Aunt Sally's Landing

Aunt Sally was a steamboat and in the 1890's the residents of Arkansas City thought she would bring them fame and propsperity via trade with East Coast seaports when she chugged up to this spot where the Arkansas River is joined by Walnut Creek near the border of Kansas and Oklahoma.






In fact, for a short time, there were two steamboats that made regular runs from Fort Smith, on the Kansas-Arkansas border, to Aunt Sally's Landing at Arkansas City. Although the steamboat trade dwindled, Arkansas City's did become a bustling trade center rivaling Wichita for a time. In the latter 20th century, however, the railroad and petroleum based economy of the area fell apart and never materialized though and Arkansas City now struggles to maintain a role of importance in Cowley County, Kansas.

The beautiful former steamboat landing on the edge of R-Kansas city, or Ark City, as it is referred to by locals, is now known as Walnut Park and was our home base for the few days we spent in this area.

Ark City and Winfield, a far less interesting city just north of the Oklahoma border, are about ten miles apart in distance and a couple of hundred people apart in population (about 12,000 each). Winfield has the distinction of being the county seat. Each strives to be unique. Ark City promotes their architecure which bears witness to the prosperity of earlier days.

This is the original high school of Ark City. Wow! What an imposing and majestic building. It is now part of Cowley County Community College.


This old Carnegie library is an example of neoclassical architecture.



And these Italian style domes are repeated in different places in the city.

Squeezed in on Main Street is a building with Spanish influence, as you can see in the roof tiles and the decorative tile across the front.


This church has Roman arches and towers.


And this one has both towers and domes.

The information on this one identified it as Renaissance and its facade is cast iron. And of course some historical murals, which you will see below seem to belong to Winfield rather than Ark City.


Winfield City has played down architectural style while playing up history by painting huge murals on many of their buildings.

Plowing a field the hard way.

This charming English cottage actually has no windows at all, and is the restroom in the park.

Even Chorro got a little confused because the children looking out the windows appeared to be so real, although from a different time.



I liked this treatment of a huge garage/warehouse.

And of course this is Kansas, and sooner or later we were bound to see Dorothy and friends going out to supper. Oops, I mean down the yellow brick road.




Both cities have small colleges.

Cowley College is in Ark City,


And Winfield has Southwestern College.


and both have Walmarts (but I spared you pictures of those).

As you can see, Chorro and I roamed the streets of both towns finding things to interest us enough to take photographs. I thought this was an apple tree.


Until I got close enough for a better look. Dimpled tennis balls? The jury is still out on these, waiting for more information.

Day's end found us snuggled back in our little home on wheels.




Unfortunately, were too low for really good sunset shots. Still, here's Ark City's sunset sky.

And tomorrow is still a new day!