by L. C. Aicher, superintendent of the Fort Hays Experiment Station in Hays, Kansas. In…
Medium: Text
Date: February 25, 1937
In this brief article, Harry Umberger, chairman of the Kansas wind erosion committee, contradicts reports circulating in New York City that the Southwest will never be able to produce wheat…
Medium: Text
Date: Between 1930 and 1937
This unidentified newspaper clipping illustrates and explains four useful techniques for combating drought and soil erosion: planting vegetation on steep slopes, strip cropping, contour plowing, and check dams.
Medium: Text
Date: August 9, 1936
This article in the Topeka Capital discusses some of the causes of soil erosion and diminished soil moisture, as well as ways to counteract these forces. Both WPA engineers and…
Medium: Text
Date: April 10, 1935
Several articles about life in the Dust Bowl can be found on the front page of this newspaper from Garden City. Articles of particular interest include two articles on “raging…
Medium: Text
Date: March 16, 1936
This article from the Topeka Journal discusses farmers’ efforts to reverse the effects of blowing soil in western Kansas. Farmers in the Dust Bowl would receive a federal allotment to…
Medium: Text
Date: January 5, 1867
The settlers of Labette Creek formed a club that adopted and incorporated twelve by-laws to protect club members from losing their claims to other settlers. If any part or parts…
Medium: Text
Date: June 2, 1934
In this letter Howard Bucknell, president of the Jewell County Farm Bureau, updates Governor Landon on the drought situation in his county. There was an acute water shortage, forcing Jewell…
Medium: Text
Date: May 17, 1879
This article published in the nationally-renown newspaper Harper’s Weekly discusses the black exodus from the South, stating that Kansas seemed to be the objective for many of these emigrants. In…
Medium: Text
Date: September 2, 1886
This untitled article from the Nicodemus Western Cyclone newspaper outlines how the residents of Nicodemus were building comfortable homes and persevering through hardship. The settlement in Nicodemus had been established…
Medium: Text
Date: May 23, 1879
According to this brief, unsigned article in the Topeka Daily Capital, black delegates in Richmond, Virginia, had convened to consider the welfare of blacks in their state. They concluded that,…
Medium: Text
Date: Between 1932 and 1938
This article from an unidentified newspaper describes the problems that can occur if fields drain too rapidly and lose valuable moisture. In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture,…
Medium: Text
Date: 1880
The Senate select committee charged with investigating the causes of the Exodus included this list of sworn affidavits in their report. The affidavits are given by ten black men and…
Medium: Text
Date: April 30, 1879
This article from the Lawrence Daily Journal discusses a newspaper article from the Chicago Tribune written during the Exoduster Movement in 1879 providing a brief history of the black community…
Medium: Text
Date: July 18, 1934
This letter from Harry Umberger, the Director of Extension at Kansas State Agricultural College (now Kansas State University), accompanied a map designating the drought relief counties as of July 1934.…
Medium: Text
Date: December 23, 1933
This letter from Harry Umberger, the Director of Extension at Kansas State College (now Kansas State University), was addressed to Willard Mayberry, secretary to Gov. Alf Landon. The letter discusses…
Medium: Text
Date: 1886
This excerpt of the Kansas Bureau of Labor report includes only Part 12, the portion of the report focusing on the Exodusters in Wyandotte, Kansas. The report includes transcribed testimonies…
Medium: Text
Date: 1880
A. A. Harris, a white resident of Ft. Scott, Kansas, gave this brief testimony on March 29, 1880, before the Senate select committee investigating the causes of the Exodus. Harris…
Medium: Text
Date: 1880
This report, written by the majority party of the Senate select committee investigating the Exodus, outlines the majority’s conclusions about why Southern blacks were emigrating to the North during the…
Medium: Text
Date: 1880
This report, written by the minority party of the Senate select committee investigating the Exodus, outlines the minority’s conclusions about the reasons for black emigration to the North during the…
Medium: Text
Date: April 25, 1879
This article includes information about Exoduster relief efforts in both Topeka and Lawrence. In Topeka, the Kansas Freedmen’s Aid Association had appealed to other counties, asking them to form local…
Medium: Text
Date: December 21, 1878
This article in the Topeka Colored Citizen argues that, while many Northerners believed that the Civil War had ended, Southerners continued to deny blacks their rights. It also includes an…
Medium: Text
Date: Between 1880 and 1881
Horatio N. Rust, secretary of the Southern Refuge Relief Association, sent this letter to the editor of the Chicago Inter Ocean to pass along news from Elizabeth Comstock, agent of…
