Little Barn on the Prairie

Upon completion, ranch owner Stephen F. Jones learned that his barn was one of the largest barns in the state of Kansas at the time.

Like most of the buildings on the ranch, the Spring Hill barn was built of limestone ...

Prairie for the People

When Stephen F. Jones began acquiring this property for his Spring Hill Ranch in 1878, Kansas had been a state for 17 years, and much of the Kansas prairie was already being converted into cropland.

The majority of the land which ...

Huffman Prairie

1904 - 1905

The hawk which now takes his flight over the top of the wood was at first, perchance, only a leaf which fluttered in its aisles. -Henry David Thoreau

After their first successful flight at Kitty Hawk in 1903, the ...

Claridon Prairie

This grass land, extending one mile east between the road and the railway, is one of the few surviving remnants of the once extensive prairies that were part of pioneer Marion County. This strip, preserved by chance when the railway ...

Prairie Mission

A United Presbyterian Mission

Prairie Mission was established in 1894 by the Freedmen’s Board of the United Presbyterian Church of North America to educate the children of ex-slaves. The Mission consisted of a church, school building, dormitories for male and female ...

A Prairie Reborn

These rambling acres of grass and greenery might not look like a carefully planned landscape. Yet they are part of an ongoing restoration effort begun in 1939 to undo the effects of 76 years of farming, restoring agricultural fields to ...

St. Michael's Prairie / The Lewis and Clark Expedition

St. Michael's Prairie

St. Michael’s Prairie, the site where St. Joseph would be established, was identified on maps at least as early as 1792. French explorers and trappers had been traveling up and down the Missouri River since the early 1700s, ...

Prairie Grove

The community of Prairie Grove began in 1845 and became a place for early settlers to gather. A cemetery began in 1849 when the young daughter of John M. and Caroline Stovall died. In the 1880s a school/church building was ...

Prairie Home Companions

The semi-arid plains are home to hundreds of wildlife species. but even species specialty adapted for life on the prairie need water to survive. The South Platte River and nearby State Wildlife Areas provide excellent habitat for a variety of ...

The Prairie States Forestry Project

The Prairie States Forestry Project was initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935 to combat the severe wind-caused soil erosion of the Dust Bowl days. From 1935 through 1942, the U.S. Forest Service, working with the Works Progress Administration ...