Kansas Trivia & Tidbits

Looking for Kansas trivia? Try our list Kansas little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

The first mammals to survive space flight were a rhesus monkey named Able and a squirrel monkey named Baker. The monkeys blasted into space aboard a Jupiter missile. Able was born at the Ralph Mitchell Zoo in Independence (pop. 9,846).

first appeared: 10/18/2009

Antique trucks and a bus jut out of the ground, with either their hoods or bumpers pointed skyward, at Truckhenge. An automotive version of England's Stonehenge, Truckhenge was created by artist Ron Lessman on his family farm in Topeka.

first appeared: 10/4/2009

The state's largest city is Wichita with a population of 344,284. Incorporated in 1870, the city is located at the junction of the Arkansas and Little Arkansas rivers.

first appeared: 9/20/2009

The state's oldest consecutive rodeo is the Flint Hills Rodeo in Strong City (pop. 584), begun in 1937 by the Emmett Roberts family and held every year since.

first appeared: 9/6/2009

Kavya Shivashankar, 13, of Olathe (pop. 92,962), spelled her way to the top of the 2009 Scripps National Spelling Bee by correctly spelling "laodicean," meaning lukewarm or indifferent in religion or politics. Kavya, who hopes to become a neurosurgeon, won $40,000 in cash and prizes, plus a trophy.

first appeared: 8/23/2009

The Blue Rapids (pop. 1,088) Public Library, built in 1875, is one of the state's oldest libraries in its original building. A group of women opened the library with 143 donated books in a store in 1874.

first appeared: 8/9/2009

With more than 9,500 acres and brisk wind, Cheney Reservoir in Cheney (pop. 1,783) is a popular sailing lake. Several national sailing regattas have taken place at the lake.

first appeared: 7/26/2009

—After being elected in 1901, the all-woman city council and mayor in Haddam (pop. 169) didn't waste any time building a jail for the confinement of Haddam's unruly men. The limestone calaboose still stands.

first appeared: 7/12/2009

—The only American maker of professional-level violins, violas, cellos and basses is K.C. Strings in Merriam (pop. 11,008). The company crafts, restores, rents and sells a complete line of stringed instruments used by musicians worldwide.

first appeared: 6/28/2009

—Students in the entrepreneurship class at Oakley High School get hands-on business experience while providing Oakley (pop. 2,173) with entertainment as they manage the community-owned Palace movie theater.

first appeared: 6/14/2009

—The Leavenworth (pop. 35,420) home of Fred Harvey, who operated a chain of restaurants called Harvey Houses along the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, is being restored as the National Fred Harvey Museum. Harvey lived there from 1883 until his death in 1901.

first appeared: 5/31/2009

—About 275 competitive barbecuing teams will put their best meat forward as they vie for $73,000 in prize money at The Great American Barbecue on Memorial Day weekend in Bonner Springs (pop. 6,768).

first appeared: 5/17/2009

—Black painter and graphic artist Aaron Douglas (1899-1979), born in Topeka, moved to Harlem in 1925 and played a leading role in the black cultural movement known as the Harlem Renaissance. His work includes murals at the 135th Street branch of the New York Public Library, now the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

first appeared: 5/3/2009

–Lt. Gen. Frank E. Petersen, born in 1932 in Topeka, became the first black pilot in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1952.

first appeared: 4/19/2009

—The Allen-Lambe House Museum in Wichita was designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright in 1915 and is considered to be the last of his "Prairie Houses." The house was built for Henry J. Allen, who served as governor from 1919 to 1923.

first appeared: 4/5/2009

—The last Kodak-certified Kodachrome processing lab in the nation is Dwayne's Photo in Parsons (pop. 11,514), where about 100 employees process the 35 mm color slide film introduced in 1935 by Kodak.

first appeared: 3/22/2009

—One of the biggest barns in the state is the Cooper Barn, built in 1936 in Breton and measuring 114 feet long, 66 feet wide and 48 feet tall. The enormous barn was moved in 1992 to the Prairie Museum of Art and History in Colby (pop. 5,450).

first appeared: 3/8/2009

—Founded in 1879, WaKeeney (pop. 1,924) was named by combining the last names of Albert Warren and James Keeney, owners of the Chicago land company that planned the city.

first appeared: 2/22/2009

—During World War II, a POW camp near Concordia (pop. 5,714) housed about 4,000 prisoners. The $1.8 million compound had 304 buildings, including a hospital, warehouses, barracks, mess halls, administrative offices and a fire department.

first appeared: 2/8/2009

—Born in 1923 in El Dorado (pop. 12,057), cartoonist Mort Walker is best known for the comic strip Beetle Bailey, about a work-shirking U.S. Army private, which was syndicated in 1950.

first appeared: 1/11/2009

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