1880 census of Farmer Township, Wabaunsee County, Kansas
Creator: United States. Census Office. 10th census, 1880
Date: June 1, 1880 through June 2, 1880
This excerpt of a census schedule provides details--including the name, age, race, and occupation--of settlers in Farmer Township in Wabaunsee County, Kansas. The county included a black population (B=Black) who had settled there in 1879 with the help of the Freedmen's Relief Association.

Affidavits of colored men, in report and testimony of the select committee to investigate the causes of the removal of the Negroes from the southern states to the northern states, in three parts
Creator: United States. Congress. Senate. Select Committee on Negro Exodus
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 one black woman who outlined their treatment while living in Louisiana. Each affidavit includes their full name and parish (county) of residence. Although this source does not directly refer to Kansas, many Exodusters who came to Kansas during the post-Civil War period came from Louisiana.

Agricultural development, wealth and rural population of the states on the tributory to the Union Pacific Railroad for the years of 1900-1910
Creator: Union Pacific Railway Company
Date: September 17, 1912
Union Pacific Railroad Company Agricultural Bulletin (No. 104). Union Pacific Railroad promotional advertisement showing aggregate statistical wealth values and population figures for areas west of the Mississippi River during a ten year period of time.

Battle of Milliken's Bend
Date: June 7, 1863
An illustration from Harper's Weekly, July 4, 1863, depicting the Battle of Milliken's Bend where African-American soldiers of the 8th, 9th, 11th, and 13th Louisiana Infantry Regiments and 1st Mississippi Infantry fought valiantly along side the 23rd Iowa Regiment against Confederate troops. Although the African-American soldiers were recently recruited and ill-equipped, they engaged the Confederate troops in one of the longest hand-to-hand battles of the Civil War. The battle finally ended after the Union gunboats Choctaw and Lexington arrived and began firing on the Rebels.

Catherine B. Dart to Lewis Allen Alderson
Date: 1832-1833
Several letters written by Catherine B. Dart to Lewis Allen Alderson and his wife, Lucy. Lucy died in February 1833. Lewis Allen Alderson later moved to Atchison, Kansas, in 1858 and was a prominent Baptist minister. He died in Atchison in 1881.

Colonel Don Estevan Miro to the Ioway Indians
Date: March 15, 1784
This document was presented to Antoine Burada by his uncle, George Campbell. George Campbell was the "half-breed" son of Vance Murray Campbell, a fur trader and U. S. treaty interpreter, who fathered several children by the daughter of No Heart, an Ioway chief. Their daughter Emily (sister of George) married Michael T. Barada. Their son Antoine Barada (1863-1924) of White Cloud, Kansas, was one of several by that name in the Ioway and Omaha tribes, so he is not to be confused with his first cousin Antoine Barada (1807-1885) of Barada, Nebraska, a celebrated figure in that state's folklore. This is the Antoine Barada who signed the treaty between the United States and the Kansas Nation, at St. Louis, in 1815. The document is addressed to "de la Nacion Ayoas" - the Ioway nation - and was signed by Colonel Don Estevan Miro, who was the Spanish governor of Louisiana during the period when it was secretly deeded by the French to the Spanish. It was presented to the Iowa Nation at the Spanish Office of the Province of Louisiana, at New Orleans, March 15, 1784. This document was donated to the Kansas Historical Society circa 1905 according to the Transactions of KSHS, vol. 9 (1905-1906), p. 251, note 55.

Fred L. Haywood to his sister, Loesa
Creator: Haywood, Fred L.
Date: April 06, 1863
A typed copy of a Civil War letter from Fred L. Haywood to his sister, Loesa. Fred, a member of the 1st Minnesota Battery, writes about his experience at the Battle of Shiloh, daily camp life, and his feelings on the Emancipation Proclamation, He also wrote about finding out after the recent death of a soldier from the 1st Kansas regiment that the soldier was actually a woman who had been posing as a soldier for nearly two years.

Front page of account of Major Zebulon M. Pike's exploration
Date: 1807-1810
The beginning page of the report submitted by Major Zebulon M. Pike of his exploration of the western United States submitted to Congress and published in 1810. Zebulon Pike was an army lieutenant sent by the U.S. government to explore the southern part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1806. Upon his return, Pike prepared a report to the U.S. government in which he described the Plains as the "Great American Desert."

George W. Scott papers
Creator: Scott, George W., 1850-1920
Date: 1889-1899
Business correspondence, arranged chronologically, of George W. Scott, one of the first residents of Edgerton, Kansas. A large portion of the collection is correspondence between Scott and Frank S. Hammond, Scott's partner in a 20,000 acre ranch in the Texas panhandle. Much of the correspondence deals with their attempts to raise cattle, lease the land, and sell or trade the property. Hammond worked as a general manager for several railroads (Kansas City, Fort Scott, and Memphis Railroad Company; Kansas City, Shreveport, and Gulf Railway Company; and the Kansas City, Watkins, and Gulf Railway Company) that were in the process of expanding their lines, and mentioned these activities in his letters. Due to their real estate investments in Texas, many letters come from banks, insurance agents, and land surveyors in the panhandle. Scott also served as secretary for the Johnson County Fair Association and owned the Gardner Lumber Company. Scott frequently corresponded with creameries, dairy farmers, wholesale dry goods retailers and seed merchants, including the Kansas Seed House owned by Frederick W. Barteldes in Lawrence. Also included are invoices, checks, contracts, and inventory lists from various businesses.

Governor Thomas Osborn immigration received correspondence
Creator: Kansas. Governor (1873-1877 : Osborn)
Date: 1873-1876
Governor Thomas Osborn compiled this series of correspondence on immigration issues from letters received while in office from 1873-1877. The letters address many aspects of immigration including the appointment of commissioners; immigration promotion; foreign immigration from Scotland, France, Wales, Europe in general, the Scandinavian countries (Sweden, Norway, Denmark), and Germany. Domestic immigration is also addressed concerning immigrants from New England, Louisiana, and Tennessee (early Exodusters); and Indian lands.

Harry Turbet Taylor's World War II letters
Creator: Taylor, Harry Turbet
Date: September 20, 1942 - October 2, 1944
A collection of three photos and letters written by Lt. Harry Turbet Taylor (a.k.a. Tea and H. T.) to the G. S. Houdyshell family in Topeka, Kansas. Taylor, a member of the Eighth U.S. Air Force and later the Ninth U.S. Air Force, served as a B-26 Marauder pilot during World War II in England. The letters were transcribed by Mary Lou Houdyshell Anderson, Taylor's niece. Included in the collection are an account written by Taylor telling about an incident where his plane was hit by flak in a bombing run at Noball (V-11) Launch Site and biographical information.

Henry Worrall watercolor
Creator: Worrall, Henry
Date: 1884
This promotional watercolor of Kansas scenes was painted by artist Henry Worrall for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). It is believed that Worrall painted the poster for the Kansas chapter of the WCTU to use at the World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition held in New Orleans in 1884. The poster depicts Topeka and various types of Kansas iconography.

Kansas Exhibit, New Orleans Cotton Centennial
Creator: Centennial Phoographic Co. International Exhibition, Edward L. Wilson & W Irving Adams
Date: Between 1884 and 1885
This is a photograph of the Kansas wheat and corn exhibit at the New Orleans Cotton Centennial in New Orleans, Louisiana. Most of the exhibit is constructed of natural materials such a wheat stalks, etc. The detail is fairly elaborate.

Map of Louisiana from D'Anville's atlas
Date: April 19, 1788
This is a map of Louisiana from the atlas of cartographer Jean Baptiste Bourguignon D'Anville.

Mitchell's Travellers Guide through the United States
Creator: Mitchell, Samuel Augustus
Date: 1834
Map of the United States showing roads, distances, steam boat and canal routes. The vicinities of major cities are inset, including Cincinnati, Albany, New Orleans, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, and Washington, D. C. Towns are indexed on the back of the map. This map is provided through a co-operative project between the Lecompton Historical Society and the Kansas Historical Society. Partial funding was provided by the Ross and Margaret Wulfkuhle Charitable Trust and the Freedom's Frontier National Heritage Area.

Nebraska and Kansas
Creator: J. H. Colton & Co.
Date: 1854
This map of the Nebraska and Kansas territories by J. H. Colton shows forts, villages, missions, Indian lands, and various routes including the northern, central and southern routes of the Pacific Railroad; the Oregon route; the Santa Fe route; Cook's wagon route; Conde & Bartlet's route; and the route to Fort Smith. The map also includes an inset of parts of North, Central and South America; and the territory acquired from Mexico through the Gadsen Purchase. Woodcut illustrations include Indians, wolves, bear, deer, beaver, buffalo hunting, and settlers with wagon. The Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854) provided that each territory would decide whether or not to allow slavery through the constitution under which it would enter the union. In Kansas, this approach to managing the expansion of slavery (know as "popular sovereignty") precipitated a battle between proslavery and antislavery forces known as "Bleeding Kansas." This map is provided through a co-operative project between the Lecompton Historical Society and the Kansas Historical Society. Partial funding was provided by the Ross and Margaret Wulfkuhle Charitable Trust and the Freedom's Frontier National Heritage Area. Copies of this map are available for viewing at both the Kansas Historical Society and Lecompton Historical Society.

New England Emigrant Aid Company Texan Committee, Report
Creator: New England Emigrant Aid Company. Texan Committee
Date: March 8, 1860
Samuel Cabot submitted a report of the Texan Committee to the New England Emigrant Aid Company Executive Committee. The committee recommended that the Company take action to settle portions of Texas northwest of San Antonio with antislavery advocates as part of the effort to halt the westward advance of slavery. Cabot expressed the committee's view that the only peaceful solution to the slavery issue required demonstrating to slaveholders the superiority of free labor over slave labor; the committee believed West Texas a logical place for this demonstration to occur.

Part 12: Exodusters, in first annual report of the Bureau of Labor and Industrial Statistics
Creator: Kansas Bureau of Labor
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 of Exodusters as well as a detailed table showing statistics compiled from seventeen families, including their location, ages, health, and occupations. The report also includes a few references to Exodusters in Topeka.

Poultry and bees on farms
Creator: Union Pacific Railway Company
Date: May 20, 1912
This Union Pacific Railroad agricultural bulletin, number 102, shows statistical production of poultry and bee colonies for areas west of the Mississippi River, with a comparative evaluation for 1900 and 1910.

Prison Board - Transmittal of Letters
Creator: Kansas. Governor (1915-1919: Capper)
Date: January 28, 1915
This file includes correspondence relating to the transmittal of letters to the Prison Board. The file is incomplete because it no longer contains the transmitted letter to the Prison Board. Included in the file is the reply from the Governor's office. This is part of a bigger collection of Governor Arthur Capper correspondence.

Report of the minority, in report and testimony of the select committee to Investigate the causes of the removal of the Negroes from the southern states to the northern states, in three parts
Creator: United States. Congress. Senate. Select Committee on Negro Exodus
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 Reconstruction period. This committee, composed of majority and minority parties, had taken testimony from hundreds of people having direct knowledge of the exodus movement. In essence, the minority party concluded that the Northern Republican Party and emigrant aid organizations had not persuaded blacks in the South to emigrate to the North. Instead, the unfavorable condition of life in the South had caused this mass exodus. The minority members were William Windom, a Republican senator from Minnesota, and Henry W. Blair, a Republican senator from New Hampshire.

S. H. B. Schoonmaker to Governor John P. St. John
Creator: Shoonmaker, S. H. B.
Date: May 17, 1879
S. H. B. Shoonmaker of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, wrote this letter to Governor St. John on behalf of the black residents of his parish (county). He asked the governor a number of specific questions, including how these black emigrants could obtain land, where they should settle, and whether there were relief organizations that could assist the refugees. In addition to his service as governor, St. John also served on the Board of Directors of the Kansas Freedmen's Relief Association.

State Flags
Creator: Kansas. Governor (1915-1919: Capper)
Date: February 1915
This file includes correspondence and postcards; correspondence from Secretary of States describe the colors, fabric, dimensions, and symbolism of their state flag. The postcard, if provided, shows the graphical design of each state flag. Correspondence is arranged alphabetically by state. This file is part of a bigger collection of Governor Arthur Capper correspondence.

Union Pacific Railroad Company, Livestock Bulletin No. 108
Creator: Union Pacific Railway Company
Date: August 14, 1913
This bulletin is a promotional advertisement providing aggregate valuations for livestock contained in the areas west of the Mississippi River ("on farms in the states on and tributory to the Union Pacific Railroad") for the time period between 1910 and 1913.

United States Army tanks
Creator: United States Army
Date: April 1954
This photograph shows a fleet of United States Army tanks on flatcars en route from Camp Polk, Louisiana to Fort Riley, Kansas.