Judy Billings, director of the Lawrence Convention & Visitors Bureau, is a key player in efforts to promote the state's Bleeding Kansas Heritage.

John Nichols, left, and Edward Hoover perform for the sesquicentennial commemoration of the Battle of Black Jack in this August 2006 file photo.

Judy Billings, director of the Lawrence Convention & Visitors Bureau, displays the first copy of the feasibility study on the proposed Bleeding

Judy Billings, perhaps the most visible cheerleader for the Civil War history of northeastern Kansas, grew up in Missouri.

Before you get too upset, though, her defense: “I’m definitely a Jayhawk at heart. I call myself a turncoat.”

Billings, who wears several hats, including that of director of the Lawrence Convention & Visitors Bureau, has become a key part of promoting the state’s Bleeding Kansas heritage. A new effort is under way to capitalize on that heritage in terms of tourism.

She might be an unlikely fit for the job – and not just because she grew up in Missouri. Billings sort of fell into this job, one she’s held for 25 years. And she didn’t come into it with a love of history – that’s come with time.

Billings, now 64, grew up in Hannibal, Mo., the famed hometown of writer Mark Twain.

She doesn’t remember much about being taught the “Missouri” side of the Kansas-Missouri border skirmishes, which many historians call the true beginning of the Civil War.

“I didn’t ever study it in school,” she said. “Either I wasn’t a very good history student or something, or they just didn’t teach it then.”

After earning a degree from the University of Missouri – yes, she pronounces it with a “ruh” at the end – Billings taught second-graders.

But in the early 1980s, when she decided to return to school for an MBA, she chose Kansas University.

It was around the same time the Chamber of Commerce was trying to launch the Convention & Visitors Bureau. After a couple of years serving as a part-time secretary while she took classes, the director job opened up. Billings applied and landed the job.

Changing job

The focus of Billings’ job has changed through the years.

Through the years, there have been various sporting events, including the National Junior Olympic Games in 1988.

In the 1980s, the big push was bringing film crews to the area, such as the filming of “The Day After” TV movie in Lawrence. Also in the ’80s, Independence Days, a historically themed festival, brought thousands of visitors to town.

Judy Wright, who worked with Billings on Independence Days, remembers how energetic Billings was from the start, putting in long hours and doing much of the work herself.

“We’d go pick each other up at 6:45 in the morning and go to (South Park),” Wright remembered. “I think she loves the community and wants to promote the community.”

Starting in the late 1990s – and continuing until today – one of the biggest pushes has been territorial history.

In 1999, Billings helped introduce a bill that would create the Freedom’s Frontier National Heritage Area, which will work to tout this area’s Civil War history.

Congress finally approved the bill in 2006.

Now, Billings is leading a consortium of 41 counties in eastern Kansas and western Missouri who want to preserve their heritage and attract visitors.

To ensure federal funding, the Convention & Visitors Bureau last year broke ties with the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce and now is housed in city property at Ninth and New Hampshire streets. Plans call for the offices eventually to be in the former Carnegie Library at Ninth and Vermont streets.

Billings said she’s glad the area finally has found an outlet for promoting its history.

“I’ve always thought, from day one practically, that history and heritage, that Bleeding Kansas history and things that happened in Lawrence and the area were important,” she said. “I just didn’t know how to package that or provide an experience for a potential visitor, where they were going to be fulfilled by their visit.”

She admits, for her personally, it took awhile to get interested in Lawrence’s history. She says historical fiction, in particular, piqued her interest in local history.

Lawrence historian Katie Armitage, who has worked with Billings on a variety of projects, says she’s seen that interest in history take off.

“She’s become more and more knowledgeable in seeing that our heritage here is such an important part of our story,” Armitage said. “I think people don’t realize she didn’t come to this as a historian.”

Untapped potential

Now that she better understands the history, Billings is trying to figure out how to market it.

That might mean exhibits at museums. It might mean better use of the Web. It might mean audio tours at battle sites.

But, if done right, Billings said there is a clientele for this sort of history, especially with the 150th anniversary of Civil War events approaching – and, in some cases of territorial history, already passed.

She notes that many national Civil War brochures, such as those touting Underground Railroad sites, don’t even include Kansas.

“It’s up to us to do our research and inform them of what we have,” Billings said. “We can’t sit back and expect them to do it for us.”

Billings is using her connections to make that happen. She’s well-connected in the Lawrence arts community and has served as a Rotary present and president of the Kansas Humanities Council, among other involvement.

And having roots on the other side of the state line hasn’t hurt.

“With this heritage area and having my feet in both states,” she said, “I can stand in front of a group like that – where there are Missourians and Kansans – and really have them understand that I understand different perspectives of the story, that I’m not rooted in one or the other.”

‘Visitor’ not ‘tourist’

This is a job that keeps Billings busy.

But she finds time to visit her two sons – one in Seattle, the other in Washington, D.C. – and she manages to find time to fly-fish with her husband, Dave.

Through the changes in focus, Billings has managed to keep her job – no small feat in the political world she works in. She’s also managed, she said, to do the job without getting burned out.

“People change jobs a lot these days,” she said. “But for me, it’s been always something new, a new challenge all the time.”

With visitors to Lawrence spending an estimated $46 million in 2006, and with that number expected to be higher when estimates come in for 2007, Billings said, in the end, bringing people to town improves the quality of life for those living in Lawrence.

“I’ve never use the term ‘tourist’ in this environment,” Billings said. “I use the term ‘visitor.’ We don’t want to be a tourist town. We want to be a place that’s a good place for us to live that also attracts the visitor dollars.”