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Topeka travel guide

about Topeka

Topeka is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Shawnee County. As of the 2000 census, the population is 122,377.

Several ships of the US Navy have been named USS Topeka in honor of the city.

Topeka geography

Topeka is located at 39°2'21" North, 95°41'22" West (39.039200, -95.689508).¹ Topeka is in north east Kansas at the intersection of I-70 and U.S. Highway 75. It is the origin of I-335 which is a portion of the Kansas Turnpike running from Topeka to Emporia, Kansas. Topeka is also located on U.S. Highway 24 and U.S. Highway 40 which are co-incident from Topeka to Lawrence, Kansas.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 147.6 km² (57.0 mi²). 145.1 km² (56.0 mi²) of it is land and 2.5 km² (1.0 mi²) of it is water. The total area is 1.70% water.

Topeka history

19th Century

In the 1840s, wagon trains made their way west from Independence, Missouri, on a 2,000-mile journey following what would come to be known as the Oregon Trail. About 60 miles west of Kansas City, Missouri, three Kansas Indian sisters established a ferry service allowing travelers to cross the Kansas River at what is now Topeka. During the 40s, travelers could reliably find a way across the river and plenty of whiskey but little else.

In the early 1850s, traffic along the Oregon Trail was supplemented by trade on a new military road stretching from Fort Leavenworth through "Topeka" to the newly-established Fort Riley. In 1854, after completion of the first cabin, six men established the "Topeka Town Association." Included among them was an "idea man" named Cyrus K. Holliday who would become mayor of Topeka and founder of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad. Soon, steamboats were regularly docking at the Topeka landing, depositing meat, lumber, and flour and returning eastward with potatoes, corn, and wheat. By the late 1860s, Topeka had become a commercial hub providing access to many of the Victorian era's comforts.

After a decade of abolitionist and pro-slavery conflict, the Kansas territory was admitted to the Union in 1861 as the 34th state. Topeka was finally chosen as the capital, with Dr. Charles Robinson as the first governor. Cyrus K. Holliday donated a tract of land to the state for the construction of a state capitol.

Although the drought of 1860 and the ensuing period of the Civil War slowed the growth of Topeka and the state, Topeka kept pace with the revival and period of growth that Kansas enjoyed from the close of the war in 1865 until 1870. In 1869, the railway started moving westward from Topeka. General offices and machine shops of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad system were established in Topeka in 1878.

During the late 1880s, Topeka passed through a boom period that ended in disaster. There was vast speculation on town lots. The 1889 bubble burst and many investors were ruined. Topeka, however, doubled in population during the period and was able to weather the depressions of the 1890s.

20th Century

Topeka was the home of Linda Brown, the named plaintiff in Brown v. Board of Education which was the case responsible for eliminating the standard of "separate but equal", and requiring racial integration in American public schools.

It is interesting to note that, at the time the suit was filed, only the elementary schools were segregated in Topeka, and that Topeka High School had been fully integrated since its inception in the late 1890s.

Monroe Elementary, one of the segregated schools, is now a National Historic site with interpretive exhibits. The national historic site was opened by President George W. Bush on May 17, 2004.

Topeka has struggled with the burden of racial descrimination even after Brown. New lawsuits attempted unsuccessfully to force suburban school districts that ring the city to participate in racial integration with the inner city district. In the late 1980s a group of citizens calling themselves the Task Force to Overcome Racism in Topeka formed to address the problem in a more organized way.

Topeka is the hometown of Gwendolyn Brooks, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet; William C. Menninger and Karl Menninger, psychiatrists and founders of the Menninger Clinic; Ron Evans, astronaut, commander of the pilot ship on Apollo 17; Coleman Hawkins, jazz saxophonist; Langston Hughes, poet and author; Charles Curtis, U.S. Vice President (1929–33); and Kay E. Meadows, first African American member and president of the Topeka School Board.

Topeka is the site of Washburn University, notable as the last city-chartered university in the United States.

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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Topeka, Kansas".

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