May 9, 2024 | Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Novelists, Schools, Volume 14
Bienvenido Santos Ablah Library Wichita, Kansas By Abby Bayani-Heitzman Filipino American writer Bienvenido “Ben” N. Santos had a complicated relationship with the Midwest. He first arrived in the United States in 1941 as a pensionado, or government-sponsored scholar,...
May 9, 2024 | Drama, Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Nature, Volume 14
William Inge Riverside Park Independence, Kansas By Autumn Finley Growing up in a flyover state, I never much considered the literary merit of my home in the southeast corner of Kansas. Apart from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie, the novels I read...
May 9, 2024 | Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Nature, Nonfiction, Volume 14
Sarah Smarsh Rural Kingman County Murdock, Kansas By Taylor Krueger During Sarah Smarsh’s childhood, driven by poverty and necessity, she moved frequently between the Kansas prairie and nearby metropolitan Wichita. Born on the precipice of the 1980s Farm Crisis,...
May 9, 2024 | Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Nature, Nonfiction, Uncategorized, Volume 14
Miriam Davis Colt Vegetarian Settlement Company Allen County, Kansas By Pete Dulin Concern loomed like a thunderhead in this untamed place. Miriam Davis Colt, her family, and other settlers intended to make their home in the Vegetarian Settlement Company, a planned...
May 4, 2024 | Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Schools, Volume 14
Ben Lerner Topeka High School Topeka, Kansas By Molly Hatesohl There are many things in Room 103 of Topeka High School that evince its history. Designed in 1930 during the Collegiate Gothic Revival, its granite fireplace and wrought iron chandeliers imbue the...
May 4, 2024 | Kansas, Kansas, Literary Landscapes, Nature, Nonfiction, Volume 13
Jotham Meeker The California Road Franklin County, Kansas By Diana Staresinic-Deane On a rise above Ottawa Creek in Franklin County, Kansas, a shallow depression roughly six feet wide hugs the southern boundary of a battered cemetery before it veers north and vanishes...