Great Plains Research

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Promoting research of the economic, martial, political, educational, agricultural, and cultural histories of the Great Plains with a concentration on central and western Kansas. Materials include primary source materials such as diaries and correspondence generated by homesteaders, photograph collections, newspapers from the African-American community of Nicodemus (the first black community founded west of the Mississippi River), genealogical materials, pamphlets published by radical presses, and a litany of scholarly and popular works. Family and church histories (including baptismal records, obituaries, ship manifests, censuses, and family genealogies), and video and audio recordings of folk music and oral histories are also included.

Collection Strengths

Haldeman-Julius "Little Blue Books"
- Published by the Haldeman-Julius Publishing Company and immensely popular during the interwar years, these paperbacks, known as “Little Blue Books” due to their size and the frequent coloring of the cheap pulp paper they were printed on, were mass marketed to a working class audience as a “university in print” as they covered a myriad of subjects including freethought, birth control, self-improvement, philosophy, the Classics, and popular literature.
Tim Johnson Historical Kansas Collection
- Containing materials donated by FHSU alum Tim Johnson, this collection features letters, programs, and other memorabilia from the Kansas Territorial Days through the early 1900's. Many of the letters tell about life on the frontier, farming, and schools in Kansas. Programs for graduation ceremonies and school events are also included.
Tim Johnson Historic Postcard Collections
- Contains several collections of photographic and “real photo” postcards created by renowned national photographers, itinerant lensmen, and the local photographers who, during this period, could be found in most Kansas communities regardless of their size. The postcards in these collections capture unique private and public moments of ordinary Americans of the Progressive Era through the Great Depression engaged in their labor, leisure, commerce, and civic communalism. They include rare, "real photo” postcards taken by Liberal photographer Hal Reid documenting prairie life; carnival cards produced for Parker Amusement (formerly of Abilene and Leavenworth); and exceedingly rare “real photo” postcards of the vigilante AHTA (Anti-Horse Thief Association) along with related memorabilia.
Volga German Heritage
- As the Volga German Society of Rush and Ellis Counties, the Bukovina Society of the Americas, and local figures like genealogist Kevin Rupp and the late folklorist Lawrence Weigel all played integral roles in developing the materials in Ethnic Studies through donations of resource materials and monies, many of the holdings focus on the histories of German families from Eastern Europe who immigrated to the area in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
European Immigrant Communities
- Containing materials pertaining to other European immigrant communities such as the Czech and Scandinavians
Black Homesteaders
- Including artifacts about Nicodemus, Kansas, the center houses historical information about Black homesteaders settling in the Great Plains.

Research Tips

Search the FHSU Library Catalog. Begin by searching keywords for your research topic. From the results list, use the right sidebar to filter results under the “Location” heading to show only the locations designated with the prefix “Special Collections - Great Plains” or one of several derivatives.
The Kansas Heritage Research Guide was created in conjunction with the Kansas Heritage Project, this research guide provides an overview of the histories and cultural heritage of central and western Kansas counties.
Trails to the Past is a bibliography of primary sources found in Special Collections relating to various aspects of life on the frontier.
A Guide to the Collections (a bibliography of materials from Ethnic Studies) created in 1997 by Dr. Helmut Schmeller has been updated with new items added to the collection since that time.
A bibliography of genealogical materials for Hays and Ellis County is available Special Collections & University Archives. Initially compiled in 1999, it was last updated in 2016.
As a FamilySearch affiliate library, FHSU Library also offers limited access to FamilySearch databases from the library computers.
The Hays Convention and Visitors Bureau is also available to help with your inquiries about the Volga German heritage of the area. You may contact them at info@haysusa.com
Ask a Librarian for research help
Make an appointment to view materials in the Fenwick Reading Room

Exhibitions and Featured Digital Content

FHSU Library's exhibition program includes both site-based and online exhibitions that incorporate materials from Special Collections' Great Plains Research holdings. Additionally, select materials from the Special Collections & University Archives have been digitized and housed in its Digital Collections.