Historical Image of the Day

Henry Tanner, "Kansas City, Kansas," 1897

Historical Image of the Day

Stephen A. Douglas, Illinois Democratic senator.

Like many northern Democrats by the 1850s, he had to serve the slave power to survive. Ultimately, his willingness to compromise destroyed him. Although he beat Lincoln in the Senate race in 1858, he lost in 1860, primarily because the southern Democrats walked out of the convention when Douglas was nominated. This despite the fact that Douglas did everything he could to destroy the Missouri Compromise through the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which introduced the concept of "popular sovereignty," which supposedly would let people decide as a state whether they wanted slavery. What this really meant was that pro and anti-slavery zealots flooded to Kansas to start killing each other over the issue in 1857. So-called "Bleeding Kansas" was a prelude to the Civil War and few deserved more blame for it than Douglas. Despite this, he wasn't considered ideologically pure enough for the Democratic Party of the time.

Any comparisons between the Democratic Party of 1860 and the Republican Party of 2009 are up to the reader to decide.

Historical Image of the Day: Special College Football Edition

University of Kansas football coach Mark Mangino and the Orange Bowl mascot, 2008

Historical Image of the Day

Kansas State Senate, 1905

Historical Image of the Day

"Abandoned House, Haskell County, Kansas"

Photo by Irving Rusinow, 1941

Greensburg

Last May, a tornado completely destroyed the town of Greensburg, Kansas. One known for having the world's largest hand-dug well, it briefly became known for being a site of utter chaos. Last June, I was driving from Denver to Texas on back roads. By sheer coincidence I drove through Greensburg. It was one of the most shocking things I had ever seen. The city was gone. A few of the old brick Victorian Era buildings were sort of standing. Then, like a line was drawn through the eastern side of the town, everything was standing, as if nothing had ever happened. Remarkable. I thought about taking pictures but I felt it was immoral to be a tourist in someone's space of suffering.

I did have to wonder about the future of a destroyed town in western Kansas. The western Plains have been losing population for 90 years now. Greensburg isn't on the interstate. There's no real reason for people to move back there. It's a county seat but that's about the biggest economic engine in the area from what I can tell.

But Greensburg is rebuilding. What's more, it is doing so in an environmentally friendly way. I'm surprised that a small Kansas town is taking such a radical step, but as the linked article suggests, this is an opportunity to rejuvenate the town based upon the independence that locally created wind energy can provide. That they are moving into LEED certified buildings and connecting the region's farms to an environmentally based economy is even more surprising and suggests that forced into a crisis, even leaders in the nation's most conservative areas can think creatively about environmental issues.

It's a fascinating story and perhaps a model for keeping people on the Plains.

Historical Image of the Day

Sockless Jerry Simpson, probably early 1890s

Greensburg, Kansas

I was interested in Dan Barry´s article on Greensburg, Kansas because I drove through their last week. 3 months ago, it was just another county seat in western Kansas. Then, a tornado slammed through it and completly destroyed it. Everything. I just happened upon it last week in the first part of my move to Texas. I was totally speechless. The place is just gone. A few of the older buildings with thicker walls are sort of standing. The east side of town escaped most damage. But the center of town is demolished. This was the first real natural disaster I had ever seen. Let me tell you, it lived up to the name. Absolutely amazing.

Barry´s bigger question is whether the town will survive. The answer is almost certainly no. Now, it is the county seat so presumably something will be there. But on the Great Plains, it doesn´t take anything nearly as damaging as a 2 mile wide tornado to send a town into decline. Greensburg was already suffering from a declining population, especially among the young. Like much of the Plains, western Kansas has seen its population consistenly decline for nearly 100 years now. There´s not much left out there. Some towns are now gone completely. Others are barely hanging on. The only influx of population there on much of the Plains, and certainly in western Kansas, comes from Latin American workers coming north to labor in meatpacking. Outside of that, zilch.

The Great Plains are dying and I´m not sure what will bring them back. Probably nothing. Most of it is far from any large cities, from any major economic activity, or from the nation´s major social trends. Frankly, it´s not a place where many people should be living. It´s sad that Greensburg, which advertised having the world´s largest hand-dug well, should disappear in this way. But it was heading toward death anyway.