Kansas

Kansas is a state in the Midwestern United States of America. Kansas has a total population of 2.9 million, with an area of 82,000 sqmi, making Kansas the 34th largest state by population and the 15th largest state by area. The name of the state comes from the Kansa Native Americans, whose name comes from a Siouan-language phrase meaning "people of the south wind". The land that would become Kansas was bought in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Kansas became the 34th state to be admitted to the United States on January 29, 1861. Kansas' capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita.

Kansas is in a region known as America's Breadbasket. Like other states in this area, Kansas is a large producer of wheat and other grains, producing one-fifth of all wheat grown in the United States. In addition to wheat, Kansas produces large amounts of grain sorghum, summer potatoes, and sunflowers, with other industries in Kansas including aviation and communications.

The terrain of Kansas consists of prairies and forests. All of Kansas is in the Great Plains.

Early history
In 1539, Marcos de Niza, a friar, reported rumors of Cíbola, a city of gold, to Spanish colonial officials in Mexico City. Niza said the city was in modern-day New Mexico. In response to the rumors, two years later, Francisco Vázquez de Coronado,with an army of 3000 Spaniards and 8001 Mexicans, marched northward from Culiacán in hopes of finding the city.When Coronado did not find the city in New Mexico, he continued northeast into the Mississippi Valley, crossing the present area of Kansas diagonally. This made Conrado and his army the first Europeans to see the Great Plains, including Kansas. Later, Juan de Oñate also traveled to Kansas in 1601.

In 1682, Marquette, Joliet, Hennepin and other French leaders took formal control of the Mississippi Valley, including the land that would become Kansas. This land, known as the Louisiana territory, was used to organize trade with Native Americans. In 1762, France ceded the Louisiana territory to Spain. However, in 1801, Spain receded the territory back to France in the Third Treaty of San Ildefonso. On April 30, 1803, Napoleon sold the Louisiana territory to the United States in the Louisiana Purchase. In the early 1800s, Kansas was used to hold Native Americans that were removed from their native lands.

Statehood
On May 30, 1854, the Congress signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The Kansas-Nebraska Act stated that Kansas and Nebraska were both territories of the United States. It also stated that Kansans would vote on the legality of slavery.

Upon hearing this, about 1,200 armed New Englanders came to Kansas to vote against slavery. However, thousands of southerners, mostly from Missouri, came to vote for slavery. The final vote was to make slavery legal, and Kansas adopted most of Missouri's slave laws. There was fighting between Southerners and Northerners in Kansas. In one fight, John Brown and his men killed five people in the Pottawatomie Massacre. Later, Southerners destroyed Lawrence, Kansas. Kansas was called "Bleeding Kansas".

Between 1854 and 1861, Kansas proposed four state constitutions. Out of the four proposed constitutions, three did not allow slavery. Finally, in July 1859, Kansas passed the Wyandotte Constitution, which was anti-slavery. The constitution for statehood was sent to the U.S. government in April 1860 to be voted on. The constitution was passed by the House of Representatives, but rejected by the Senate. This is because southern voters in the Senate did not like that Kansas would become a state without slavery. In 1861, after the Confederate states formed, the constitution gained approval from the Union, and Kansas became a state.

Kansas in the Civil War
Four months after Kansas became a state, the Civil War started. Out of the 381 battles in the Civil War, four were fought in Kansas. Throughout the war, Kansas remained a Union state.

On August 21, 1863, William Clarke Quantrill led a force of 300 to 400 Confederates into the town of Lawrence, Kansas. Quantrill and his troops burned, looted, and destroyed the anti-slavery town. This battle became known as the Lawrence Massacre. In total, 164 Union soldiers and 40 Confederate soldiers died in the Lawrence Massacre. In the Battle of Mine Creek, on October 25, 1864, Union soldiers attacked Confederates as they were crossing the Mine Creek. The Union surrounded the Confederates, and captured 600 men and two generals. 1,000 Confederate soldiers and 100 Union soldiers died in the battle. In total, 8,500 people from Kansas died or were wounded in the Civil War.

Post Civil War
After the Civil War, many free slaves came to Oklahoma and Kansas. In fact, between the years of 1879 and 1881, about 60,000 African Americans came to this region. This is because the slaves wanted economic opportunities, which they believed awaited them in Kansas. African Americans also came to Kansas for better political rights and to escape sharecropping.

Dust Bowl
From 1930 to 1936, Kansas went through a period of time called the Dust Bowl. During this time, Kansas had little rainfall and high temperatures. Thousands of farmers became very poor and had to move to other parts of the United States. In total, 400,000 people left the Great Plains area. The years from 1930 to 1940 was the only time the population of Kansas went down. The number of people living in Kansas decreased 4.3 percent.

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
During the 1950s, school segregation was required in fifteen U.S states. However, Kansas was not one of these states. Instead, school segregation was permitted by local option, but only in elementary schools. In 1896, the ruling from Plessy v. Ferguson stated that segregation was allowed, but equal facilities should be made available for blacks and whites. Often, however, black schools received less funding and had fewer textbooks than white schools.

For these reasons, Linda Brown and her family sued the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. Brown won the case, and the ruling was to overturn the Plessy v. Ferguson decision. This was considered by many a landmark case in the civil rights movement.

Geography
Kansas is the 15th-largest state in the United States. It covers an area of 82,282 square miles (213,109 km2). Of this, about 462 square miles (1196.57 km2) are water. This makes up 0.60% of the total area of the state.

Kansas is one of six states on the Frontier Strip. Kansas shares borders with Nebraska to the north, Oklahoma to the south, Missouri to the east, and Colorado to the west.

Kansas increases in elevation from east to west. All of Kansas is in the Great Plains, where the land is mostly flat with prairies and grasslands. Eastern Kansas has hills and forests, like the Flint Hills and the Osage Plains in the southeastern part of the state. The highest point in the state is Mount Sunflower near the Colorado border. Mount Sunflower is 4,039 ft (1,231 m) tall. The lowest point is the Verdigris River in Montgomery County, at 679 ft (207 m) above sea level.

Weather


Kansas has a varied climate with an average yearly temperature of 56°F (13°C). The record high in Kansas is 121 °F (49.4 °C). This occurred in Fredonia on July 18, 1936, and in Alton on July 24, 1936. The record low in Kansas is -40 °F (-40 °C). This occurred in Lebanon on February 13, 1905. Kansas is in a temperate area of the country. Like other states in this region, Kansas has four distinct seasons.

Kansas can have extreme weather in all four seasons. For example, in spring and autumn, Kansas has many tornadoes. In fact, the state averages 55 tornadoes per year. This is because Kansas is in the area known as Tornado Alley, where cold and warm air masses come together to make severe weather.

In summer, Kansas has experienced severe droughts. For example, in 1934, 1936, and 1939, Kansas had less than average rainfall and widespread dust storms as a part of the Dust Bowl.

In winter, Kansas has snow in most parts of the state. The average snowfall in the northern half of the state is 16 inches, with the average snowfall in the southern half of the state being 8 inches. Blizzards and related snowstorms are rare in Kansas.

Population
Kansas had 627 cities in 2008. The largest city in Kansas is Wichita, which had a population of 382,368 in 2010. The other largest cities in Kansas are: Overland Park, 173,372; Kansas City, 145,786; Topeka, 127,473; and Olathe, 125,872. Between the years of 2000 and 2010, the Kansas population increased 6.1 percent.

Ancestry
The 2010 Census says that the people of Kansas were:
 * 83.8% White American (77.5% non-Hispanic white)
 * 5.9% Black or African American
 * 1.0% American Indian and Alaska Native
 * 2.4% Asian American
 * 0.1% Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander
 * 3.0% from two or more races.

Ethnically 10.5% of the total population was of Hispanic or Latino origin (they may be of any race). They are mostly in southwest Kansas. Many black people in Kansas were from the Exodusters, free black people who left the South.

As of 2011, 35.0% of Kansas's population younger than one year old were part of a minority group (i.e., did not have two parents who were non-Hispanic white).

Language
English is the most-spoken language in Kansas. Spanish is second.

Economy
Farming has always been an important part of the state economy of Kansas. The main crop grown in Kansas is wheat. In fact, Kansas farmers produce about 400 million bushels of wheat per year. Kansas also ranks first in the United States in grain sorghum produced, second in cropland, and third in sunflowers produced. However, farming is not the only important part of the economy of Kansas. Many parts of airplanes are made in the city of Wichita. Also, many important companies are near Kansas City, Missouri. For example, the Sprint Nextel Corporation is one of the largest telephone companies in the United States. Its main operational offices are in Overland Park, Kansas.

About 90% of Kansas's land is used for farming. Kansas's agricultural products are cattle, sheep, wheat, sorghum, soybeans, cotton, hogs, corn, and salt. As of 2018, there were 59,600 farms in Kansas, 86 (0.14%) of which are certified organic farms. The average farm in the state is about 770 acres (more than a square mile). In 2016, the average cost of running the farm was $300,000.

The industrial products are transportation equipment, commercial and private aircraft, food processing, publishing, chemical products, machinery, apparel, petroleum, and mining.

The median household income for Kansas was $47,709 in 2009. The gross domestic product (GDP) for Kansas was $122,700,000,000 ($122.7 billion) in 2008. Overall, Kansas' GDP accounts for less than 1 percent of total U.S. economy.

Kansas has three big military bases: Fort Riley, Fort Leavenworth, and McConnell Air Force Base. The US Army reserve has about 25,000 soldiers at these bases, and they also have about 8,000 civilian employees there.

Highways
There are two interstate highways in Kansas. The first part of the interstate highway opened on Interstate 70 west of Topeka. It opened on November 14, 1956.

Interstate 70 is an important east-west highway. People can go from Kansas City, Missouri to Denver, Colorado. Cities on this highway include Colby, Hays, Salina, Junction City, Topeka, Lawrence, Bonner Springs, and Kansas City.

Interstate 35 is a major north–south highway from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to Des Moines, Iowa. Cities on this highway include Wichita, El Dorado, Emporia, Ottawa, and Kansas City (and suburbs).

Interstate Highways

 * (formerly known as I-35W)
 * (formerly known as I-35W)

State symbols
The state symbols of Kansas are: Carin Terrier state dog

Related pages

 * Colleges and universities in Kansas
 * List of counties in Kansas
 * List of locations in Kansas
 * List of rivers of Kansas
 * List of United States Senators from Kansas

Book sources


This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:

Other websites


Maps
 * Kansas Department of Transportation maps