Kansas

Kansas

KANSAS

State of Kansas

ORIGIN OF STATE NAME: Named for the Kansa (or Kaw) Indians, the "people of the south wind." NICKNAME: The Sunflower State; also, the Jayhawker State. CAPITAL: Topeka. ENTERED UNION: 29 January 1861 (34th). SONG: "Home on the Range." MARCH: "The Kansas March." MOTTO: Ad astra per aspera (To the stars through difficulties). FLAG: The flag consists of a dark blue field with the state seal in the center; a sunflower on a bar of twisted gold and blue is above the seal, the word "Kansas" is below it. OFFICIAL SEAL: A sun rising over mountains in the background symbolizes the east; commerce is represented by a river and a steamboat. In the foreground, agriculture, the basis of the state's prosperity, is represented by a settler's cabin and a man plowing a field; beyond this is a wagon train heading west and a herd of buffalo fleeing from two Indians. Around the top is the state motto above a cluster of 34 stars; the circle is surrounded by the words "Great Seal of the State of Kansas, January 29, 1861." ANIMAL: American buffalo. BIRD: Western meadowlark. INSECT: Honeybee. REPTILE: Ornate box turtle. FLOWER: Wild native sunflower . TREE: Cottonwood. LEGAL HOLIDAYS: New Year's Day, 1 January; Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., 3rd Monday in January; Lincoln's Birthday, 12 February; Washington's Birthday, 3rd Monday in February; Memorial Day, last Monday in May; Independence Day, 4 July; Labor Day, 1st Monday in September; Columbus Day, 2nd Monday in October; Veterans Day, 11 November; Thanksgiving Day, 4th Thursday in November; Christmas Day, 25 December. TIME: 6 AM CST = noon GMT; 5 AM MST = noon GMT.

50 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bair, Julene. One Degree West: Reflections of a Plainsdaughter. Minneapolis: Mid-List Press, 2000.

Boyer, Richard O. The Legend of John Brown. New York: Knopf, 1973.

Davis, Kenneth S. Kansas: A Bicentennial History. New York: Norton, 1976.

——. Soldier of Democracy: A Biography of Dwight Eisenhower. New York: Doubleday, 1945. 1952.

Frederickson, H. George, ed. Public Policy and the Two States of Kansas. Lawrence, Kans.: University Press of Kansas, 1992.

Howes, Charles C. This Place Called Kansas. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1984.

Kansas, University of. Center for Public Affairs. Kansas Statistical Abstract 1983–84. 19th ed. Lawrence, 1984.

Napier, Rita, ed. Kansas and the West: New Perspectives. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003.

Peak, Kenneth J. Kansas Temperance: Much Ado About Booze, 1870–1920. Manhattan, Kan.: Sunflower University Press, 2000.

Richmond, Robert W. Kansas, A Land of Contrasts. Wheeling, Ill.: Harland Davidson, 1999.

Shortridge, James R. Peopling the Plains: Who Settled Where in Frontier Kansas. Lawrence, Kans.: University Press of Kansas, 1995.

Socolofsky, Homer, and Huber Self. Historical Atlas of Kansas. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1972.

——, and Virgil W. Dean. Kansas History: An Annotated Bibliography. New York: Greenwood, 1992.