We’re ringing in the New Year this time–100 years ago in Kansas, 1918.

January 1, 1918

  • The Topeka food price board set prices to stop overcharging.  some items were:  sugar, 9 cents a pound; flour, 24 pounds for $1.45; cornmeal, 4 pounds for 25 cents; potatoes, 2 3/4 cents a pound; lard, 33 cents a pound.
  • The national draft board ruled that marriage after May 18, 1917, would not exempt men from the draft.

January 3, 1918

  • Flour-hoarding was reported from all parts of the state.  Orders were issued to limit sales in cities to 48-pound sacks and in rural districts to 96-pound sacks.  Names of hoarders and grocers were reported.

January 5, 1918

  • The Camp Funston library opened.  It contained 20,000 volumes and many magazines and newspapers.

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.