This Day in Kansas History - March

These entries are taken from The Annals of Kansas, 1541-1885 by D.W. Wilder, The Annals of Kansas, 1886-1925 edited by Kirke Mechem, and contributed by staff members of the Kansas State Historical Society (these entries are marked with an *). Other sources used will be noted. This is not meant to be a comprehensive list of events in Kansas history.

March

1 - [1885] - State Census. Population, 1,268,562; males 679,316; females, 589,246; native -- males, 601,962; females, 533,925; foreign -- males, 77,354; females, 55,321; white -- male, 654,841; females, 565,514; [black] -- males, 24,379; females, 23,655.

2 - [1867] - State Historical Society organized. Samuel A. Kingman, President; C.K. Holliday, Vice President; D.W. Stormont, Treasurer; Andrew Stark, Librarian; S.D. Bowker, Corresponding Secretary; George A. Crawford, Recording Secretary. [The present Kansas State Historical society was not organized until 1875.]

3 - [1887] - Coronado and Leoti, rivals for the Wichita county seat, were surrounded by armed guards, and strangers were not allowed to enter. Merchants carried guns while waiting on customers. Streets were patrolled day and night.

4 - [1854] - At five o'clock in the morning, after a night session, the Kansas-Nebraska bill passes the Senate by 37 to 14. Its title is, "An act to organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas." Not further acted upon.

5 - [1868] - The two German papers of Leavenworth consolidate, and take the name Zeitung.

Senator Ross is reported by telegraph as opposed to impeachment.

P.H. Hubbell stops the Grasshopper Falls Gazette, and starts the Ellsworth Advocate.

Meetings of settlers on the Osage and Neutral Lands, demanding a chance to buy their homes at the price established by law.

Douglas county twice enjoined from issuing bonds to the L.L.&G.

6 - [1662] - Don Diego de Penalosa begins his march from Santa Fe. The expedition came eastward about 500 miles, and reached Quivira. [Quivira was near present day St. Joseph, MO]

7 - [1903] - C.W. Parker's merry-go-round factory at Abilene had a special order from China, the motive power to be eight Chinamen.

8 - [1895] - The Legislature adjourned. Laws were passed to: pay bounty to farmers furnishing cane sugar to the factory at Medicine Lodge; maintain the chinch bug experiment station at K.U.; authorize Fort Scott to issue bonds to purchase the building and grounds of Fort Scott Normal; prohibit lotteries, gift enterprises and policies; establish a G.A.R. museum in the Capitol; make Washington's birthday a legal holiday; create a State Board of Irrigation; require fire insurance companies to create a fund for members of fire departments in incorporated cities; provide seed for needy farmers; establish an industrial reformatory at Hutchinson.

9 - [1885] - L.J. Worden, P.M., secures the free-delivery system for Lawrence.

Adjutant General Campbell orders five companies of the State Militia to hold themselves in readiness for active service.

The strikers ask that wages be returned to those before the ten per cent. cut, on the first of October.

10 - [1876] - The Leavenworth Times publishes the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in the [John] Brown confiscation case. The Kansas officers, Thos. A. Osborn, Jas. L. McDowell, James S. Emery and Clark J. Hanks, are required to pay to Mr. Brown, of Virginia, the money in their hands. Brown's Kansas land was sold under an act of Congress confiscating the property of Rebels.

11 - [1912] - At Fort Riley officers of the Sixth field artillery and their wives rode in a huge sleigh with bobsleds attached, pulled by 22 teams of artillery horses and escorted by 12 guidon carriers and 12 trumpeters.

12 - [1888] - Towns along the Santa Fe were out of fuel. The Garden City Herald reported that "several young society gents were seen on their way to the residence of their best girls last night carrying a bucket of coal."

13 - [1902] - Paul Troutman, Emporia high school boy, built a telephone line on fences in the Comiskey neighborhood and was paid 50 cents a month by farmers for its upkeep.

14 - [1917] - The Legislature adjorned. Laws were passed requiring approval of the Public Utilities Commission to build bridges or dams across navigable streams or rivers; requiring approval of the State Board of Health for building vaults or mausoleums; providing for the adoption and regulation of the city manager form of government by cities wanting it; regulating streetcar traffic; providing for condemnation and appropriation of land by oil and pipeline companies; authorizing counties to levy taxes to pay for extermination of grasshoppers; prohibiting the sale, giving away or advertisement of cigarettes or cigarette papers; providing for a Kansas Water Commission to investigate and control flood prevention, drainage, water power and irrigation; setting the minority age of both men and women at 21; creating the office of State Fire Marshal; providing for the protection of game birds; authorizing the State Board of Health to make regulations for control of diseases; making it unlawful for any person to have intoxicating liquor in his possession and prohibiting transportation of liquor, except for medicinal uses; providing for compensation for injured workmen; providing for an eight-hour day in lead and zinc mines; creating a State Highway Commission and prescribing its duties; providing for distribution of federal funds for vocational education; establishing a State Board of Administration to manage state institutions; establishing a State Industrial Farm for women.

15 - [1862] - Kansas soldiers at Fort Riley destroy the office of the Kansas Frontier News, a disloyal paper published at Junction City.

16 - [1878] - Osage City is declared the county seat of Osage county; the vote of the county was about 9,000.

17 - [1856] - Senator Douglas, from the Committee on Territories, introduces a bill to authorize the people of Kansas to form a constitution; recommitted, June 25.

18 - [1884] - Special session of the Legislature. A.P. Riddle is elected President pro tem. of the Senate. Funston, Greene, Patchin and Sluss absent. In the House, one vacancy has been caused by the death of Dr. J.D. Bain, of Barton county. Of the other seven vacancies, Orner of Barber county, James of Shawnee, Waters and Crichton of Labette, and Bissell of Phillips, leave empty chairs by acceptance of Federal offices. Bishop of Smith, Carr of Harper, and Weimar, have vacated their places by removal from their districts. In the case of Phillips county, the people have sent up a substitute, by election at the regular time last fall, but there was lacking a proclamation by the Governor of the vacancy and for the election of a successor. Mr. W.H. McBride, the person elected, had a clear majority in a vote of 1,327, and is present. Mr. Bishop, of Smith county, is also here.

19 - [1880] - John A. Halderman appointed Minister to Bangkok, Siam.

20 - [1879] - An "exodus" of [blacks] from the South to Kansas. Benj. Singleton, of Morris county, is President of the Invitation Committee in "Sunny Kansas."

21 - [1936] - Kansas is enjoying the greatest boom in the oil industry since its peak year of 1919. [Ives, Footprints on the Sands of Time]

22 - [1922] - The Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. was installing a dial telephone system at Topeka at a cost of $1,250,000.

23 - [1881] - A large public meeting in Leavenworth takes formal action against the prohibitory law.

24 - [1890] - Prairie fires in southern and western Kansas destroyed thousands of dollars worth of grain, livestock and other property. The loss in Sedgwick county was estimated at $150,000.

25 - [1854] - William Walker, the half-breed Wyandot chief, writes: "Slavery exists here, among the Indians and whites, in defiance of the compromise of 1820."

26 - [1879] - "Gold" found in Cowley county.

27 - [1897] - Two men robbed the Caney bank of $40,000 in broad daylight. One was recognized as Henry Starr, former member of the Dalton gang.

28 - [1837] - The act of June 7, 1836, takes effect by the proclamation of March 28, 1837, and the western boundary of Missouri is extended to the Missouri river.

29 - [1877] - The Commonwealth says: We are in receipt, from the publishing house of Geo. W. Martin, of a copy of a Historical Sketch of the Presbyterian Church in Kansas, read before the Synod of Kansas, at its meeting at Topeka, October 6, 1876. The "sketch" proper occupies twenty-six pages, and is vigorously written. We learn from it that "the first regular preaching of the gospel on the soil of Kansas was by the Baptists, who established a mission among the Shawnees in the year 1831," within the present county of Wyandotte. The Presbyterian Church began her work in Kansas in 1835, when the Western Foreign Missionary Society, which had its headquarters in Pittsburgh, sent the Rev. Joseph Kerr and Rev. Wells Bushnell to the Wea Indians, living near where Ottawa now is. Mr. Bushnell remained but a few months but Mr. Kerr remained, and in 1836 he gathered a church of eight or ten Indians. This was the first Presbyterian church on Kansas soil.

30 - [1855] - About one thousand Missourians, under Samuel Young and Claiborne F. Jackson, arrive in Lawrence to vote, and do vote. Mrs. Robinson says: "They were armed with guns, pistols, rifles, and bowie-knives. They brought two cannon loaded with musket balls."

31 - [1915] - In the past 20 years Kansas had increased nine percent in population, 400 percent in value of crops, 200 percent in livestock, eggs and horticulture, 300 percent in manufacturers, and 400 percent in mineral output, the State Board of Agriculture reported.