Kansas is much more than just a “Fly Over State” or a flat boring state like those from other parts of our country might say after driving across Kansas on I-70 from east to west on the way to Colorado. As we travel I hear those comments over and over again. For those of us who live here we know it is so much more… oh so much more.
I know I wrote a couple of columns on the flint hills including how they were formed. They are so unique to the central plains of Kansas and some in Nebraska and Oklahoma but we in Kansas are doubly blest with this special place of which there is no other in the world quite like it.
Last Saturday evening we experienced, along with approximately 8,000 others the beauty of sitting on a spot on the Evans Ranch, near Strong City as we listened to the Kansas City Symphony perform their wonderful music.
It was a perfect evening. This was the 20th and final season for this special event. The hours and hours of work, getting sponsors, and many, many volunteers and so much more, that go into such an event is hard to imagine.
One of the main challenges is getting a ranch owner to host the event as they have to be willing to do so many things to prepare their ranch for such a large number of visitors. Such an event is also a negative on the prairie area where so many cars have to be parked and where people walk and set up their chairs. A special note: It took us a little over an hour and a half to drive the distance of 6.5 miles from highway 50 west of Emporia to the ranch. We followed a car from Hays, Kansas bumper to bumper all the way but we eventually made it. Remember, I said 8,000 attended so you can only imagine the number of cars, parked on the Kansas Prairie but it was all extremely well organized with wagons that took people from our parking lot to closer to where the activity began but still a distance from the band dome for the performance. I visited with people from Pittsburg, North KC near KCI, and Manhattan, KS to mention a few. The band dome resembled the one you see for the 4th of July concert on the Capitol lawn in D.C. There were special programs that went on from early afternoon until the 6:00 P.M. scheduled performance which was delayed a half hour until most could get parked and to the area of the band dome.
In addition to the music there was the traditional cattle drive which featured Black Angus cattle, moving across a section of the prairie, ushered by cowboys and cowgirls on horseback with the lush green prairie grass and beautiful sky as their backdrop.
The temperature was in the lower 80s with no hot sun and no wind. The Kansas clouds rolled lazily across the Kansas sky and the sunset showed various colors to complete the picture. The event closed with the audience singing all six verses of Home On The Range. Did you know there are that many? How inspirational on a perfect, peaceful Kansas summer night.
