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James Wilcox / KANSAN
One item in the new exhibit at the Museum of Anthropology in Spooner Hall is a lithograph of the Town of Kansas dating from 1855. The lithograph is by John H. Butford from a drawing by F. Buckeridge.
A TOWN CALLED KANSAS
A new exhibit at the Museum of Anthropology provides a glimpse of what life was like on the midwestern frontier.
James Wilcox / KANSAN
Nicky Proudfoot, a non-traditional student from Panama City, Panama, examines items from eighteenth century Kansas City in a new exhibit entitled "A Lifeline to the Frontier; the town of Kansas" at the Museum of Anthropology in Spooner Hall.
By Cathleen Slecha and Susan Wiley
Kansan staff writers
One hundred and fifty-five years ago, a riverfront settlement called the Town of Kansas was a vital part of western frontier expansion. It was a lifeline for settlers, traders and prospectors.
Today, this area is known as Kansas City. Mo. And although the days of the frontier are gone, clues still remain that give insight into life in the 1800s.
Excavations that began in 1992 at the original town site in Kansas City, Mo., have uncovered over 175 artifacts that will be on display at the Museum of Anthropology in Spooner Hall April 23 through July 31.
"This exhibit is the result of two years' worth of archival and archeological work," said Mary Adair, curator for the museum and director of the excavation. "It includes documents, photos, maps, personal diary accounts and artifacts that are just a slice of everyday life in the 1800s. They give the viewer a feel for how important this town was in terms of the western areas being settled."
When Dean Sather, a graduate teaching assistant of anthropology and the field assistant for the excavation, joined the project in 1992, he didn't expect much.
But he found years of archeological history.
Sather said the excavating team went to the Kansas City, Mo., original riverfront settlement because the land was slated for a redevelopment project.
"We wanted to preserve the area or contents of the area before the Town of Kansas was destroyed," he said.
The team included students from the KU-Kansas State Archeological Summer Field School, a group made up of students from both archeological schools who had worked on excavating teams all summer.
The group worked at the site for six weeks and uncovered several artifacts, mainly from the basement of an old dry goods store that had gone untouched for about a century.
Adair said she was amazed by what the group had discovered from its excavation.
Sather said that he had been researching data to trace the land ownership and age of the excavation site.
"I have looked at titles and deeds to track the ownership," he said. "I also pulled out some pieces and went through literature to find dates for them to try to date the town."
Settlement of the western territory began after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and the admission of Missouri into the Union in 1821. In 1839, 14 businessmen platted and chartered the Town of Kansas along the Missouri River near its junction with the Kansas River.
Adair said this new town not only was a connection to the more isolated frontier areas, its natural rock clue offered residents many other advantages.
Accounts tell of as many as 12 steamboats lined up daily at the Town of Kansas levee. Thousands of pounds of merchandise were unloaded for newly opened local stores and westward bound wagons.
Adair said this activity, combined with Indian trade and remnants of the old furtrade business, was the mainstay of the Town of Kansas' economy.
At the Museum of Anthropology, archival photographs and artifacts will be used to depict the growth and development of the town as it responded to such local and national events as steamboat travel, the Civil War and westward settlement.
Census records show that from 1855- 1859, the population of the town grew from 487 residents to 8,000 residents.
But some objects in the exhibit show a more personal side of the 1800's, Adair said. These objects include bone toothbrushes, china doll fragments, medicine bottles, and hand-painted chinaware.
"This town provided a jumping-off point for those who wished to venture west," she said. "But frontiersmen were not the only people there. There were families and children there. The artifacts show this because some of them are very personal objects."
Linda Greatorex, a Washington, D.C., graduate student, helped with case design for the artifacts. Greatorex also recreated a part of the actual excavation site with papier maché and dirt-coated foam rubber in which some of the artifacts are displayed.
"What we've done by replicating a cross-section of the foundation the artifacts were found in is given the viewer a chance to see what they would see if they went to the excavation site themselves." Greatorex said. "This was exciting for me because I'm in the museum studies program, I'm an anthropologist major in the archaeological discipline, and I've done some historical digging in the past, as well. It was great fun to work on the exhibit, and I am very happy with the results."
The "A Lifeline to the Frontier: The Town of Kansas" exhibit will run from April 23 to July 31 in the Museum of Anthropology, located in Spooner Hall. Museum hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sundays.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
People and places at the University of Kansas.
EXHIBITIONS AND LECTURES
Exhibition — Ante America, March 20-May 15 at Spencer Museum of Art.
Tours — "Top Ten Tour" for adults and "Only the Best" for children, 1 p.m. Sunday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Symposium — "The Impact of the Brown Declision on the U.S. in the 1950s," 3:30 p.m. Friday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Symposium — "The Brown Decision and American Education," 4:30 p.m. Friday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Lecture — "How Far Have We Come Since the Brown Decision?" 8 p.m. Friday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Symposium — "The Brown Decision: The NAACP and Civil Rights Activism in Kansas," 9 a.m. Saturday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Symposium — "The Fate of the Civil Rights Movement," 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Symposium — "Where Do We Go From Here?" 11:15 a.m. Saturday at Spencer Museum of Art. Lecture — "An Evening With Harriet Lerner," 8 p.m. tomorrow at the Lied Center.
Exhibition — Considering Space: Photographs from the Collection, through Saturday at Spencer Museum of Art.
Lecture — David Ebitz on "Visitors/Objects: Purposes of the Art Museum," 7 p.m. tomorrow at Spencer Museum of Art.
Program — Women's Recognition Program, 8