Where to Stay in Topeka, Kansas

What is Topeka known for?

The seat of Kansas government sits on the Kansas River in the northeast of the state, its story reaching from abolitionist beginnings to the civil-rights era, and its museums range from the Kansas Museum of History to the daredevil relics of the Evel Knievel Museum. The prairie starts at the edge of town. History runs deep here.

What are the main landmarks in Topeka?

Topeka keeps its history in its houses. Old Prairie Town and the Ward-Meade House preserve the pioneer years, while the Charles Curtis House and the John and Mary Ritchie House hold the memory of a vice-president and an abolitionist. The Kansas Museum of History gathers the state's record.

Newer draws sit alongside the old, from the bright Equality House to the stunt relics of the Evel Knievel Museum.

What is the history of Topeka?

Topeka was founded in 1854, in the year Kansas opened to settlement and to bitter dispute over slavery. Antislavery settlers built the town on the Kansas River, and the John and Mary Ritchie House survives from those first years, the home of an abolitionist who helped fugitives north. The city became the capital, and government has anchored it since.

Streets and a statehouse rose fast on the open prairie, laid out with the confidence of a capital-to-be. Its later story runs through the nation's. Charles Curtis, born nearby, rose from Topeka to the vice-presidency, the first person of Native American descent to hold the office, and the Charles Curtis House still stands as his mark on the city.

Churches carried the community through the decades, among them the St. John African Methodist Episcopal Church. The Ward-Meade House and Old Prairie Town keep the pioneer past, while the Kansas Museum of History gathers the whole state's record. The Equality House, painted in bright colours, marks a later chapter in the city's long argument over rights.

Prairie and politics meet in Topeka.

Where is Topeka?

The Kansas River cuts through Topeka. The city spreads along both banks in the northeast of the state, where the wooded river valley opens onto the tallgrass prairie that rolls away to the west. Low bluffs edge the water.

The plains set the horizon.

What is the climate of Topeka?

Topeka sits in the continental heart of the country. Hot, humid summers give way to cold winters on the open plains, and the seasons swing hard with little coast to soften them. Storms roll in from the west.

Tornado weather comes each spring.

How do you get to Topeka?

The interstates cross at Topeka. The city sits where major highways meet in northeast Kansas, a day's drive from either end of the plains, and rail lines still run through it along the river. Regional flights use the airport.

Most arrive by road, off the interstates that carry the traffic of the prairie.