You can still find Victory Junction on some Kansas maps.  It was at a point where Wyandotte and Leavenworth Counties met, on what was then called the Victory Highway (see the earlier post, http://www.kansasww1.org/monuments-and-memorials-the-victory-highway-eagles/ .)  The exact location is where K-7 intersects with the Parallel Parkway.

In its day it was a busy intersection, complete with  all the standard highway businesses–gas stations, restaurants, and bars.  Right in the middle of the intersection was a statue of a doughboy, a copy of the statue created by John Paulding ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paulding_(sculptor) ) entitled “Over the Top.”  It was a tribute to those Leavenworth County soldiers who made the supreme sacrifice.  It was dedicated on Armistice Day, November 11, 1929.  In that year the road now known as the Parallel Parkway was part of the Victory Highway, which became U.S. Route 40.

But sometime in the late 1930s the route of U.S. 40 was moved a mile to the south, and Victory Junction’s decline began.  In 1941, the statue was moved to the front of the Leavenworth County Courthouse, where it sits today.  In 1985 it was restored and rededicated to honor those who died in all wars from the county.

The statue today:  http://www.kansasmemory.org/item/229197

 

Blair Tarr is the Museum Curator of the Kansas State Historical Society. He oversees the three-dimensional collections of the Society, but has special interests in the Civil War, Wichita-made Valentine diners, and Leavenworth's Abernathy Furniture. In the last few years he has also done a lot of cramming on The Great War. He is a past president of the Kansas Museums Association and the Civil War Round Tables of both Kansas City and Eastern Kansas. He is currently a board member of the Heritage League of Greater Kansas City.