TOPEKA – The Kansas Humanities Council (KHC)
recently awarded Sumner County Historical & Genealogical Society of
Wellington a $3,500 grant for the “Prairie Letters: Written in Rural Kansas in
the Late Nineteenth Century” project.
Jane Moore,
SCHGS president said that in 2012 the Sumner County Historical and Genealogical
Society received a notebook containing the “Prairie Letters,” letters that had
been written primarily in the 1870’s by Emily Sell, one of Kansas’ earliest
setters. Sell homesteaded in the Rome, Kansas area with her husband. Moore said that even though Kansas was opened
to settlement in 1854 and became a state in 1861, there were only 22 white
people living in Sumner County by 1870 (The
Sumner County Story, Paul and Gwendoline Sanders, 1966, p. 9). Sumner County was not fully organized until
Nov. 7, 1871.
“When I saw that the first letters were dated
1870, and learned that there were only about 22 white people living in Sumner
County in 1870, I couldn’t imagine what life must have been like for those
early settlers,” said Elaine Clark, Prairie Letters Project Director and grant
author.
There have
been histories written about other areas of Sumner County during this time
period, but very few collections of letters have been discovered which give a
first-person perspective,” Clark said,
“that makes this collection of letters a priceless, irreplaceable piece
of Kansas history.”
“Transcription
and preservation of these letters will give future historians, researchers,
genealogists, and those interested in early settlement of the Midwest a
first-person account of the hardships and difficulties of early homesteaders,”
said Moore.
“Historical
details about settlement in the Rome, Kansas, area are sketchy, but the town was
officially organized in 1884,” Moore said, adding that SCHGS members involved in transcribing
Emily’s letters to friends and family are eager to learn about early-day
settlement of Sumner County through the eyes and viewpoint of the homesteader
and his wife.
Clark said she and her husband, Larry Clark,
traveled to Jordan Cemetery recently to view and photograph Emily’s grave
stone.
“I stood there and wondered what her life was
like,” Clark said, adding that “these letters reveal much about the early days
of Sumner County and the hardships and sorrows that families endured. We tend to take food, warmth, air
conditioning, doctors and medical care for granted, but these letters share the
facts of everyday life for Kansas’ early settlers, babies that died because no
doctors were available, weeks that go by before getting letters from family and
friends, and children who can’t get an education because they live too far from
school or they are needed to work on the farm.”
“These situations would seem foreign to
today’s young people,” Clark said.
Clark said
that some of the letters are almost unreadable because of fading, so it is
imperative for the SCHGS to transcribe these letters as soon as possible.
“This
Heritage Grant from the Kansas Humanities Council will assist in preserving
this treasure,” Clark said, “I can hardly wait to do the
transcribing.”
Clark added that as the project progresses and they learn
more about the contents of the letters, they will share information on the
website at www.ksschgs.com, blog at www.ks-schgs.blogspot.com, SCHGS Facebook page
and in area publications.
“KHC Heritage grants encourage the
preservation of local cultural resources,” said Julie Mulvihill, executive
director of the Kansas Humanities Council. “This transcription project will
preserve these one-of-a-kind primary source documents for generations to come.
What a treat to find out what stories these letters will tell.”
The Kansas
Humanities Council is a nonprofit organization that supports community-
based
cultural programs, serves as a financial resource through an active
grant-making
program, and encourages Kansans to engage in the civic and cultural
life of their communities. For more
information, visit www.kansashumanities.org.
