100 years ago in Kansas, January 22-28, 1918:

January 22, 1918

  • “Kickless Thursday” was added to the weekly schedule by the State Food Administrator to make Kansans “forget to grumble about meatless, wheatless, sugarless days, save footpower, and help whip the Kaiser.”

January 24, 1918

  • Topeka businessmen were refused a modification of the early-closing order.

January 27, 1918

  • The Topeka Committee for the Fatherless Children of France had cared for 189 orphans in the past nine months, and over $5.000 had been raised.

January 28, 1918

  • Dr. Adolph Koerber, Hutchinson, was arrested on a federal indictment charging violation of the espionage act.  He allegedly objected to anti-German lectures.
  • Victory loaf, a bread containing five percent substitute for wheat flour, went on the market.  Grocers would sell wheat flour only when buyers bought an equal amount of some other cereal.   Another wheatless day had been ordered; also a ten percent reduction in sugar rations.

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.