Posts by Debbie Leckron Miller

Untamed Fun in Southwest Kansas

By Debbie Leckron Miller on Apr. 01, 2022

The wild spaces of southwest Kansas still cut loose today with captivating culture and genuine Western heritage. Towns corral their rowdy charm in bandits’ hideouts, Front Street gunfights, frontier forts, Old West museums and cavernous 109-foot-deep wells. Outside of town, life-filled landscapes…

Sights, Tastes and Sounds of the Flint Hills

By Debbie Leckron Miller on Feb. 26, 2022

Though cattle and cowboys still roam these pastoral lands, there’s no need to saddle up to experience this last big stand of tallgrass prairie in North America. A rich blend of historic sites and modern attractions gets you knee-deep into the boundless beauty, saved from the pioneer plows thanks to…

Amazing Attractions in Northwest Kansas

By Debbie Leckron Miller on Jan. 03, 2022

Things can get rocky in northwest Kansas, where the chalky pillars and craggy canyons of Little Jerusalem Badlands State Park, Arikaree Breaks and Monument Rocks interrupt the panoramas of plains. Set out from the college town of Hays and its bustling downtown. Just off Interstate-70, Hays forms the…

5 Freedom's Frontier Sites to Explore

By Debbie Leckron Miller on Dec. 20, 2021

Retrace the drama of freedom’s struggles and triumphs in the Freedom’s Frontier National Heritage Area. Spread across 29 Kansas counties (and 12 in our neighboring state to the east), more than 200 museums and heritage sites highlight their roles in the Kansas-Missouri Border War and the shaping of…

One Epic Trail. Two Hundred Years.

By Debbie Leckron Miller on Jan. 22, 2021

In 1821, Captain William Becknell and a party of five headed west from the Missouri River to trade mules and horses and to hunt on the plains. They wound up in welcoming Santa Fe, eventually carving a 900-mile trade route that thousands of freighters, military troops, Native Americans and others…