Season 1
1. Fort Larned's Past (Part 1)
Transcript
[Footsteps theme plays with bugle and drum playing and sounds of footsteps and various sounds of people working]
Ben Long: Welcome to footsteps the Fort Larned National Historic Site podcast. This is the premiere of the podcast this is season one episode one. This season we're going to be taking a look at Fort Larned's past, present, and future. Today we're going to be taking a look at Fort Larned's past. I'm your host Ranger Ben I'm one of the Rangers here at Fort Larned National Historic Site and co-hosting with me today is our intern Carter. How's it going today Carter?
Carter Atteberry: It's going pretty good. How are you?
Ben: Doing well. Yeah, so why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself, what got you interested in the fort.
Carter: So I'm Larned-ite as like to I say. I'm original to the area. Growing up I always came out for our Candlelight Tour. I always thought it was really fun to go watch, so I want to say it was probably 2016 or 2017 I decided to go and do it and I had a ton of fun doing it. So 2020 I did it I was put with Ranger Ben here. I didn't really think too much of it but he reached out to me about a year later and asked if I would be interested in helping with the video. I said yeah sure. And when I did that video it kind of re-sparked my passion for history and I said "Hey when can I do this more?" and he said "Oh Memorial Day is coming up" and I said "I'll see you then" and the rest is history.
Ben: Yeah. And you started -- so your internship is through Freedom's Frontier and you started let's see September 2022.
Carter: Yes. Freedom's Frontier National Heritage Area. It's a pretty good internship I'm a Minority Outreach Youth Specialist. So my job is to research minorities and I'll help write minority profiles for our Fort Larned Outpost articles and just doing general research and reaching out to minorities another potential volunteers about coming out and helping us be Fort Larned.
Ben: Now as we as we dive into this episode our interview today is with Chief Ranger George Elmore. He's been here for as he counts 50 years. He is a great resource I know for me as I've developed in my knowledge of Fort Larned and it was fantastic to hear his perspective on some of the things that he's seen, some of his favorite stories and the struggles of restoring a partially still standing or I should say mostly still standing fort.
Carter: He's honestly been a great source for me and you both. There will be times where you're not around and I'm like oh I wonder how this happened or a visitor will ask me some question that I've never had to answer. I know the guy to talk to for that.
Ben: George is definitely the resource for all things Fort Larned and like I said it was awesome to be able to pick his brain on this episode and one of my favorite things to talk about was restoring the buildings and some of the many things that went into that.
Carter: Yeah, one of my favorite parts was definitely when we were talking to him about what got him -- what drew him to the fort. Getting to hear how an arrowhead, just a tiny little object has created something so beautiful. Because I really feel like he's been a big driving force for just about anything that's happened out here.
Ben: Yeah absolutely. And we hope you also enjoy the episode so here you go!
Carter: All right!
[whosh]
Ben: So welcome George.
George Elmore: Well thank you.
Ben: Welcome to the first episode of footsteps. As we get started if you uh want to tell us your title how long you've been here what other parks you may have worked at.
George: Wow, I've been here so long I've forgotten, let's see. George Elmore and title is Chief Ranger. I've been here, started in I was in college at Fort Hays in 1973, started working in February and there was nobody and they, I came down applied for a job and a superintendent at the time said "Can you start next Saturday?" Back then you could hire right off the street. Of course it was a seasonal position so then I worked seasonally for a few years then got on permanent in '76. Bicentennial position, wow!
Ben: Yeah, there were quite a few hires that year?
George: There were. Yeah right. And Fort Larned got one.
Ben: Yeah nice. Now your degree is in this sort of subject too isn't it?
George: American West History, yep. That's my degree, my hobby, and job all three rolled into one. You can't beat it.
Ben: No you can't, no you can't. So I'm bad at math how many years does that make?
George: Well do you mean according to me or according to the Park Service?
Ben: Either one!
George: I say 50. Yeah you are a bad at math. No, actually in the Park Service they calculate it by a full year and so a seasonal year only counts like normally three months but according to the park service it's like 48 years. My first year and back then too you could actually work a person non-stop, you didn't have to have a break as a seasonal but they had to switch your job position. So I started out as a GS-04 and then the superintendent came up to me and he said "Well if you wouldn't mind we'd love to keep you on over the winter but we're going to have to change your grade." It's like okay -- a GS-02. Never heard of such a thing a GS-02, wow. But that was just for a few months over the winter and then went back to a 04. And then after that it was the normal seasonal you get laid off. But policies change.
Ben: Oh yeah, monthly sometimes.
George: Not always for the best. That was pretty cool just get walk in and get hired right off the street without any yeah hassle.
Ben: Yeah, I don't know if I've heard of too many GS-02s anymore.
George: I don't think there are very many. I suspect even then it was kind of a not a common position let's put it that way.
Carter: So you said you've been here for 47 years. What other parks have you potentially worked at?
George: This is the only one I've actually worked permanently at. I got on set teams in '82 when I got commissioned with a law enforcement degree background. Graduated from the Federal Academy and so, then, we had what was called special event teams, they're now are called special reaction or SWAT teams or whatever. But on special event teams, they're only like 2,000 commissioned Rangers in the entire Park Service out of normally around 21,000 employees. So what they have to do, each region has teams that they would put together, we had like three or four in this region and then you would go out and you work events at whatever park. They could call you and you'd have to be able to be gone within two days basically to the event. Worked events all over from Philadelphia to everywhere. It was quite an experience. You get to go to these dedications or not all of them were terribly good. Mount Rushmore several times and California. It's just different places wherever they needed a team to go that's where we went.
Carter: Two days is pretty short notice.
George: Well a lot of them were emergency situations too. You know something happens and they all of a sudden need a team to come in and guard stuff, take care of things, and whatever.
Carter: Yeah. Alright, so you're from Pawnee County originally.
George: Yep.
Carter: What drew you to the fort?
George: My personal interest started with -- when I was a young guy out on the farm we had a hired man and he came in he had found an arrowhead and it's just absolutely beautiful little black arrowhead. And it just fascinated me and so that really started my interest into Indians and then from the Plains Indians history interest going into the military was just kind of a common mix. But started out all with pretty much what were these people like that made this arrowhead? What were they all about? I mean why did that arrowhead all of a sudden end up out in our pasture? You know so yeah, that started it/ and then once I got more into it, it was just naturally -- I did kind of debate a little bit when I went to college do I really want to get a degree in history or maybe geology because both of them fascinate me rocks and minerals and fossils and paleontology.
Carter: So why do you find it important to preserve sites like Fort Larned?
George: Well if we don't preserve our history who's going to even remember our history? Comes right down to preservation, you know in authenticity. There's a lot of -- people say well we could bulldoze down on the fort and we could rebuild it cheaper than we can actually restore the original. But there's something to be said about actually touching history, being able to walk in and get the feel, the smell and it's the real thing you're walking on original floors we have original panes of glass in some windows. It's just phenomenal the preservation here and how much of the original fort was preserved. And that being able to touch history just like touching that arrowhead as a kid inspires people to learn more. You can go to a Hollywood set anywhere and well Bent's Fort is an example. It's a total reconstruction. It's great -- it works good as a set, but you're not touching history, you're not really experiencing as it looked when Bent's Fort was there. It's our interpretation of how Bent's Fort looked. Where here at Fort Larned, this isn't our interpretation. We know exactly how it looks through the Army plans and through the photographs and through various accounts and the archaeological work you know setting it all up it it's actually as close I think as it could possibly get it to how it looked in the 1860s.
Ben: Now as you were growing up here in Pawnee County, did you ever come out here when it was still a ranch?
George: Well yes. Actually, of course this is a long time ago, but back when I was first 1957 when the Gunsmoke crew, my folks were going to town and I drove by and you can see all the vehicles parked "Dad, Dad can we stop and look at it?" "No we're busy" So '59 when it was dedicated, kind of the same thing they had this pageant they put on and different stuff but we didn't actually come out but drove by. So I was always curious just one the heck's going on down there you know. When I got older of course then I start coming out on my own and just walking around and looking and started getting experience for it. When I was in and then in college I came out several times too when I was -- just to walk around and look at the buildings in the admire it's just beautiful.
Ben: Now as someone who also has a background in some geology, being that we do have sandstone structures is there something that also fascinates you about the geology?
George: Of course. Yeah, the sedimentary rocks like sandstone, limestone which you've got here are really full of fossils a lot. Limestone once in a long while you'll find something in sandstone it didn't preserve us well but yeah that's kind of fun just to walk around and look at the geology of Fort Larned it too. We did that a lot in college Fort Hays where we went to school was all limestone buildings and you'd walk around and even had classes that you'd had to identify various fossils and which building and where and stuff kind of fun.
Carter: So kind of continuing on with the historic structures, you kept saying that there was people that talked about bulldozing them and just rebuilding it.
George: Well of course, I mean you start looking at the dollar and cents of something like this. What does it really cost? I don't think people are really serious about it but on the other hand it's reality. When you do historic preservation you actually go back in with square nails you try to do it exactly as it was where you could do it quicker and cheaper with drill in screws or just round nails. But that's one really good thing about the Park Service is the degree of historic preservation that everybody tries to get it back to as much as you possibly can. When the Park Service first took it over they had what was called HABs drawings there were historic architectural drawings that came in and drew it as they saw it then and they took photographs of everything. And then they had archaeologists come in and excavate to figure out where porches were they might be missing and so historians doing a lot of historical research trying to find plans, photographs, drawings, anything that would relate. And so what we see today is a combination of all that material and all that research done by these different people going into how these buildings look now. Even down to paint colors they would go in and try to do paint samples to find out was it white washed? Was it painted? If so what shade? What color? You know.
Carter: So would you change anything about the fort's historic structures?
George: Well since I've had long hand in it, there are a couple little things. There's a few times in order to get something accomplished we had to stay within the budget and so there was some compromise made. It could be corrected, like for in the barracks for example, they elected to sheetrock the walls because we didn't have the money to go ahead and plaster it. So someday that should be really re-plastered. I mean the sheetrock probably to 99% of the people coming in they don't know the difference between sheetrock and real plaster but they were really plastered. And to me little things like that kind of bugged me but and that's why if you go in there you can kind of see some lines in the sheetrock where now it's starting to create a little separation. But they do have more techniques now too for doing historic preservation when you actually do sheetrocking like in the quartermaster building they have a base now that goes on you actually skim coat plaster on the top of it. And that makes it you really can't tell and when that's done.
Ben: It's almost like what they did we've Bent's Old Fort just having that sort of adobe covering on that. It's interesting. And too, I know you've mentioned to me before the number of posts on the shops building roof.
George: Well yeah, that's an interesting one there. This actually happened a couple times out here. But the shops building the architects took a look at it, the archaeologist excavated and where the columns were from about halfway through the building up to the north where the bakery was at had been removed by the farmers to put in a fuel tank. And so they were speculating okay we know there was a column here, and a column there, and it kind of, yeah. So how many did they put in? One was arguing eight, the other was arguing ten. So they put in 10 columns and no more than a few months after the restoration was done we found a photograph looking from the east, west onto the back of the building. There were nine columns. If they would have just compromised between the two. But I mean those things and that wouldn't be that hard to correct I mean we've got other historical errors. Like over in the barracks, the front porch we assumed was like the officer's porch, it was trimmed out a lot like the front porch of the officer's so the decision was made to put wainscoting on the ceiling. And then we found this photograph that people came in and donated of three soldiers standing in front and you could look up and you can see the porch ceiling. There's no wainscoting it was an open ceiling.
Ben: And the columns themselves have a different design too from that picture.
George: Not much -- or a little bit. Yeah, but not to a great extent, they're really based off of the officers for the most part they don't have the fancy trim and everything up at the top but the basic column is pretty much the same. Actually on the barracks, it started out with a four by four down the middle were on the officer's quarters they didn't. And then once they went from that into the 1868 when they were finishing it all up then they just trimmed around that four by four. In the officer's quarters over here, the columns were all hollow. It was based on the four sides of the column supporting everything of the weight of the roof. And so one of the things that behind the scenes that you can't see for the strength and preservation of the building, the architects put four by fours in the middle of them today so that the historic columns are no longer carrying the weight it's being carried by the four by four. But the columns are still there, they're still original and they're more of a facade now without any structural bearing to them.
Ben: Yeah and the -- I mean officers row has arguably the most original material on the buildings don't they
George: Yes, very much. The North and South Officers' Quarters are probably the most historic with a lot of original fabric of any of the buildings.
Ben: Because we even have original, like you're saying floors and panes of glass and all that too.
George: Correct. Where the barracks and the quartermaster building by the farmers using it they didn't need it as a barracks obviously and so they bred cows. Where our offices are today was a dairy barn for a while and a stock barn and was pretty well gutted.
Ben: It doesn't smell like that anymore thankfully.
George: What the farmers did even there through its use, do a lot of preservation like back in the kitchens there was original lath on the ceilings, original baseboards, in some places there was original doors still going from the main part of the building into the kitchen area. Some of the I think it's four the original gun racks are still up on the walls. They weren't not a lot, but there were still some of them.
Carter: I wasn't aware that those were original columns and Officers Row
George: Yeah the officers quarters are original columns. Well, not 100%. The Commanding Officer's house, most of the North and South officers quarters are original.
Ben: And there are some too that we've tried to preserve as much as we can but say like the bottom of them has rotted so that there is some that is replaced. Is that right?
George: That's a preservation technique, yeah. You save as much of the original wood for as long as you possibly can. In some of them the farmers in the 1920s they ran a concrete porch and took off the wooden porches and some of the bottoms of some of the columns even then were rotted. And so one of the column supports underneath might have been concrete four inches high, another one might have been six inches high. They weren't necessarily all level, just went up to wherever the wood was rotted. And so today what we do, if the bottom of it starts deteriorating a little bit, just cut it at an angle, add a new little piece at the bottom and try to preserve as much as you can for as long as you can. Eventually you know like the -- probably the main rooms will be okay forever practically but the hallways still have the original floors in the hall. And it was debated when we were doing the restoration of the South Officers' Quarters, would it be better to take up the original boards and put down new, or leave them? The advantage of taking them up then you would have some original flooring to repair damaged areas that maybe in some of the other rooms or something. But we decided it was best to leave the original alone as long as we can. At some point in time in the future, the flooring is going to wear out and it's going to have to be replaced in the hallways. But until then, if we can get another 20 years out of the original floor, let's get another 20 years out of it.
Ben: Yeah. With all these original buildings, they all hold a story. What would you say is your favorite story from when this was an active post?
George: Like you're right, they all hold a story. Like over here in the officer's quarters with the young officer coming out with his wife, Cooke, and just married and the Mother-in-law comes along. You know, today we go to visit family and we might be there for a day, or a weekend, or maybe a week. Back then, no, it took so long to get out here, the Mother-in-law stays months. You know, so here as a lieutenant, they're allowed one room but then pretty soon he gets command to the company and so he gets a little increase in room space. But it's just a whole different way really -- but the story of the Mother-in-law the wife and the officer living all in that small confinement would I think have been a challenge. But you know there are ways too they could have mitigated if the other officers that lived across the hall wouldn't have minded they could have maybe partitioned some of the hallway off and let the Mother-in-law stay in the hallway I mean who knows we don't know. We just know she was with them. There's a lot of good stories with the barracks and like shooting a buffalo through the window. It's not a good story it's a sad story, but the one where we had the drunken soldier come in, he's mad at the first sergeant, he yells at the first sergeant, cursing him out and the other soldiers are trying to calm this guy down. He and a Corporal get into a fight, first sergeant here's the commotion and he comes walking out and apparently he's got his rifle at carry or shoulder arms. The drunk swings at him, first kind of takes a little bit of side step back, swings up the butt of the gun, hits the drunk in the forehead, orders he be taken over to the Blockhouse and he'll press charges in the morning, visit with the officer. Well over in the Blockhouse during the night, the drunk never sobers up. He stays blabbering and surgeon suddenly, the post doctor, suddenly gets concerned he's called over well officer day gets the surgeon, calls over the doctor, he examines him and he has a cracked skull. When the first sergeant hit the soldier in the head he cracked his skull. And then of course then the soldier dies a couple days later. Now yeah, they get court-martialed, I mean he gets tried and he's found that was conduct prejudicial of good order and military discipline on the behalf of the drunk and the first sergeant was by law bound to maintain good order and discipline in the barracks and he was justified in maintaining the discipline and it didn't intend to kill him.
Ben: Just intended stop whatever was going on
George: Right yeah, and never really probably thought he was hitting him that hard. The steel butt plate on the gun going against the forehead and everybody's kind of mad and --
Ben: Adrenaline is going you don't really yeah right how hard you're swinging that thing.
George: And the Post Hospital the favorite story there is rabid wolf coming in and biting the soldier who's sick in bed's hand and nearly lacerates a couple fingers, and runs over to the porch of the officer's quarters and goes into an officer's quarters and the ladies are screaming and throwing plates and apparently and making, getting the wolf chased back out of the building. And then over in front of the quartermaster building there was a soldier on Guard Duty. He sees it, he lowers his rifle to shoot and the wolf comes running right at him, goes right between these legs doesn't bite him. Because on the other side of the soldier was a big dog and the wolf attacks the dog and they tussle. And then the wolf finally takes off from there and he gets shot by some of the guards. So what are you gonna do for rabies? Well, also it bites Lieutenant Thompson in the leg on the porch of the officers' quarters. Nothing then you could do for rabies they washed out the wounds as best they can. The dog dies first, the soldier dies, but Lieutenant Thompson got lucky and never died. He survived the wolf bite.
Ben: I mean there's a couple different accounts of that rabid wolf attack and from what I can tell it was just about 30 seconds to a minute of pure chaos.
George: Might have been a little bit longer it running from that now the hospital this actually occurred and was the adobe hospital back in the corner and so it took a while to run that far but yeah it didn't last long -- it was all over.
Carter: What important historical events occurred at and around Fort Larned?
George: Well I think one of the most important at the national level was when the Hancock Expedition came in in 1867. April '67 they arrived 1,400 men. They know during the Civil War Indian relations kind of got worse the Indians realized that the government's fighting the government of the South and things are kind of going nutso and they took advantage of it. And so Hancock decides he could bring out this massive army of course he's Commander of Department of Missouri and they can subdue the Indians by impressing them. And he's got artillery, infantry, cavalry, press corps, band, everything you can think of on this Expedition, platoon boats to help cross the river just like you're back east and doing a big major Civil War campaign. Well scouts, guides, you know, but they go about well, back it up. Hancock wanted the Indians to come in and visit with him here at the Fort and have this big peace parley here at the Ford. A few of them make it in most of them don't because there was a snowstorm that had hit in various reasons. The Army didn't trust or-- the Indians didn't trust the Army too well because after Sand Creek they were afraid maybe this is going to be just a massacre, kill us all. So then Hancock says well I'm going to take my Army out to you. And in going out to the Village Site which everybody here knew where it was at it wasn't any big mystery, it had been a big winter encampment of Lakota and Cheyenne. They arrive at a hill and this is first night out they go into camp underneath the hill that morning they get kind of a late start they're heading out over the top of this little hill and the raid then in front of them were the warriors from this village. And they don't really know how many but they were zigzagging back and forth on their horses. What they were trying to do is delay the Army from getting to the village because they want a time for the ladies and the kids to escape and not get caught like at Sand Creek. So pretty soon, they decide to have a meeting, they meet down at the base of the hill, some of the Custer and Hancock and some of the military leaders and a couple of the Indian leaders come over and one of the Indian agents Wynkoop, actually then kind of negotiated a little bit and finally the Indians agree to let the Army come closer to the village but not to the village -- they had to stay with about a mile away. And they agreed, then they were going to have this big meeting out there. And then when the Army gets out there, they established camp, and then finally word gets back to General Hancock that the Indians had fled. You've been tricked, it's a deserted village. And so Custer goes in on his hands and knees and some other couple other guys and they-- he crawls around and yeah, it's been abandoned. Custer does find an old Indian man in one of the lodges, there was a girl and an elderly lady that had been left behind to keep the fires going, walk around, make it look like the village is still very active and it was a tremendous duping of the Army by the Indians. I mean delaying all this going from here out there and then Hancock gets mad. He orders Custer to go out in pursuit first thing the next morning so the seventh Cavalry then goes out in pursuit of the Indians that were at the village. And then Hancock decides to pretty much destroy the village. The lodges were taken down and counted and how many of them there were. The Indian agent counted how many there were and the two don't quite agree but they're close. And so finally word there's a big debate amongst historians whether the word really gets back, but Custer and his seventh Cavalry discover up at the Smoky Hill Station the stage master has been pinned to the building with arrows and burned alive with the building. And Hancock claims he got that word so then he thought for sure that these Indians were the ones that did it and he didn't know that but whether he actually got that message or he was just anxious and he ordered everything to be torched, everything to be burned at the village. And then he takes the infantry and goes down to Fort Dodge. By burning the village and all this material then he catches the prairie on fire so it's the infantry and the artillery are going down to Fort Dodge, they're going down through prairie fires and smoke and they kind of get lost zigzagging back and forth they finally get to Fort Dodge. But this changes military policy is what's so important about this. The Army suddenly realized Civil War tactics are not going to work in the West and so they go to Winter campaigns with the battle of the Washita where the Indians can't flee, can't run, they're going to be forced to be in a small area they don't have supplies like we do. We can take you know into a small village and force them onto reservations and deal with it. But by the change of military policy that's a national effect which really is in my mind very important. And then the Indian Wars are affected from then on that-- okay yeah Sand Creek is horrible. I mean you know a lot of Indians got killed but it didn't-- it changes the way the Indians perceive the government no doubt. But it didn't really influence the way the government was fighting like this expedition did. That was-- the massive expeditions didn't work, they suddenly realized that. Didn't do any good, the Indians weren't impressed at all . Could just run away and you never catch them with a large expedition.
Ben: That was Custer's first experience of the Plains Indians too, wasn't it?
George: Yes it was.
Ben: That sort of set his mind too--
George: The Indians are gonna run, I gotta get there in a hurry. Yeah, I think that was probably in his mind at the Battle of the Little Bighorn if you really get right down to it. Because there's so much that is the same, it's basically the same people that were in that Village Site there that he will meet again at the Little Bighorn and of course the Washita some of them were the same there too, Black Kettle.
Ben: Later, Hancock runs for president and that works against him, doesn't it?
George: There was-- the Press Corps was along like we mentioned and at the time the press coverage was very good, but it quickly got into the Eastern papers that, yes, that this was a big failure, it cost the government a whole lot of money for this expedition, nothing really came out of it. And Hancock does get blamed for it and yeah it probably cost him the presidency. If you'd stop and you look after the Civil War how many presidents were famous generals during the war and Hancock was very famous from the Battle of Gettysburg and he certainly would have been a shoe in. But all of a sudden, his popularity went way down.
Carter: And correct me if I'm wrong, wasn't Comanche Jack Stillwell with that expedition?
George: Yeah, there were several notable scouts and guides. Probably the most notable scout and guide really to work out of Fort Larned was Buffalo Bill, William Cody. He actually worked here in the quartermaster building. During the summer they had him out scouting and guiding but during the winter they wanted to keep him on, they switched him to a clerk, so they were able to keep him for a while here.
Ben: So if you come to our Issue Room you're walking in the footsteps of Buffalo Bill and walking--
George: the whole lineage of famous officers that were here. Nicholas Nolan, head of the cavalry and is with the Buffalo Soldiers
Ben: You got William Forewood who becomes Surgeon General, correct?
George: Right. He started-- he was actually here a couple times. He was here the first time as a single officer and apparently from some of the accounts, he liked to party. And he would invite other officers over to his house and they would have wine and parties and play cards, just get together with the guys. He leaves for a few months, gets married and gets reassigned to Fort Larned and when he was back the second time, he had his wife with him. My favorite Forewood story: got a call a few years ago from the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and they said "When did you send us the buffalo from Fort Larned?" Like what? We don't have buffalo here today, what are you talking about? "Yeah you do we got a buffalo skeleton here from Fort Larned." No, we haven't had bison here since the great herds were destroyed in the 1870s and I said "who sent the Bison?" "Well it's tagged on the box W. Forewood." So actually Forewood was a-- Post Surgeons then where the post historians, they had to record the flora and fauna, they had to record astronomical observations, weather, and he was a scientist and historian right up with being a doctor. And he went out and collected a bison and sent it to the Smithsonian and it's still there today. So what the next question was what else did Forewood send? But they checked their card catalog for Fort Larned and Surgeon Woodhall sent a coyote. So a couple of the Surgeons here sent specimens back to Smithsonian.
Carter: So going on to reconstruction. You were here for the reconstruction of more or less all the buildings, correct?
George: Reconstruction? No, restoration, yes.
Carter: Yeah, there we go.
George: The one building with this reconstruction is the Blockhouse
Carter: So what was the most difficult part of restoring the fort?
George: Well I think one of the most interesting and getting it restored is the Blockhouse and that project. The Frizells who owned the farm during the farming period from 1902 until we got it back. The Frizell family had put a pig pen over the top of where part of the Blockhouse was at. And a lot of people over the years thought that probably that had destroyed all evidence of the Blockhouse. But we had Dr. Doug Scott and he came in with a crew they found the corners of the Blockhouse were still there and so then the next year they came in and did a little more. And then finally it was determined to go back to the Congressional intent and Congress when Fort Larned was established said the Blockhouse should be reconstructed. And that push got moved forward and so it was decided to reconstruct the Blockhouse and with that they brought in another archaeologist, a couple of historic Architects and totally excavated the underground portions of the blockhouse which were still there still intact. You could tell every place there was a board it was still there, the steps going down from the main part into the basement were still there, down in the passageway, it was wooden-lined, all that lining was still there, and around the well was sandstone which is still there. The archaeologists-- a good thing that the historic architects were there because once they exposed this wood to the open air, it started just almost within minutes peeling and just decaying rapidly because of the moisture in the ground over the years. So you really if it hadn't been for the architects being there it would have been hard to document, but they quickly were able to document the size of each board, the length of each board. And so with the-- it is a reconstruction yes, but every board in that underground part today is an exact copy of what was found in that underground part. In in the stone back in the well house they laid down plywood once they excavated, it restored the building, picked up the plywood, so when you walk into the well-house itself you're even walking at the original dirt level where the original floor was at. So there's a lot of historic integrity even though it's reconstruction. Backing up from this a little bit, when we were doing the restoration of the officers' quarters we had to remove the concrete and put the wooden porches back. Well, when the Blockhouse was torn down, apparently they had saved the stone and then as the porches on the officers' quarters started to deteriorate and sag, they took these Blockhouse stones and shored them up underneath. And so we found entombed in the concrete in front, numerous Blockhouse stones underneath it. Blockhouse stones have been encapsulated in this concrete, we found over 300 original stones from the Blockhouse. And cornerstones, gun loophole stones, I mean it was easy-- it's kind of like a puzzle putting it together but the historic architects with the photographs were then able to figure out exactly how the corners looked. And then there's all 300 of those stones are back into the building today. So even though it's a reconstruction, yeah, it has original stones in it, the underground parts all have historical integrity, foundation, original foundation had to be removed, but the exact foundation today is on top of exactly where it was then.
Carter: So how much progress have we made up to this point in terms of restoration?
George: We have the Commanding Officer's house yet to restore on the interior. We did the exterior and hopefully within the next year or two we'll be able to do the interior of the building we're in right now. That's the last big original building to be restored. Now in the future, whether we'll ever see you know other things done. A lot of the early documents called for the 10th Cavalry Stables to be reproduced and one of the Sutler's Stores at least, where the soldiers could buy and sell and traders up and down the trail could buy and sell. And the Stables has always been considered extremely important to do because of the entire story of the Buffalo Soldiers just being organized. The very first Buffalo Soldier unit assigned to the field was assigned to Fort Larned, the first engagement was not here but on their way here over there by Fort Harker, they were attacked-- some people think it was by Indians but that was never really decided, it could have been easily by Desperados trying to steal their horses. But they were shot at, they returned fire, nothing else really happened but that was actually an engagement that they did have on their way here. And then they arrive here with 99 men, Nicholas Nolan like I said the hero of Gettysburg Cavalry. But he was their captain and stays here for about two years with the men and the stories of them while they were here and what occurred here, and some of it's really kind of sad. A lot of the infantrymen they may have fought in the Civil War to free the slaves but in their mind they didn't fight to work with the Black cavalry. They didn't like that. Others accepted them, it brought a lot of racial issues to the front. The whole thing is a long long story and it's more then we probably have time to talk about today but just the bottom line is there's a lot of discrimination that took place between the Black troops and the White troops here.
Ben: Absolutely. And you see some of that discrimination happening even though the laundresses and--
George: Oh yeah, oh yeah, right lighting fires. That's not the only fire there's one in the barracks too. Probably one of the infantrymen walking by thew a match on-- they were changing the prairie hay and the bunks, bed sacks and had to be changed every month.
Ben: And there was even discrimination against Nolan.
George: Oh yeah, tremendous. He's accepted by the other officers because of his Civil War record and being a great officer. He's married his wife's here with him, but yeah he was ostracized in a lot of ways too.
Ben: Which is unfortunate.
George: Like especially by the infantrymen. You know, one of the commanding officers even told Nolan when he was Officer of the Day he'd gone into-- some of these infantrymen got into a fight. Anyway, he was told "You're a cavalry officer, these are infantrymen, they don't have to pay attention to your orders." But he was Officer of the Day, so yeah certainly they did have to. But, a lot of discrimination like that little things and yeah.
Ben: And what's really cool is in recent years our friends' group has been able to-- has donated one of his revolvers that he had.
George: Yeah, our friends' group the Fort Larned Old Guard found out about this revolver and were able to raise about $15,000 to get it purchased for the exhibits here which is really phenomenal to get an original gun carried by a Fort Larned officer on display. I think on our exhibits one of the best things and these are just two years old now, three, that we worked a lot with the tribes. And so for the first time, we're actually telling the story of the Indians the way the Indians perceive it. Like when you come in, we have the hologram of a Cheyenne girl in a lodge telling you their version of the Indian Wars. And then culturally too, we really deal a lot now with the Buffalo Soldiers and the Hispanics. Trying to talk more about just not the uniforms and the equipment that was carried and used here, but the actual people who were here. And I think too maintaining what we've done is going to be a challenge for some of the people in the future. Hopefully they won't take shortcuts and say "well okay we're not gonna-- we know the fences are all whitewashed, but we're not going to whitewash them." The facings of the buildings were painted and the fences and smaller outbuildings and things were whitewashed. The military makes a big distinction of the two.
Ben: And you can see that today too, you can see the difference between the whitewash and the-- like the privies are painted you can tell that and the doors too. No, there was a-- I was talking to a reenactor at a recent event and asking him what his thoughts on this site were and he said usually you have either well preserved or secluded like these posts were. And he says you never often see the two together and that's really what we have here. Like you were saying, I mean there's little things that we can work on improving in the future. And even though the trees that you see here today weren't there when the Army was here it really shields us from the highway and turns back that dial.
George: On the trees you've got to stop and consider what time you're talking about. If you're talking about 1859 when the Army first arrived, we have sketches by Private Roche and the river looks almost identical to the way it did today. But the soldiers that were here during the Civil War years cut down the trees from firewood, they didn't want to go out away. The regular army when they were coming back after the war, they were going up to 30 miles away and they were upset that all the shade trees were gone and if you look at the photograph like that one taken in 1867 you see stumps where trees were they've been cut down. But the river I think should pretty much be kept as it is. Now it's the early view of Fort Larned not the 1860s view, but still, it provides a good screening barrier for the highway which actually helps sound proofing and everything else and visually helps to throw you into that period without seeing a lot of modern traffic a quarter mile away on the highway.
Carter: So how can we continue to grow and develop Fort Larned?
George: The best was keep selling it to the American public. The Congressional mandate we have is to educate and interpret Fort Larned for the American public, you know what happened here. We need to keep following that keep our eyes on that Congressional mandate whether it be social media or whether it be increased visitation, it really doesn't matter because we're educating and interpreting what happened in the American West to the public through both ways. And when we've got to continue that and hopefully over a period of time, it will naturally get more visitation. But our visitation has flowed up and down over the years. When Gunsmoke was very active and on TV, we used to have around 50,000 a year. Gunsmoke goes off the air, Dodge City is no longer a big mecca for everybody that wants to go see the cowboy thing, their visitation drops from probably a hundred and some thousand down to around 30,000-40,000 today. The power of the TV really got people whether it was-- no matter what you think of Gunsmoke it brought attention to Central Kansas and to Dodge City which is only 55 miles away. And it brought a lot of people here.
Ben: Yeah, even though the show itself was filmed what, in California?
George: Well, and Milbourne Stone, played Doc on Gunsmoke, grew up just a quarter mile south of the fort and played these buildings as a kid and I think he probably had a lot to do with a lot of the little stories that they had once in a while. "Well we're going to Fort Larned" or "Let's go fishing on the Pawnee." You know or going to Fort Hays so he had a lot of the historical references that he was able to help with for authenticity.
Ben: That's really cool. Now we have uh some really cool events throughout the year, five or six or so. How would-- sort of speaking to the listeners and our volunteers that help us out with that, how would-- tell us a little bit about maybe what your favorite event is and how those folks can help out with those kind of things.
George: Well my favorite event is Candlelight Tour because it's all based off of historic records and it's for one night we do first person and it's trying to create the illusion as if you walk through the fort when some of these different events occurred. Unfortunately it doesn't ever-- we have to cap it out like around 200 people a night and we could give a lot more than that but in order to keep it-- these scenes correct, takes a lot of planning and everything but it takes a lot of volunteers volunteer effort. Some Candlelight Tours have had up to 70 people volunteering, the average one's probably around 50 people that are coming out and helping with it. And it's important to local people take part with some of the things that we do. We couldn't begin to do interpretation without volunteers here. You know our staff is way too small, just like today we have a volunteer blacksmith in the Blacksmith Shop we have a volunteer carpenter over in the Carpenter Shop. And I think that's pretty important too if you remember Colonial Williamsburg and how everybody goes there to see the way everything happened during the colonial period. I hate to say this term, but almost like a Williamsburg of the west where people could come and actually learn about the 1860s and have some of the crafts and different things going on that went on here. I think our Plains Indian interpretation needs to increase a lot though too. We really-- our mandate is to tell the story of the Santa Fe Trail and the military role and we've got to keep doing that but we could certainly expand it more into a lot more Indian interpretation than what we're doing. But trying to find native and living history people that it's kind of-- in this area it's not too easy.
Ben: And that's important not only just for events, but for just sort of day to day because we get 25,000 to 30,000 or so visitors a year.
George: We're averaging around 28,000 to 30,000 right now. It's-- during the virus it goes up and down a little bit but the average year will be right around 28,000 to 30,000. It kind of stabilized at that. When we dedicated the Blockhouse and had that reconstruction done all of a sudden it went up to around 50,000 just made a little bump. We expected that to kind of happen because of the locals telling you said "Hey, they put a building in out there let's go see it." It's really important for the local community and Fort Larned to work hand in hand. At any point in time, if that doesn't happen it's not going to be good for either one of us.
Ben: There's definitely ways that we can--
George: The friends' group is very important and doing a very good job of promoting Fort Larned and hopefully they will survive and stay there too. I can envision down the road, the Cheyenne Sioux Village that was burned the friends' group own it today, it's 32 miles from here. That will hopefully become a National Landmark and then eventually become a satellite area of Fort Larned and a lot of the Native interpretation then can be done out the village site, but that's in the future yeah.
Ben: Down the line.
George: Down the line.
Ben: So for our listeners who say from out of the area or across the country, what are some ways that they can help support the park and help what we do here?
George: I think it's not just for them to help support the park but what can we do to help them? You know, while they're here learning about the American West and if we excite them about the place, they're going to come, they're going to learn about it, and then through that then in reverse it helps us too.
Ben: And hopefully they tell their friends what a cool site this is.
George: well we get a lot of visitation from outside the United States and you stop and think, almost half of the soldiers were immigrants. You know, French, Italian, Swedes you name it.
Ben: You would have heard all sorts of languages--
George: all sorts of languages being spoke here. And the Indian leaders too, let's don't forget them. Black Kettle was here, the Indian agency was here, these tribes were coming in and seeing Fort Larned. I mean they were curious how the soldiers lived and walk around and look at the buildings. And an account from one of the officer's wives that she never got used to the time they were here the room could suddenly go dark and there'd be an Indian looking in her window. But they were coming in, picking up annuities, and signing treaties. It wasn't fighting it was peaceful attempts during the Indian Wars. So not all of Fort Larned is about fighting. The Bureau of Indian Affairs was here, the Indian agents were here, and a lot of peaceful attempts too. Can you imagine if you were a soldier here on one hand you're giving the Indians food, ammunition, to maintain their way of life and the next day you're out on patrol and one of your friends gets shot. What are you gonna think? I'm sure it was hard for them to understand today but both were done here. Peaceful and military attempts.
Carter: How can listeners learn more about the park?
George: By coming here. Or listen to our social media and pick up a good book. You know, we got a lot of publications on the fort and different things. Hopefully we will continue social media, continue the outreach and keep reaching people that, like you're talking about then they will be excited to come here. To really learn about the park, they need to come here. You know, you can read about it but until you come here and you physically touch it, you can walk on the original floors, you can see history, I mean it's just oods of the original stuff. It just -- wow. Where can you go and really touch the 1860s like you can here.
Ben: It's definitely a new unique site and definitely a unique perspective you have from being able to see sort of the evolution of the past into the present sort of the ranch era and then almost turning the dial back as we go forward.
George: Right. We can be very thankful the National Park Service got it.
Ben: Yes.
George: I can imagine what this would have become if it would have been--
Ben: Yeah, we might not have what we do today.
George: Yeah, might not be here.
Ben: Well thank you for coming on thank you for talking with us for a bit and--
George: Certainly.
Ben: Hopefully it'll encourage some folks to come see it for themselves.
George: Let's hope so!
Ben: Alright, thank you.
[whosh]
Ben: Alright well thank you for taking a listen today we hope you enjoyed this episode looking into Fort Larned's past. Again, if you don't follow us already on our social media, we are on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, also be sure to check out our webpage. We have a lot of resources there for you as well as some of the videos and things like that that Carter and I referenced at the beginning of the podcast.
Carter: Thanks for giving it a listen if you have any interest in stuff that's pretty similar to Fort Larned definitely check out Bent's Old Fort.
Ben: Their social media has a lot of similar aspects to ours so--
Carter: And it's a super cool site
Ben: It is
Carter: It's one of my favorites. Keep exploring your National Parks, come to Fort Larned.
Ben: And we hope you have a wonderful day. Keep an eye out for future footsteps podcasts. Thank you again for listening and we hope you have a wonderful day.
Carter: We'll catch you next time on footsteps the Fort Larned National Historic Site podcast thank you.
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Guest: George Elmore Host: Ben Long Co-Host: Carter Atteberry Topic: Fort Larned certainly has a multi-faceted past with many different stories — stories that Chief Ranger George Elmore has spent his entire career studying. In this episode we hear the stories of not only when Fort Larned was an active military post, but some of the actions in the past that brought us to where we are today in representing Fort Larned's past.