Geography and Industry

Kansas is wheat country. It is an even tableland that rises gradually from the lowland prairies in the eastern part of Kansas to the much drier western plains that border the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, in neighboring Colorado. The major rivers that drain the state are the Arkansas and the Kansas rivers, both of which flow southeastward through Kansas on their way to the Mississippi (although the Kansas River flows into the Missouri River first).

The climate is good for wheat, but can be hard on humans. Hot and humid in the eastern part and hot and dry in the western part during the summer months (which are also tornado season), Kansas can be bitterly cold during the winter (which is the blizzard season).

As stated above, Kansas is a wheat state. In fact, many people would say that Kansas is the wheat state! Kansas is the number-one-producing wheat state in the country. For a very long time, farming was Kansas's leading industry. In addition to wheat, the state also produces plenty of sorghum and corn, and beef cattle.

But farming is no longer Kansas's leading industry. Nowadays Kansas is a leading maker of computer parts and transportation equipment such as airplanes. Lots of planes are now built in Wichita, which has become an aerospace town.

WORDS TO KNOW

Tornado

A tornado is a weather phenomenon that causes air to spin in evertighter circles until it forms what is known as a funnel cloud. This spinning storm can be like a top, sliding all over a vast area and crushing everything in its path. Tornadoes are usually very destructive and often fatal, so be careful if you ever see one in person!

History

The first Europeans to visit Kansas were the members of the Spanish conquistador Coronado's expedition, which passed through in 1541. They were searching for gold. They found a mostly flat, rolling country cut by huge, fast-flowing rivers.

When the French arrived to claim the region as their own and make it part of the sprawling Louisiana country in the late seventeenth century, there were several large tribes of Native Americans living in what is now Kansas. These tribes included the Kansa (for whom the state is named), the Osage, the Wichita, and the Pawnee.

When horses were introduced into the region, many of the Native Americans quit farming in the eastern part of the state, and moved out onto the plains to become nomadic buffalo hunters. The Pawnee in particular became skilled trackers and hunters on horseback. Many of them later worked for the U.S. Army as scouts in the government's wars against other tribes.

Because much of Kansas was covered in prairie grass that was too thick to be plowed, it was seen as part of the Great American Desert. Is it any wonder that many of those Native Americans you've been reading about in the previous chapters wound up getting sent to the “desert” part of Kansas? Many others were removed even farther south into what was then called Indian Territory, and what we today call Oklahoma.

Because it was close to Missouri and other southern border states, Kansas got caught up in the struggle over slavery during the decade preceding the American Civil War (1861–65). There was a bitter struggle between people who had moved to Kansas from slave states, such as Missouri, and wanted Kansas as another slave state for the Union, and those people who had come to settle Kansas from the northern free states.

This was a mini civil war that preceded the larger one that occurred across the country just a couple of years afterward. This fight and the territory itself were referred to as Bleeding Kansas.