Kansas In 1920

Excerpt from History of the Kansas State Council of Defense: December, 1920 It is a very difficult matter to recount all of the activities and services of the Kansas State Council of Defense. It was so busy in trying to make world history that it failed to take note of its own records, so that when the Council of Defense closed its work in December, 1918, although a vast deal of work had been done, many things had been begun which were stopped in their midst on account of the sudden closing of the war. As soon as possible people dropped warlike pursuits and devoted themselves to the work of peace. This left the records of the work of many committees, and especially of the counties, in considerable confusion. The editor of this report, which attempts to give a portrayal of the organization and activities of the State Council of Defense, has found great difficulty in collecting the facts regarding the work actually done. In some counties, for instance, where they did persistent and vigorous work careful records were not kept, while in others where not any more work was done everything was carefully recorded. The same is true of the general committees; some of those who were most active did not have elaborate reports, while others reported everything in full. Under such circumstances it has been very difficult to obtain a complete record of service and to give proportionate space to the work of the counties and to the general committees. Some of the committee reports necessarily had to be abbreviated to keep them from being out of proportion, and others were necessarily brief; otherwise the volume would be extended to great length. The editor is very grateful to those who assisted him in furnishing information and records of the transactions of the county organizations and of the state committees. If in the analysis of material an apparent injustice has been done to certain groups of people and certain localities, it has been entirely unintentional; the editor has done the best he could under the circumstances. It must be kept in mind that it was difficult to get the cooperation of people in certain sections of the state in furnishing material. No such organization had ever been established in the state before, because no such need had ever occurred, and the shifting scenes of war gave constant changes in organization and activities of the Council of Defense, although its purpose, that of support of the war in general, and the boys at the front in particular, was never lost sight of. Every individual member of the Kansas Council of Defense held himself in readiness to do everything in his power to forward the movement, and there was complete unanimity of purpose, perfect cooperation and absolute consecration to the cause by every member of the Council. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Kansas City during the Pendergast Era (1920 - 1939); a city of possibilities in a time of economic stress, hard lines of race and class, and cultural innovation.