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A podcast focusing on the perspectives, lives, and stories of Kansans to provide greater insight into the state we all call home.
Ep64
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Garden Bounty
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[00:00:00]
Gus Applequist: So if you have a friend or relative that is a gardener, this is that time of year-
Sydney Collins: yeah ...
Gus Applequist: where all of a sudden, just their, the bounty of their garden is suddenly-
Sydney Collins: Their harvest ... your bounty. It's, like, thrust upon you.
Gus Applequist: This happened to us here today thanks to our wonderful-
Sydney Collins: Tanner, yeah ...
Gus Applequist: photojournalist and producer, Tanner, who gifted us some cucumbers and zucchini.
Sydney Collins: Mm-hmm.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Sydney Collins: They're, like, big. They're like this. Like, the cucumbers are pretty good cucumber size.
Gus Applequist: Do you have a preference between cucumbers and zucchini?
Sydney Collins: I don't... Well, I don't know. I think probably cucumbers just 'cause I love soaking them in ranch dressing.
Gus Applequist: That's fair.
Sydney Collins: Or my new favorite thing are cucumber, like, they call them wraps, but what you do is you slice the cucumber in half, and then you kinda scoop out the middle.
You put, like, cream cheese and turkey and all that, and you make a sandwich out of it.
Gus Applequist: That sounds very fresh and healthy. [00:01:00]
Sydney Collins: It's so good. Especially if you just put tons of cream cheese in it. Some Everything seasoning, if you have any. Oh, that's so good.
Gus Applequist: If, if you have any recipes or any specific, you know, like, like, really impressive photos of your bounty from your garden-
Sydney Collins: yeah
Gus Applequist: ... we'd love to see it. Send it in to us.
Sydney Collins: Cucumber and onion kinda salad. Oh. It's lunchtime here at- Ask a Kansan Guys.
Podcast Intro and Guest Tease
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Gus Applequist: Welcome to Ask a Kansan
Sydney Collins: ... a podcast
where we're amplifying, connecting, and uncovering stories across Kansas.
Gus Applequist: And today we are, you know, revisiting our Kansas history. We've done this on a few episodes.
Sydney Collins: Yeah, b- and this is the best part of it, is we've had probably, I don't know, [00:02:00] between five and seven historians on the podcast
in the last year and a half.
Gus Applequist: Both, like, professional, academic, and-
Sydney Collins: you know. Like, a wide variety.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Sydney Collins: And every single one of them focuses on something different in Kansas. And it's just fascinating how many different avenues of history that you can go, go down.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. If you have listened to many of our episodes- and, and there's things you'd like us to cover,
Sydney Collins: I'm sure we can find 'em.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. We'll find an expert to, to tell you about it. Our guest today is Kristen Epps. I should say Dr. Kristen Epps, that she is... she does have a PhD. Very. Very smart person. Kristen is a professor at Kansas State University and affiliated with Dr.
Andrew Orr a previous guest. One of our- most fun guests.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. Yeah. He was, Go check out Dr. Andrew Orr's episode. It's-
back in 2025, kinda early on. Early on.
Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. But Kristen, Kristen brought, You know, she's both an editor and a writer. And we talked about her books that she's working on, and [00:03:00] yeah, just great conversation.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. So without any further ado, here's our conversation with Kristen.
Kristen Epps: Thank you so much for having me.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. Yeah, thanks for being here. Oh, good. I've, I've been curious. So, so you've brought with you one of the things that you do. Could, could we start by having you introduce yourself- to our audience?
Kristen Epps: Definitely.
Gus Applequist: I can get that for you..
Kristen Epps: Oh.
Producer: Move just a little.
Kristen Epps: Perfect.
Sydney Collins: There you go.
Kristen Epps: Yes.
Gus Applequist: Perfect.
Sydney Collins: Beautiful.
Kristen Epps: All right. I'm Kristen Epps. I am a historian of Kansas. I teach at Kansas State University, and I consider myself an adopted Kansan- because I wasn't born here. But I've grown to love the Sunflower State.
Gus Applequist: Hm. And so, so you're a teacher. You're also a writer and an editor?
Is that correct? Yeah.
Kristen Epps: Yes. So I edit the journal Kansas History. I've been editing that since 2020, and it's published jointly by the Kansas Historical Society and K-State.
Gus Applequist: Wow. Wow. Hm. That's awesome.
Why Kansas History Matters
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Gus Applequist: So just to sort of get started, you were... You've kind of already referenced this, but you were born in Colorado, but you landed here in [00:04:00] Kansas as a teenager, and you've come back to the state again and again.
So what's brought you back? What's kept you interested in Kansas?
Kristen Epps: That's a good question. I mean, I have family here, so that helps. But I think the history of the state has just captured my attention in a way that I did not expect. As you mentioned, I moved here when I was in high school, which is the worst time to move across the country.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. Yeah.
Kristen Epps: Legitimately, it was a challenge. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, actually. So I've lived in Colorado and the Pacific Northwest. And it it was definitely d- a change, an adjustment. But- I really, as I got older and started... You know, I went to college in Kansas City. As I go- got older and started to think about, more seriously about my career, I had an internship at the Historical Society in Topeka. And that was my first real introduction to Kansas history. And I was lucky enough to work on [00:05:00] a project there where I was reading sources from Bleeding Kansas, primary sources of journals- and letters. And I just grew fascinated by the fact that Kansas was so central to the struggle before the Civil War- which I had not really understood before I moved here. And just the opportunity to be here and to engage with people who are also interested in that history has been really lovely.
Gus Applequist: Were you aware of Bleeding Kansas before coming to Kan-
Kristen Epps: Probably. You know, I- it probably was in one of my, like, US history classes in, like, seventh grade or something like that. But I did not really know much about it at all.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm. Do you think your perspective coming to Kansas from outside of Kansas has given you a better perspective of Bleeding Kansas and some of the other history of the state?
Kristen Epps: I think in some ways. I have not really spent a lot of time on the East Coast.
I'm very much a Westerner, and being able to think about the role that the West has [00:06:00] played in national history- has been, I think, part of that story for me. Again, I grew up places that were very different from Kansas, but yet we all have had some role to play in that national narrative, that story- of who we are as Americans. And so that- that Kansas connection has become kind of part of my broader interest in Western history.
Gus Applequist: You, you, like, basically just took my next question right out That's okay. No,
um, I think I'm still gonna ask it. Um, Just 'cause I'm, I'm curious what you will say.
So yeah, I gather from your work that, that you well, that sometimes events in Kansas have national implications. So how has your research into Kansas history provided sort of a lens with which to better understand the nation as a whole? Like, what, what is it about Kansas history that helps you understand the nation?
Kristen Epps: That's such a good question. There's so many ways I could answer that. I think that the frontier experience is part of it, coming out west and settling the West is part of [00:07:00] Kansas i- identity. But also within that too, you have the indigenous people who were here first, and sort of how that interaction plays out is one that has, you know, been the case, you know, since the colonial period, that there's been conflict between indigenous people and the settlers who arrived.
And so I think Kansas is continuing that story. Obviously, when it comes to the beginning of the Civil War and the lead-up to the Civil War, you know, John Brown is sort of who everyone associates with Kansas, but there were other abolitionists and other folks in the area who believed very strongly that slavery was wrong, and they are also really vocal about that.
And I always tell my students when I teach that the only time we see Kansas in the news nowadays is often for something bad, like a tornado, like the Greensburg tornado- or like the BTK Killer.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. There's that little, little tidbit ...
Kristen Epps: You know, things like that tend to be how people think of Kansas, or they think of it as flyover country. [00:08:00] But before the Civil War, we were front-page news for other reasons. You know, n- newspapers all along the East Coast, North and South, had stories about John Brown. They had stories about what was happening in Lawrence. They had stories about you know, the, the conflict over slavery's expansion, and that really, that really I think exemplifies a very key moment when Kansas influenced the rest of the country.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Inside the Kansas History Journal
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Gus Applequist: I wanna talk more about Bleeding Kansas, but before we do- let's talk a little bit about Kansas history. So you edit Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains. For listeners who've never seen an academic history journal before, you know, what is it? What does your role involve, and what sort of stories are included?
Kristen Epps: Yeah, great question We are intending to present academic material to a more public audience. So it does include citations, and it's peer-reviewed. Some of these things that academic journals use, some of these [00:09:00] are tools to make sure that the information, you know, is accurate and vetted and things like that. But we also include images and try to write, or, or the authors try to write articles that are engaging.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Kristen Epps: So we publish all kinds of things related to Kansas from any time period. I mean, we've published an archeological study of Blue Earth Village, which is outside Manhattan.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Kristen Epps: It was written by a colleague of mine who just retired from K-State. We publish things on you know, Brown v. Board. We have published issues that include oral histories from Brown v. Board. So really anything that has to do with the history of Kansas, we are excited to share.
Gus Applequist: And describe just a little bit of what it's like being an editor- and how that's different from writing, obviously.
Kristen Epps: Yeah. I like being an editor. It is a lot harder, I think, than people realize because- ... there's so many... I mean, as video editors and, and you, you understand, there's all of these sort of layers of cognitive [00:10:00] work that you have to do. 'Cause you wanna make sure the story flows, it's readable, there's a central point, right, an argument that's being made. But then you also wanna make sure that the language is clear. You wanna make sure it's organized in a way that makes sense. And so I really love getting to work with authors to help develop those ideas. And we do have a small staff, so I'm not, you know, doing this entirely by myself. But the the staff help with that, too.
So I have a really great team that I work with. And it's, yeah, it's, it's really enjoyable.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Becoming a Historian and Editor
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Sydney Collins: I kinda wanna back up a little bit. What got you interested in this line of work?
Kristen Epps: In the editing side?
Sydney Collins: Editing, history. kinda sparked it?
Kristen Epps: Hmm. Well, there's a few things. I mean, one of them might be relatable to listeners, which is I read the American Girl books growing up.
Sydney Collins: Oh, yeah.
Kristen Epps: I read, you know, Little Women Sarah, Plain and Tall- Island of the Blue Dolphins, all of those sort [00:11:00] of books that were really popular in the '80s and '90s. And I think that's where some of it started. And also, my parents took us to museums and history sites- as a kid. And I think a lot of it has to do with I, I'm fascinated by people. What makes people tick? And history is a great way to get at that. Hmm. To try to understand individuals, but also sort of how societies work as well, how groups work as well. Why are people interested in reform and change? What is it that inspires them to step out and make a difference? Those kinds of questions- just have always interested me.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: Brilliant.
Slavery on the Periphery
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Gus Applequist: So, you've written a book about- Bleeding Kansas. Yes. Remind me of the title, please.
Kristen Epps: It's called Slavery on the Periphery, and it traces the expansion of slavery into the West from around the 1820s up through the end of the Civil War.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Kristen Epps: And basically, the main [00:12:00] point, if I can narrow it down to one, is that Bleeding Kansas is often framed as this contest over the extension of slavery. And it's framed often in a way where it's focusing on kind of the rhetoric of it. Should it expand? Should it not expand? And what I do in my book is I show that actually enslaved people already lived here.
And that this wasn't a sort of cerebral question. This was a question that impacted actual people's lives.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: Brilliant.
Gus Applequist: I think I know that we both studied Bleeding Kansas a little bit- in our education. But I think we could use a refresher, and I'm sure members of our audience could also.
What Was Bleeding Kansas
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Gus Applequist: Could you just briefly describe what was Bleeding Kansas? And, and, you know, why is it significant?
Kristen Epps: So Kansas became a territory in 1854 after the Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed in Congress. And one of the components of the Kansas-Nebraska Act was that the status of the territory when it decided to enter the Union would be determined by the voters. Prior [00:13:00] to this, Congress had often decided is slavery legal here, is slavery not? And they wanted to put it in the hands of the voters, so they used this concept called popular sovereignty. And what happens then is that you have Northerners, you have Southerners who are coming out to Kansas in order to gain the majority.
Because when they take that vote, which by the way they don't know when that's supposed to happen or when it will happen. But when they take that vote, whatever side has the majority is gonna be the side that determines the fate of the whole territory. And there are lots of folks, I should point out, who come out just because there's land and they want opportunity.
So not everyone is coming out with a political agenda, but some folks are. And the bloody side of it, that makes, you know, that's part of the story is, you know, political. But we also have the outgrowth of that, which is the violence that comes because for many people, this is the first time that they've lived in close proximity to someone with very diametrically opposed [00:14:00] views, and there's going to be conflict because of that. You've probably heard of, you know, the Pottawatomie massacre is a famous example- of that. But there's also other instances. There's an abolitionist named John Doyle who was trying to help some enslaved people escape, and he's kidnapped and put in prison in Missouri across the border, and the enslaved people that he was with are sold back into slavery or put back into slavery.
So there's all these, these, incidents, you know, there's too many to name really, that, that lead to the, the bloody or the bleeding moniker.
Gus Applequist: Hmm. I feel like, like if I just to recite the basic things that I remember from my education. It's like Bushwhackers from- from Missouri. Yes. Jayhawks from-
Or Jayhawkers? Jay- Jayhawkers.
Kristen Epps: Jayhawkers.
Gus Applequist: Jayhawkers from, from the Kansas side. And you know, that's like... And, and the fact that, that Kansas was like a f- a free state.
Enslaved People in Kansas
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Gus Applequist: But do I gather that there were enslaved people in [00:15:00] Kansas?
Kristen Epps: Yes. There were. So, Kansas entered the union in 1861 on what we now celebrate as Kansas Day in January. And so for that span of time, even really before 1854, there were... It's hard to know numbers, but somewhere probably around, like, 2, 3, 400 enslaved people here. You might be familiar with the Shawnee Methodist Mission out in Johnson County-
that Thomas Johnson ran. He owned enslaved people. So there were enslaved people there, enslaved people at Fort Scott, Fort Leavenworth just in communities, you know, around, like, Junction City, Manhattan even.
Places like that.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, it's shocking, isn't it?
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, I think, I think we've collectively sort of taken pride of being a free state. So, yeah.
Kristen Epps: Exactly. No, and it's, it's a hard narrative to challenge because Kansans are very proud of that free state heritage. And I'm not suggesting that that wasn't present.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kristen Epps: But we also have to think about the experience of African Americans, and they were experiencing a very different Kansas [00:16:00] in 1855, 1856 than white Kansans were.
Gus Applequist: Certainly.
Researching Hidden Histories
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Gus Applequist: So one of the things I, I sort of realized as, as reading honestly some of the reviews of, of your work- is that, that you tend to put enslaved people at the center of the story rather than treating slavery as like a, just a political issue. So why was that important to you, and how did you, like, do research on this? I know records from that period are probably relatively thin.
Kristen Epps: For sure.
Gus Applequist: So yeah, how did you, how did you go about doing all of that?
Kristen Epps: Well, I came to this topic in a roundabout way. I was reading other sources on Bleeding Kansas and kept catching these very, very small references. You know, like, "Oh, by the way, this enslaved woman, you know, worked in this home and did this," and it would just be that, you know, a sentence or two. Mm-hmm. And I started to wonder why, I...
'cause I was seeing this repeatedly, why it wasn't getting mentioned more. And, you know, I'm not a representative of the African American community, so I don't wanna claim [00:17:00] that I'm telling their story, but I did believe it was a story that was worth telling, and especially because of, you know, s- students in Kansas schools often don't hear that part of the story. And the research process was a challenge because again, it was often a sentence, two sentences. And I- my book does look at the Kansas counties and the Missouri counties, so the area around, like, you know Platte City, Weston Kansas City down towards, like, even Harrisonville, places like that on the Missouri side.
There were more sources for that because there were more enslaved people in Missouri. So I look at the border as, as a region.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kristen Epps: And basically it was finding every source I could imagine, being really creative- and just mining as much information as I could. And when I didn't feel comfortable making a solid conclusion, you know, I do say, "It's possible that," or- or, you know, I, I try not to [00:18:00] pull... I try not to make claims with too much confidence. And I know there are sources that I've missed that I'm sure people have found since then that would, would contribute to this topic. Sometimes I was in kind of dusty courthouse, courthouses looking at tax records. But it was really fun 'cause I got to, I got to travel a bit and go to some of these local historical societies and, and work with, with people from all around the area.
Archives Not Just Google
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Gus Applequist: There's sort of a attitude people have today of, like, everything's on the internet. Just go [00:19:00] look on the internet.
Sydney Collins: Oh, yeah.
That's not reality.
Gus Applequist: I, you know, it's kinda shocking. I, I... My alma mater here in Salina, Kansas Wesleyan- they had to get rid of a bunch of books, which was the right decision for them because their library... They, they needed to prioritize other things for it. And it was the right decision for their students.
But it was sad to see them get rid of books and think that, you know- While some of those might have been digitized- like, there's a lot of, of, of work that has to be done- of going to the places and having the conversations and getting the hands on those physical books. So it's, it's cool to hear. I think we've, we've sort of romanticized the idea of, like, Indiana Jones and, and like- But, but it, it is still necessary, isn't it?
Kristen Epps: It is. There is so, so much that has not been digitized, and the historical societies across the state and the country are working continually to digitize things. But it's, it's an un- insurmountable task, and I think some things maybe don't need to be digitized either.
Gus Applequist: Mm.
Kristen Epps: I think having them in an archives is accessible enough, depending on what the topic is and, and what the [00:20:00] needs are for researchers. That's also something I talk to students about a lot when I teach Kansas history and, like, methods, I teach methods classes, is there is so much out there that you cannot find through a Google search.
So, so much, and that's where being a trained professional comes in. That's what we teach students who are history majors and history minors and just history enthusiasts, is we teach them how to research, we teach them how to think, we teach them how to analyze.
Gus Applequist: I think one of the most exciting things that can happen is when you're comparing, like, one account of something- and another account, and you have sort of this, like, realization of something- that you're not sure if it's been realized before- by somebody else. Yeah, just a thrilling... Like, the research can be thrilling.
Kristen Epps: It can. Those are great moments. I had a moment in St. Louis when I was researching, where I was looking at the governor of Missouri's records from the Civil War era, and Abraham Lincoln had written to him, which, which makes sense.
He was president at the time. A governor of Missouri, but I hadn't anticipated seeing that, and I flip and I [00:21:00] see A. Lincoln's signature. And I'm like, "Oh, cool. He touched this letter." And, you know, those kinds of things are really fun. Or, or same things with John Brown's letters. You know, it's just- it's crazy to think about them having touched the same document.
Letters from John Brown and Others
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Gus Applequist: I'm, I'm curious about John Brown's writing. Is, is his writing as intense as I m- might imagine it to be?
Kristen Epps: Not, not really. No. He was extremely passionate and dedicated. But he do- his writing doesn't sound like the rantings of a madman or anything like that.
I mean, it's passionate. Sometimes it's just normal sort of conversation, too. I mean, he was a, a human who asked how people's moms were doing and things like that. Mm. But I do recommend, there is a lot that has been digitized from John Brown. I do recommend you read some of it because it is, it does give you great insight into, to who he was and why he had chosen this particular mission- for, for his life.
Sydney Collins: This is kind of a caveat, Are there other voices that you have come [00:22:00] across- and you're like, "Oh, this is not what the public actually thinks they are."
Kristen Epps: Mm-hmm.
Sydney Collins: Have you come across any, any others like that?
Kristen Epps: Yeah. The John Brown example is one. I mean, there's some, I don't know how interesting this is to your listeners, but there is one Civil War general who was in Kansas who was very whiny in his letters. Um, His name's Samuel Curtis, and he complained a lot, and had, I think, trouble accepting criticism.
And so it was interesting to read, you know, sort of his responses to people critiquing him, 'cause he had sort of mini hissy fits in letters-
Sydney Collins: Oh my gosh, that is so funny
Kristen Epps: ... and things like that was really fun.
Gus Applequist: Which side of the conflict was he on?
Kristen Epps: Oh, Union. Union, yeah. And I'm not, you know, trying to comment on his skills as a general, but it was, it was a funny, a funny, thing to just continue reading and realize, he's, he's kind of, he doesn't have a thick skin. So there are, I mean, there are other examples I'm sure, I just can't think of, [00:23:00] but.
Sydney Collins: Well, I'm, that is such a great example, 'cause it, it's fascinating to think of, like, 'cause people have those exact personalities today.
Kristen Epps: Mm-hmm.
Sydney Collins: And so when- you think of, like, you know, mid-1800s early, even early 1900s, like, we think that they're, all these people in history are, you know, tough and strong- and you're like, "No, they're the exact same personalities as we have today."
History Hits Home
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Kristen Epps: Exactly, and that's one of the reasons why I love history, is because, like I said, you do get to understand people. And sometimes you'll read, you know, a letter from a young man writing to his father, and you can tell he's trying to, like, get his father's approval.
Gus Applequist: Oh.
Kristen Epps: Things like that that are kind of heartbreaking. Or there's a series of letters that exist from a couple that lived outside Lawrence during the Civil War, and you, you know that the husband dies.
Sydney Collins: Oh. Oh.
Kristen Epps: But you're reading the letters building up to that.
Sydney Collins: Mm.
Kristen Epps: Sarah Fitch is the, the wife in the story, and so you're [00:24:00] just, they're, they're loving letters, and they're talking about- you know, how are the kids, you know, this, you know, all of these sorts of things. But you know, he doesn't make it, and so you get to the end, and just, you know, a little tear happens. Oh. And it's, it's, it can be emotional in a lot of ways. And, and also studying slavery can be very emotional, because you're reading a lot of very difficult material, too.
Writing Kansas For Everyone
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Gus Applequist: So you have another book coming out. And as I understand it, that's gonna be, like, a narrative history of the state?
Kristen Epps: Yes.
Gus Applequist: I, okay, I have, I have many questions. So you have a co-writer named Jim Leiker?
Kristen Epps: Yes, Jim Leiker.
Gus Applequist: Am I saying that right? And, and it's meant for general readers- which is, which is exciting. So, first question is, how is writing for a broad audience different than maybe more academic-focused work?
Kristen Epps: Well, this is where having a co-author helps because we're able to bounce ideas off each other, and that is very helpful. And he's a really excellent narrative writer. He teaches...
I should shout out to Jim. He teaches at Johnson [00:25:00] County Community College, and he's been teaching Kansas history for many years. One of the reasons why I wanted him to be my co-author was because he had all of that experience and because I thought his writing style was really lovely, and that we would be able to, by working together, find a balance. I also I don't come from an academic family. I mean, I, I have educated people in my family, but I don't come from a family of, like, academics. And I feel like that also gives me the ability to kind of understand what would someone who's, you know, wanting to be well-read but is not a professional, what is it that they would wanna know?
And we're very excited to tell so many stories. So many really cool and interesting stories in this book.
Gus Applequist: I took AP US and- AP World History in high school. And frankly, I probably shouldn't have been in that classroom. I wasn't a good enough student at that point in my academic life.
But we- I remember reading Jared Diamond's Guns, [00:26:00] Germs, and Steel, and it just kind of just, my eyes just kinda glazing over and not getting it. So, so it's exciting to hear that you're gonna be focusing on, on Kansas, and in a way that is hopefully accessible to a lot of folks.
Kristen Epps: We hope so.
From Ancient Seas To Today
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Kristen Epps: It will cover when Kansas was an ocean. I mean, we start-
Sydney Collins: Ooh. Wow
Kristen Epps: ... we start at the beginning. And we end around, like, 2018-ish.
Sydney Collins: Oh, wow.
Kristen Epps: It's, it's a big story to tell. There's a lot, of course, that, you know, we can't go into a lot of detail on. There's stories that are left out or stories that don't get maybe as much attention as we would hope. But we also can't have a book that is 700 pages.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Kristen Epps: We want to be mindful of the fact-
Gus Applequist: That's where the editor comes in, right?
Kristen Epps: Yeah. Absolutely. We wanna be mindful of the fact that people don't want to spend-
all of that time reading. And they wanna have something that's digestible and accessible, and it will be out in early 2027.
It's being published with the University Press of Kansas.
Gus Applequist: Well, congratulations on that.
Kristen Epps: Thank you.
Gus Applequist: That sounds like a big endeavor and very [00:27:00] exciting.
Kristen Epps: It's been seven or eight years in the making.
Sydney Collins: Wow.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kristen Epps: I'm excited for readers to see it. But it is a little nerve-wracking because we've spent so much time working on it.
We want it to be well-received. Yeah. So we'll make sure that y'all get a copy.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. Oh, that'd be great. Yeah. Yeah, we'd love to. And, and we'll do our best to put, put a good word in or two. Yeah.
Kristen Epps: Thank you.
Gus Applequist:
Resilience And Many Kansases
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Gus Applequist: You know, there's, there's been a lot made and said about the resilience of Kansas people.
Gus Applequist: And I, I'm just curious, in, in the work that you've done on this book have you seen evidence of that across time?
Kristen Epps: Most definitely. I think about some of the history of Western Kansas with the Dust Bowl- with blizzards, with the grasshopper plague of 1874, where their crops were literally chewed to the ground. I mean, there's a lot of examples of that. There's examples of, you know, immigrant communities that are, are surviving even when the surrounding community maybe is not that accepting of them. There's a [00:28:00] lot of great examples of that, and we do talk about that quite a lot in the book. We wanna make sure that readers understand there's not one single story of Kansas.
That in fact, there's many stories and many different perspectives on the state and, and what the state means.
Gus Applequist: That's beautiful. I look forward to reading
I wanna talk about the sesquicentennial but before we do that you know, are there stories that you've come across, especially in this s- survey of Kansas history, that you'd really like to zone in on and, and, you know, bring to the public attention?
Kristen Epps: I don't know. There's so many, I don't know how to choose. I think there's a lot of stories about, like, unions and labor a- advocacy. You know, ending child labor initiatives to improve working conditions in mines. There's a lot of, if, if you're not familiar, a lot of mining that occurred in down like, like Cherokee County.
Gus Applequist: Mm.
Kristen Epps: Down in Southeast Kansas. There's a lot of stories about that that I think folks in that area are familiar with, but maybe people [00:29:00] elsewhere aren't. There's a lot of women who were really active in the suffrage movement that I don't think get as much credit perhaps as they should. There's, I mean, just, I don't even... I feel terrible. I don't even know how to answer that question. There's just so many.
Gus Applequist: Well, I, there's so many great tidbits there. So, many of the things you just mentioned are, are sort of like social good- social activism. And so I imagine that, that you, you have thoughts and opinions on that. And, and so, so what is the role that history and telling those stories can play today?
Reform Movements And Change
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Kristen Epps: Mm. I am really interested in reform movements. I'm really interested in people who see a problem and wanna solve it.
Gus Applequist: Mm.
Kristen Epps: I joke that I'm an eldest daughter, and that is sort of our personality, is to take charge and, and, and fix things and, and organize things. And so we do talk quite a lot about reform movements in the book. And I think there's a few different lessons that you could take from that. If you look at things [00:30:00] like the movement to desegregate schools, and of course we know about the Brown v. Board decision in 1954, that was not something that happened instantaneously. It had been a process. The local NAACP had been working on this. This is not sort of a a sudden decision. This is a movement, and one of the things that you learn when you study reform movements, suffrage is another great example in Kansas, is that you're going to fail before you succeed. In Kansas, women tried to get the right to vote. Failed. They failed in, in 1867. They failed in 1894, and that was discouraging, and it impacted the movement. You know, women understandably sort of did question, "Well, are our methods not working? Our tac- you know, what can we do to change this?" It took decades and decades, and women finally in Kansas got the right to vote in 1912, which w- was before the, the national amendment.
[00:31:00] But it comes back to your point about resilience. If you wanna see change happen, you cannot expect it to happen instantaneously. It's gonna be a lot of work behind the scenes. It's gonna be a lot of struggle, a lot of frustration. Doesn't mean it's not worth it.
Gus Applequist: Mm.
Kristen Epps: But it's going to be... Y- you need to really buckle down and, and commit, I think, is, is an important lesson there.
America 250 And Civic Duty
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Gus Applequist: So with the USA's 250th anniversary being this year and projects like Kansas 250 Commission underway what do you hope most Kansans take away from looking at their own history right now?
Kristen Epps: I'm so interested in colonial history and Revolutionary War history, so this is a really fun time to be a historian. I think that your stories matter is something we all need to remember. Sometimes that's not always apparent. The idea too that we have a responsibility as citizens or as, as residents of the [00:32:00] state to take our legacy, you know, coming out of this, you know, the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, to take that legacy and extend it and make sure that we secure it for the next generation. Mm. To advocate for people who are disenfranchised or maybe don't have the same privileges that we do, to make sure that they're included in the government, the way that society functions, you know, they're given opportunities. I think there's, there's so many, so many ways that this, this sesquicentennial, I hope, can encourage people to learn more about who they are and to learn more about how they can make a difference.
Gus Applequist: You know, there, there's sort of a, A group of people that, that might say, you know, "Why should we fund history? Why should we invest in, in something that has already happened?" You know, and, and th- we have, we've had this conversation with the liberal arts- and about, you know, [00:33:00] why is Latin still something- that is studied today.
Why History Matters
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Gus Applequist: But so from your perspective, you know, what is the value of history, and, and how do we sort of approach that?
Kristen Epps: There's a couple different ways to answer that. One would be that studying history is an ex- an exercise in analyzing, thinking critically, being able to communicate and understand how other people communicate, which are, I guess, what employers would call, like, soft skills that are really important for you. But then that's not specific to history. That's really something that you can also get in, you know, English classes and things like that. I think for history If you're going to be in America, if you're gonna be in the United States, whether you're a citizen or not, you do have responsibilities to know how things were in the past and how that has impacted where we are today. And I don't wanna say, you know, history repeats itself, because it doesn't [00:34:00] exactly repeat itself. Something that happened in 1920 is not gonna be the same as 2020, no matter what, because we have technology, we have the internet, all of these sorts of things. But one of the ways that historians often say it is that history doesn't repeat, but it rhymes.
If you wanna understand where we are today, you wanna be sure that you are contributing to the world today, you can't forget about the people who came before. You can't forget about how things used to be. Those are integral to who we are as people. You know, who our ancestors were shapes who we are, and the same goes for society.
Gus Applequist: I think of it, about that often, that, like, I stand on the backs of countless, faceless Norwegian and Swedish farmers- and a few that were really brave and left everything that they had to come to Kansas to the middle of nowhere where it was nothing, and, and they built a life there. And yeah, everything I have I owe to those people that came before.
And that's true of [00:35:00] each of us, right? And different blends of backgrounds, and it's a beautiful thing.
Sydney Collins: It is beautiful.
Finding Hope In Community
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Gus Applequist: Okay, so my, my last question, going back to the sequicentennial celebration. We've been working on a, a long-term project here at Fili based on an event that came about thanks to the 1976 bicentennial celebrations. And as we've looked back and researched that time and era there was just this real, you know, jubilance and, and celebration, and just just, like-
Sydney Collins: Pride ...
Gus Applequist: Yeah, pride just oozing. And so to juxtapose that with the current sort of state of mind in the United States like, I feel like this is so different of an era than that was.
Not that 1976 was perfect 'cause- it obviously was not. And there was many people that were struggling in, in many ways during that time. But as a person that studies history, where do you personally find hope that this grand experiment in, in democracy can continue, and we can [00:36:00] perhaps regain some of that community pride that was so tangible back in '76?
Kristen Epps: Yeah. I... You know, the world is very different today, partly because people are very siloed. We are at home watching Netflix. We're getting our information from Facebook or Instagram. We don't have those c- those community events in the same way that they had before the internet. I don't wanna imply that they don't exist, but So what we need to do then is, like you said, look for ways to celebrate that. And I personally, I think I find hope in the next generation in a lot of ways. I work with college students. They are just starting out in their adult life, and I see a lot of joy. Also, they're stressed out. You know, they have papers and finals. But I see a lot of joy and a lot of curiosity about the world, and being curious and staying [00:37:00] curious is, I think, one of the most important skills, if you wanna call it a skill, that anyone can have, is being curious about others, being curious also, you know, sort of s- about yourself.
Why are you making the decisions you make? And for me, as someone who's now sort of mid-career, I hope I can always kind of latch on to those, to those young folks and, and see the optimism, not always optimism, but s- but often optimism that they have for the America that they wanna build, that they wanna see.
Gus Applequist: That's a heck of a good answer.
Sydney Collins: That's a great answer. Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Thank you so much for taking time to come and be on Ask a Kansan today. It was really a pleasure having you.
[00:38:00]
Post Interview Reflections
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Gus Applequist: Well, we hope you enjoyed that interview with Kristen.
Sydney Collins: I always find it fascinating how many different avenues there, there are in just history in general. And I like her perspective on making the people and what they experienced kind of the core of what, what kinda- she does, is the experience of it. ' Cause a lot of times we read things and we disas- like, we dissociate ourselves from what they, like, are experiencing. But you have to understand, like, these things actually happened. It's not just some magical world where it's like, oh, that doesn't matter to me now. No, these, these things happened.
I
Gus Applequist: Think Dr. Epps highlighted another one of those you know, like the subtlety of history, the nuance of history, and that, like, w- we've all been told that, you know, well, we, we can be [00:39:00] proud that we were a free state.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: And that the truth is more complicated than that. And that you know, there's a, there's a narrative out there right now about like, "Well, I don't wanna feel shame." You know, I don't necessarily want anybody to feel shame, but I do think we have to acknowledge the things that have happened in our world and in our state.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: And, and until we, we reckon with some of those things we're just kind of uncovering or covering up things that are just uncomfortable, and that's never good.
Sydney Collins: Very much so.
Gus Applequist: Well, I see you have something for us.
Sydney Collins: Yes. We haven't done a Kansas history in a while.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Sydney Collins: Let me bring up my notes.
Gus Applequist: Great episode to do it.
Sydney Collins: Yep. So I tried to theme this Ame- around America 250.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Sydney Collins: We'll see how close I got. I just found some really cool stories that I haven't heard before.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Exodusters Black Migration
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Sydney Collins: Kansas was the destination of one of America's first great Black migrations. So this happened in 1879, so the Exoduster movement of 1879 brought thousands of formerly enslaved African Americans to [00:40:00] Kansas seeking land, opportunity, and freedom.
The National Archives describes it as the first major voluntary mass migration of African Americans after Reconstruction. Estimates suggest 40 to 60,000 people participated with Kansas as their primary destination. I've never heard those numbers before. I think the numbers is what surprised me s- surprised me the most.
Gus Applequist: There's a lot on this screen that I've-
Sydney Collins: There's a lot going on
Gus Applequist: Ho for Kansas is quite a slogan.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. So this is a flyer that I found. I believe this excerpt is from the National Archives is where I got it from. But it says, "Ho for Kansas. Brethren, friends, and fellow citizens, I feel thankful to inform you that the Real Estate and Homestead Association will leave here the 15th of April, 1878, in pursuit of homes in the southwestern lands of America. Transportation rates cheaper than ever was known," yada, yada, yada, yada. So, [00:41:00] like-
Gus Applequist: Okay. Yeah. The next line is interesting. It says "Benjamin Singleton, better known as Old Pap."
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: I'm assuming he's the organizer of all this. This is from Nashville, Tennessee, March 18th, 1878. There's, there's a lot of things that, i've always I've always liked the word Exoduster. Yeah. I'm really curious what the etymology, etymology, entomology. Yeah. I've always been confused-
Sydney Collins: I wonder if it's in here ...
Gus Applequist: if I'm studying insects or words, but Exoduster's just a really interesting word. So need to look that up.
Sydney Collins: Next one.
Camels And Prehistory
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Sydney Collins: What? Kansas was once home to camels, sort of. This is a better fact than folklore. Giant camel fossils have been discovered across Kansas. Millions of years ago before humans arrived, camels actually evolved in North America, and fossil evidence shows camel species lived in is now what is Kansas.
Gus Applequist: Wait, so are you saying, like-
Sydney Collins: They're skeletal ...
Gus Applequist: like camels, like in the Sahara-
they can be traced back to North America?
Sydney Collins: Apparently.
Gus Applequist: Wow.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. it's from a reputable source at KU. I cannot remember the website now.
Gus Applequist: Okay.
Sydney Collins: [00:42:00] But,
Gus Applequist: Wow ...
Sydney Collins: from their, like, ecological
Gus Applequist: When, when you get into the prehistoric stuff-
it, Kansas was weird.
Sydney Collins: Very weird.
Sydney Collins: All right.
Kansas And Modern EMS
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Sydney Collins: A Kansas doctor helped create the modern emergency medical system.
Sydney Collins: So, it actually wasn't Dr.
Norman that you see. I'll, I'll mention who the... Dr. Norman has different things, but because Kansas serves large rural areas, the state became an early leader in developing coordinated EMS trauma care and paramedic training systems that helped improve emergency care across long distances. So I'm tr- I'll try to summarize this because it is a long article, but it's a good article.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: And it's from The Journal of Emergency Medicine.
Gus Applequist: Wow.
Sydney Collins: Basically the history of emergency medical services, or EMS dates to the Battle of Waterloo when Napoleon's s- surgeon-in-chief, Dominique Jean Larrey developed the new concept of, [00:43:00] quote, flying ambulances, unquote. In the USA, the first civilian-run ambulance system was established in 1865 at the Cit- Cincinnati Commercial Hospital. In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson received a report stating that more Americans were killed in automobile accidents alone in 1965 than in the Korean War.
Gus Applequist: Oh, wow.
Sydney Collins: So highlighting the shortcomings of EMS.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Sydney Collins: So if you're wondering when that all took place, that's it.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: So this led to the formation of the National Highway Safety Administration- which in 1969 created the first nationally recognized curriculum for emergency medical technicians and ambulance systems. So where does Kansas come into play with this?
Great question. The Kansas State Legislature passed a bill requiring expansion of EMS led by Dr. Norman McSwain-
Gus Applequist: What a name
Sydney Collins: of the [00:44:00] University of Kansas Medical Center. with the goal that 40% of the Kansas population would have access to emergency mobile intensive care by 1976.
In Kansas, many people played a role in the early development of EMS. Dr. Dennis Allin, A-L-L-I-N emergency medicine f- physician, served in multiple service and leadership roles throughout the development of Kansas EMS.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: So under his leadership, all state p- paramedic training programs were standardized in a nationally accredited education
Gus Applequist: You know, obviously our healthcare system is, is, it's a challenge because we have counties with a thousand- residents and, and so it's not like it's perfect, but, but I can't imagine what Kansas would be- without EMS today and the, you know, the helicopter services and things that get people around. I also just have to comment on Dr. Norman McSwain's style here.
Sydney Collins: I love it.
Gus Applequist: This is- There, it's- You said '60s, right?
Or '70s. '70s. [00:45:00] He's got, he's got all three. He's got the hair. The plaid suit. He's got the plaid jacket and the enormous tie.
Sydney Collins: The giant tie.
Gus Applequist: It's... If you're watching-
Sydney Collins: He does have a good set of hair, though ...
Gus Applequist: you're gonna have to check this, this-
Sydney Collins: I'll give him that.
Gus Applequist: Oh, yeah.
Sydney Collins: He has a good head of hair.
Gus Applequist: Dr. Norman. My
goodness.
Sydney Collins: Goodness gracious. Yeah, I thought that w- I had no idea-
when I, when I was doing research today. So, I think there might be one more. Oh, yeah.
Speed Kansas Hot Wheels
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Sydney Collins: Speed, Kansas.
I- we might have talked about this one already. I don't know. So Speed is a small rural city in S- in Speed, in Kansas, my bad. Located in Phillips County in North Central Kansas. Founded in 1890s and incorporated in 1928. It is one of the state's smallest incorporated communities with a population of 37- according to the 2020 census.
Gus Applequist: It's amazing they're incorporated.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. But the fun fact is, is that in the year of 2008, Speed held a special event for the Hot Wheels 40th anniversary cross-country road [00:46:00] trip.
This event was only one of six stops in the United States. It brought well over 10,000 individuals to the area in celebration of Hot Wheels.
Gus Applequist: Well, to those 37 folks living in Speed, if, if you wanna do this again, I think we might have to go and visit. I'm, I'm, I wouldn't say I'm the world's biggest Hot Wheels fan, but but Hot Wheels are fun.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. Hot Wheels are s- are still a thing. So I thought that was kind of fun.
Gus Applequist: That is fun.
Sydney Collins: But yeah, that's all I got for today. Just fun little Kansas, like, trying to find the real obscure things today.
Gus Applequist: I like it.
Very good. Very good.
Well, you've done it.
Episode Wrap And Farewell
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Gus Applequist: You've reached the end of another episode of Ask a Kansan.
Sydney Collins: Happy birthday. Hope everyone still has all of their fingers after the great 4th of July.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, 250 years, that's a big deal. Yeah. That's a quarter of a millennium, you know?
Sydney Collins: It not... we're still the youngest of many- ... but we're getting there.
Gus Applequist: We sure are. Yeah.
Sydney Collins: Make sure to check us out on askaKansan.com. Sign up for our Curious Kansan newsletter, and make sure to check out the merch page.
Gus Applequist: Thank you so much for watching, and we will see you in [00:47:00] the next one.
Sydney Collins: Thank you so much. Bye.