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Friday, April 27, 1973
University Daily Kansan
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Folklore Reflects Kansas Tradition
By BILL GIBSON
Kennan Staff Writer
Kansan Staff Writer
The folklore of Kansas is crowded with ghosts, renegades, Indians, immigrants and
Folk art and tales and legends of these and other characters reflect a rich Kansas cultural heritage. Smith, associate professor of anthropology and chairman of the Kansas Folkcore
Legends are one aspect of the folklore of a region.
Many of the tales and legends of the Lawrence area concern the looting and burning of the town by the renegade William Quantrill and his raiders in 1863.
According to legend, an Indian made a heroic attempt to warn the townpeople of the impending raid. Chickasaw Indians had spotted Quantrill's approaching band and were horrified, narrow, a member of the tribe, to mount their swiftest horse and ride to warn the town.
The horse became completely wounded during the guiding ride. Impatient and concerned about the town, Running Sparrow continued to climb with his knife and poured gunpowder in the wound. The horse reared and continued on, but died five miles from town. Running Sparrow, continued on foot, but arrived only six minutes before the smoke of the barking buildings.
Many of the 150 people who were killed in the raid were buried in a common graveyard in East Lawrence, according to one of Smith's students. Legend has it that on each anniversary of the raid, which was over a decade ago, gravestones rises and walks about the cemetery.
Another Indian legend fostered the belief that the east side of a hill in south Topika would never be struck by a tornado. The Indians who lived on the hill believed that a tornado would jump over the east side causing no damage.
The legend was small comfort to those who lived on the hill in 1968 when a tornado swept through the area uproading trees and branches, and where dinners on the Washburn University campus.
The University of Kansas is not without its own legend. One of the most famous colleges in the country, it was founded by Jesse E. Smith.
The story has been told so many times that the exact date has been lost, but it is still known.
doing her laundry in the Corbin Hall basement supposedly was stabbed by a custodian and left to die. She crawled back inside. She desperately scratched at the door, she desperately scratched at the door.
Her roommate, frightened by the scratching, shoved a desk in front of the door and huddled in a corner of the room. Her roommate walked into the room. Roommate living dead in a pool of blood:
Many coeds, having heard this tale, have been reduced to hysteries by what they thought were scratchings at their own doors by the ghost. Some have said that the ghost breaks objects and runs down the hails storming loudly and shrieking.
But legends are only one part of the region's folklore, which includes folk music, dancing, family histories, house styles, recipes, dialects and costumes.
Smith said that this heritage was all around but was ignored by or unknown to most people. He said that regional cultural traditions involved great art and deserved to be recognized along with the works of the educational elite.
"It is what has transcended from history or how things were derived from the past.
"When you study your heritage you are studying things that are still alive," he said.
"I think college students have recognized this and have begun studying their heritage."
But too many students are trying to discover heritage in a theater situation, he said, rather than in actual participation in such cultural events as square dancing and folk singing, which are still a part of community activities.
"We draw these boundary lines without knowing that we draw them," he said. "Thus there is no communication from one to another about their cultural activities."
Smith said that ignorance of native regional culture was the result of an in-
state, especially around Garden City,
Chicago. In the city, there are many
Chicano communities.
"Some people think that Kansas is a homogeneous state. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have many different ethnic groups in Kansas, including Swedish, Chicano, German, Mononite and Russian communities."
Many of these groups still speak Spanish, wear Mexican costumes, celebrate Mexican Independence Day, use folk medicines and retain Mexican religious customs.
Chiccone originally came to Kansas as a creeper labor for the railroads. Thus, all railroad workers in Chiccone were
Several of these ethnic communities hold festivals and celebrations that feature native customs to renew interest in their cultural heritage.
Smith said the Kansas heritage was a cross between the farming and cattle-raising influences. Thus, even farmers who had never been raised on grass such as high-booted heeled boots and western hats.
He said the area was rich with festivals and celebrations, including centennials and county fairs where both catteraising and goods and techniques were displaced.
The traditional music of the plains area is country or bluegrass music, which has been revived recently. The fiddle and banjo are the principal instruments.
Square dancing is characteristic of the heritage of Kansas. Smith said that many square dancing groups continue the tradition despite general public ignorance or apathy.
Because of migration patterns, regional traditions overlap and spread all across the country. Smith said that a Kansan was not feel out of place on the east or west coast, where country music and even square dancing have become common.
Frat to Celebrate 50th Anniversary
The Gamma Chapter of Sigma Phi Epison at the University of Gama willms for its 10th anniversary.
Chancellor Raymond Nichols, along with national representatives of Sigma Phi Epsilon including executive vice president, Don Johnson, will be among the celebrants.
According to chapter president Tom paulson the founders and over 150 will attend.
Events include an open house followed by a dinner party at the EIK's club with slides showing the fraternity's history and guest speakers.
City Apartment Guide Available At Consumer Protection Agency
A guide to 57 Lawrence apartment complexes is now available, according to Ray Berman, codirector of the Lawrence Consumer Protection Agency (CPA).
Information concerning each complex lists rent and deposit costs, number of rooms, furnishings, appliances and bills the renter is responsible for.
The apartment complex guide, a project of the agency, was compiled with the assistance of the Unorganized Housing Association, a University of Kansas student group. The pamphlets are available at the office, Room 229 in the Kansas Union.
"We plan to contact the dean of women's office and the dean of men's office to discuss a case," he said.
students," said Richard Lauter, Evanston,
Housatou Association of the Unorganized
Housing Association.
The apartment guides will be mailed to all fall KU students by the personnel office, located at 1730 Pine Street.
A "poor people's survey" should be available to students by fall, Berman said. This pamphlet will consider the housing in the East Lawrence area.
The agency has plans to compile a more extensive book next year concerning other types of housing. Duplexes, mobile homes, and townhouses that are not a part of a complex will be listed.
The expanded plans also include suggestions on housing and rating of the buildings.
In a Hindu monastery in Brazil Anne Kalsa护救 her life long studies of the relationships of pasture and man in Indian culture and of the Indians, she examined the imprint of their bone feet in the earth and found that she intimately sank to a lower level in her bones, which she experienced with this principle. For ten years she developed and refined her designs. She loved sculpting and painted on her bones and more. Every nuance of her form grew out of her interior involvement. She was guided by her master, Ms. Amalina, who taught the shoe themselves. The leading physicians and arthropodists in Denmark and other countries has been awarded patients in every major country.
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Brochure available.
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816 531 9082
George Carlin
Kenny Rankin
In Concert University of Kansas, Hoch Auditorium
Saturday, May 5, 8 p.m.
Tickets 4.00,4.50. All seats reserved
Tickets are on sale NOW at Kiefs, Mall Shopping Center, and the Town Crier, 919 Mass. Tickets will also be on sale Monday April 30, 10 a.m., at the On Campus Booth, Jayhawk Blvd. There will be a 10 ticket limit per person on tickets sold at the On Campus Booth, on Monday April 30. These are the best seats available.
A KU-Y Production