photo by: Elvyn Jones

Bill McFarland, of Topeka, presents his research on early legislators at the Territorial Capital Museum in Lecompton Saturday, June 11, 2022.

The Territorial Capital Museum in Lecompton celebrated its 40th anniversary Saturday with a presentation on an important historical lithograph that is now on display in the museum.

Bill McFarland, a retired Topeka schoolteacher, explained that the lithograph was of the early Kansans who met 165 years ago in Lecompton’s Constitution Hall as the Free State Territorial Legislature. The 1857 body wasn’t the first Kansas legislative body, but it was the first one legitimately elected in the territory’s chaotic and bloody days of political hostilities between abolitionists and pro-slavery factions.

photo by: Submitted photo

A lithograph of 39 men elected to the Free State Legislature of 1857 is on display at the Territorial Capital Museum in Lecompton. A pro-slavery member who never attended a legislative session in not pictured in the lithograph.

In November 2020 at an auction in Strong City, Tim Nedeau, a teacher at Washburn Rural Middle School, purchased the lithograph, which is composed of individual portraits of the representatives who served in the 1857 Legislature. His retired friend, McFarland, then researched the lives of the men.

The lithograph, which Nedeau has loaned to the museum, is important because it provides some of the only surviving images of a number of the representatives, McFarland said. A pro-slavery member elected to the 40-man body never attended a session and is not included in the lithograph, he noted.

The Kansas settlers depicted were early movers and shakers who founded towns, churches and colleges, McFarland said. It was different from most legislative bodies in that it featured more farmers than lawyers.

McFarland noted the irony of the Free State Party-dominated Legislature meeting in Lecompton, the home of pro-slavery sympathizers in Kansas Territory. Free State leader James H. Lane may have decided to have the Free State Legislature meet there with the intention of burning Constitutional Hall and much of Lecompton, he said. If so, the arrival of federal troops from Fort Leavenworth put an end to such a scheme.

Among the representatives was the great-grandfather of former U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts, McFarland said. Most of the members were elected as Free State Party candidates, although there were also members of the newly formed Republican Party and four Democrats among the roster, he said.

The list includes a number of men who took part in the Colorado gold rush, including Hiram Appleman, of Willow Springs. McFarland said Appleman did better than most because the merchant sold goods in Colorado rather than search for gold.

Another Douglas County representative was Oliver Barber, of Clinton, whose brother Thomas Barber was murdered in the Wakarusa War in December 1855.

Another Douglas County representative to experience personal loss in Bleeding Kansas was John Speer, publisher of The Tribune in Lawrence. Two of his sons were killed during Quantrill’s raid on Lawrence in August of 1863. His son, Robert Speer, who served as a page during the legislative session, is believed to have been killed when the raiders burned The Tribune to the ground. The raid occurred on the young man’s 18th birthday, McFarland said.

McFarland said his research on the biographies was aided by those written for the 50th anniversary of the 1857 Legislature. He also made use of Kansas newspaper archives, he said.

Nedeau said he was pleased that a large crowd turned out to see the presentation.

The Territorial Capital Museum, 640 E. Woodson Ave., is open from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday and 1 to 5 p.m. on Sunday.