Manhattan, KS Summary

photo by gusto

Manhattan is a pleasant college city of about 40,000 people in the northern Flint Hills of Kansas. Short-story writer and journalist Damon Runyon was born here.

A large Kaw Native American village was once situated on the present site of Manhattan. Fort Riley was established to the southwest of the present town site in 1853. In 1854 two white settlements were established nearby. These were soon consolidated under the name of Boston. When a large group of new settlers arrived, the name was changed to Manhattan, reflecting hopes that the “Little Apple,” as it is now called, would become a trading center to rival Manhattan in New York.

Kansas State University was founded here between 1859 and 1863.

Manhattan has many historic buildings and museums. Worth seeing are Aggieville Moro, an old shopping district full of interesting retail outlets, and Goodnow House, a stone farmhouse built in the 1860s by Isaac Goodnow, a leader in the Free State movement and one of the town’s founders. He later established the college which became Kansas State University.

Visitors to the university can enjoy the Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, and the beautiful botanical gardens. Adjacent is Riley County Historical Museum. Located in Pioneer Park is Hartford House, a prefabricated oneroom house brought on a steamboat to the area by early settlers.

Also of interest is the Wolf House Museum, based in an 1868 limestone boarding house and furnished with nineteenth-century period pieces, as well as the American Museum of Baking, the only baking museum in the United States.

An untouched native tall-grass prairie can be seen at the Konza Prairie Research Natural Area.

The Oregon, Santa Fe, and Old Military Trails provide hiking and bird-watching opportunities in the Flint Hills. Tuttle Creek State Park is popular with anglers, and Sunset Zoo features animals of Kansas, Australia, South America, Asia, and Africa, including snow leopards, tigers, and sloths.

Fort Riley, to the southwest of Manhattan, is known as “the Cradle of the Cavalry” because many cavalry regiments were formed here, including George Custer’s 7th Cavalry, which suffered a dramatic defeat at Little Bighorn. The US Cavalry Museum, housed in the original 1855 hospital, features exhibits on American mounted forces from the Revolutionary War to 1950. The First Infantry Division Museum examines the division’s history from 1917 to the present. Custer House is an 1854 limestone structure that provides an insight into frontier life.

Also at the fort is the First Territorial Capitol. The territory’s first (pro-slavery) legislature met in this stone warehouse in 1855 before moving on to the Shawnee Mission in Kansas City. It provides insight into the territorial and national conflict over slavery and into life on the Kansas frontier. In 1928 the building was rebuilt from its ruins.

Visitors can also take a walk on the Kaw River Nature Trail, which offers outstanding views.

Manhattan is on I-70 and has its own regional airport. Buses connect Manhattan with Topeka, Kansas City, Denver, and Wichita.