Happy 163rd birthday to Kansas on Jan. 29, 2024! The Great Seal of Statehood was approved by the first Kansas legislature on Jan. 29, 1861. It was designed by John J. Ingalls, state senator from Atchison. The Kansas motto, Ad Astra per Aspera (To the Stars Through Difficulties), circles the border of the seal. Symbols on the seal include a cluster of 34 stars, marking our place in the line of states admitted to the United States of America. The sun rises over a Kansas landscape, which depicts the history of Native Americans hunting American Bison as a wagon train heads west. River travel by steamboat, typical of the day, and a settler plowing a field complete the vignette.

You are invited to stop by the Game Room on Monday, Jan. 29, and pick up your copy of the Official Travel Guide of Kansas, a “real” map of Kansas, and a sunflower for your lapel. Have a great day celebrating Kansas!

As you read the travel guide and wish you could see some of those places again or for the first time, make sure to make those wishes known to our Resident Services Leader, Monte Spiller.

Would you like to each lunch at the Hays House in Council Grove or explore Emporia? Are you curious enough to take one of the day trips to the Arikaree Breaks or climb Mount Sunflower or visit the Prairie Museum of Art and History? Maybe pick lavender next summer at A&H Farms? It’s all happening, right here in Kansas where Sunflower is a State of Mind.