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Although this version of
Kansas Katie is out of print, the entire book and
illustrations are now in our
anthology:
Kansas Tall Tales

From the author who brought us Johnny Kaw: The Pioneer Spirit of Kansas, Izzie : Growing Up on the Plains in the 1880s, and the delightful young adult novel Imagicat, comes a new offering sure to appeal to younger readers and delight teachers and librarians anxious to find more publications about Kansas when doing Kansas studies sections or for that elusive Kansas Day program.  Jerri Garretson has a well-earned reputation as an author of Kansas stories for young readers in the last couple of years.  With her newest book, Jerri fills several very real needs.

Kansas Kate: A Sunflower Tale is similar to Johnny Kaw.  It is the story of a larger than life character that adds to the imaginative lore of Kansas.  While more of this type of work is always welcome, Jerri also introduces a feminine version of the heroic, larger-than-life Paul Bunyanesque character.  Kansas Katie is not as roughhewn as Johnny Kaw -- she is feminine, yet strong, full of the endurance of the pioneer, while able to relate to kittens and flowers, the type of woman who settled the prairies and plains of our state.

With this book we are introduced to a new talent of Jerri's.  She not only wrote the story, she is also the illustrator.  Although the cover is in color, the interior pages are line drawings suitable for very young children to color themselves.  The book even includes a song, "Home on Kansas Katie's Range," (sung to the tune of "Home on the Range"), a short bibliography about sunflowers, a recipe for Kansas Katie's cookies and a chance to acquire a Kansas Katie doll created by Manhattan dollmaker Gayla Brown.  Recommended for elementary school library media centers and public library children's sections.

Reprinted with permission. 

Katie and her constant feline companion, Buttercup, had heard so much about the land of Johnny Kaw, a place called Kansas, that they just had to come and see for themselves.  Anyway, with everyone talking about the exploits of Johnny Kaw and his big northern friend Paul Bunyan, Katie was downright sure that what that place needed was the touch of a woman!  So, she hiked up her skirts and headed west with her big yellow cat Buttercup perched on her shoulders. 

Took them quite a spell, it did, but at last they passed Westport and were out on the Kansas Plains, a place where it was said, a body could "look forwever at a waving sea of tall grass."  It was a strange new country for Buttercup, one where she could hardly find a place to practice her favorite game of, "I'm hiding and you can't find me."

But this wasn't the Kansas Katie was looking for.  There were fields of wheat and corn, fences and roads.  She was determined to do something dramatic to give Mother Nature a hand in gaining back some of the beauty that she was sure Kansas once had.  Then came the opportunity when Buttercup found a place to hide, in a large, tangled thicket of blossoms the same color as Buttercup.  Only those two green eyes peering out among the leaves and flowers gave away her hiding place.  Here was Katie's answer of what to do!

She would build a 'soddy' down by the river and do whatever was necessary to promote those 'sunny weeds' that were hardy enough to grow anywhere and thrive in the hot Kansas sun.  Katie began by harvesting 'whole bushels' of the sunflower seeds and dried them out for early spring planting.

She and Buttercup would spend their winter eating sunflower seed bread and sunflower seed cookies.  Any hungry or thirsty traveler who came by the 'soddy' alongside the river, was invited in for sunflower seed snacks washed down with a drink of fresh, cool water.  It was a grand plan, and pretty soon a lot of people heard about it.

There were plenty of seeds for spring planting, so Katie and Buttercup traveled along the trails and byways most everywhere, with a knapsack full of sunflower seeds.  Up and down the rutted trails and traces and across deserted fields, encouraged by a lot of purrs and meows from Buttercup, Katie became a western counterpart of Johnny Appleseed.  And it seemed like every seed grew, millions and millions of them!  Katie called is 'spreading sunshine.'  Kansas became a glowing carpet of flowers.

So successful was pioneer Katie with her yearly sowing of sunflower seeds all over the state that people came to call Kansas the Sunflower State.  So, in 1903 the State Legislature passed a resolution that really did make Kansas the Official Sunflower State.

Now, when you go traveling from St. Francis to St. Paul, Atchison to Abilene to Elkhart, you will see thee hardy, yellow flowers and know that Kansas Katie and Buttercup passed that way.

Well, maybe Kansas Katie really didn't exist, but if you are a grandparent anticipating holding a grandchild on your lap -- and read a 'what if' story this Christmas or on a birthday to eagerly listening ears, Katie and her flowers that turn their faces to the sun, is the book for you!

Jerri Garretson is a Manhattan [Kansas] based writer.

Kansas Katie is a companion to her earlier Johnny Kaw book. 

Reprinted with permission.