20 facts about the State of Kansas

1. The State of Kansas is located in the Midwestern United States.
2. In 1990 Kansas wheat farmers produced enough wheat to make 33 billion loaves of bread, or enough to provide each person on earth with 6 loaves. 
3. Residents of Kansas are called "Kansans."
4. At one time it was against the law to serve ice cream on cherry pie in Kansas. 
5. Historically, the area was home to large numbers of nomadic Native Americans who hunted bison.
6. A grain elevator in Hutchinson is ½ mile long and holds 46 million bushels in its 1,000 bins.
7. When officially opened to settlement by the U.S. government in 1854, abolitionist Free-Staters from New England and pro-slavery settlers from neighboring Missouri rushed to the territory to determine if Kansas would become a free state or a slave state. 
8. Thus, the area was a hotbed of violence and chaos in its early days as these forces collided, and was known as Bleeding Kansas. The abolitionists eventually prevailed and on January 29, 1861, Kansas entered the Union as a free state.
9. Pizza Hut restaurants opened its first store in Wichita, Kansas. 
10. Capital: Topeka.
11. Kansas is bordered by Nebraska on the north; Missouri on the east; Oklahoma on the south; and Colorado on the west.
12. Russell Springs in Logan County is known as the Cow Chip Capital of Kansas. 
13. The state is divided into 105 counties with 628 cities.
14. In Lucas, Civil War veteran S.P. Dinsmoor used over 100 tons of concrete to build the Garden of Eden. Even the flag is made of concrete. 
15. The abolitionists eventually prevailed and on January 29, 1861,[8][9] Kansas entered the Union as a free state. After the Civil War, the population of Kansas exploded when waves of immigrants turned the prairie into productive farmland.
16. The graham cracker was named after the Reverend Sylvester Graham. He was a minister who strongly believed in eating whole-wheat flour products. 
17. Total Area: 15th among states, 213,109 sq km (82,282 sq mi)
18. Dwight Eisenhower, 34th president of the United States, was born in Abeline, Kansas in 1890.
19. Sumner County is known as the Wheat Capital of the World.
20. Kansas was a crucial battleground in the fight over slavery between 1858-1859, and was finally admitted as a free state in 1861, just before the Civil War.