Edgar Langsdorf Award
The Edgar Langsdorf Award of Excellence honors superior writing and is presented on an annual basis to authors of articles in the quarterly publication Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains.
The award honors the memory of Edgar Langsdorf, a longtime employee of the Historical Society. An exceptional historian and writer, Langsdorf made many contributions to Kansas history, often unheralded.
The Kansas Historical Foundation appoints a panel of judges to make the selection by September 1 of each year. Presentations of a plaque and award of $200 are made at the Kansas Historical Foundation annual meeting in the fall. Find a list of past recipients.
There is no application procedure for this award. It is selected by the panel from articles published each year in Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains.
2022 -
2021 - Peter Grant, "The 1918 Influenza Outbreak at Haskell Institute: An Early Narrative of the Great Pandemic," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, Volume 43 (Summer 2020)
2020 - Sarah Bell, "A Congress of Women: The Woman’s Council at the Ottawa Chautauqua, 1892-1914," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, Volume 42 (Spring 2019)
2019 - Christopher C. Lovett, “Bad Girls: Sex, Shame, Public Health and the Forgotten Legacy of Samuel J. Crumbine in Kansas, 1917-1955,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, Volume 41 (Spring 2018)
2018 - Dr. Ian H. Munro, Merriam, “C. H. J. Taylor and Black Empowerment in Post-Reconstruction Kansas, 1877-1887,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 40 (Autumn 2017)
2017 - Marilyn Irvin Holt, Abilene, “Over the Hill to the Poorhouse,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 39 (Spring 2016)
2016 - Dr. Brie Swenson Arnold, "To Inflame the Mind of the North: Slavery Politics and the Sexualized Violence of Bleeding Kansas," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 38 (Spring 2015)
2015 - Justine Greve, Grantville, “Language and Loyalty: The First World War and German Instruction at Two Kansas Schools,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 37 (Autumn 2014)
2014 - Dr. Tai S. Edwards, Overland Park, “Disruption and Disease: The Osage Struggle to Survive in the Nineteenth-Century Trans-Missouri West,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 36 (Winter 2013-2014)
2013 - Charles Delgadillo, “’A Pretty Weedy Flower’: William Allen White, Midwestern Liberalism, and the 1920s Culture War,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 35 (Autumn 2012)
2012 - Benjamin Goossen, "Like a Brilliant Thread: Gender and Vigilante Democracy in the Kansas Coal Field, 1921-1922," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 34 (Autumn 2011)
2011 - Christopher C. Lovett, "A Public Burning: Race, Sex, and the Lynching of Fred Alexander," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 33 (Summer 2010)
2010 - William E. Foley, "Murder on the Santa Fe Trail: The United States v. See See Sah Mah and Escotah," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 32 (Summer 2009)
2009 - Dr. Steven Trout, "The Western Front Comes to Kansas," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 31 (Autumn 2008)
2008 - John N. Mack, “United We Stand: Law and Order on the Southeastern Kansas Frontier, 1866–1870,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 30 (Winter 2007/2008)
2007 - Joseph B. Herring, "Selling the ‘Noble Savage’ Myth: George Catlin and the Iowa Indians in Europe, 1843-1845," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 29 (Winter 2006/2007)
2007 - Brooke Speer Orr, "Mary Elizabeth Lease: Gendered Discourse and Populist Party Politics in Gilded Age America," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 29 (Winter 2006/2007)
2006 - Karen Manners Smith, "Father, Son, and Country on the Eve of War: William Allen White, William Lindsay White, and American Isolationism, 1940-1941," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 28 (Spring 2005)
2005 - Frederick D. Seaton, "The Long Road Toward 'The Right Thing to Do': The Troubled History of the Winfield State Hospital," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 27 (Winter 2004/2005)
2004 - Jeff R. Bremer, "A Species of Town--Building Madness': Quindaro and Kansas Territory, 1856-1862," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 26 (Autumn 2003)
2003 - Kristen A. Tegtmeier Oertel, "'The Free Sons of the North' vs. 'The Myrmidons of Border Ruffianism': What Makes a Man in Bleeding Kansas?" Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 25 (Autumn 2002)
2002 - Kevin J. Abing, "Before Bleeding Kansas: Christian Missionaries, Slavery, and the Shawnee Indians in Pre-Territorial Kansas, 1844-1854," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 24 (Spring 2001)
2001 - Julie Courtwright, "Want to Build a Miracle City?: War Housing in Wichita," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 23 (Winter 2000/2001)
2000 - James R. Shortridge, "Kansas Barns in Time and Place," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 22 (Spring 1999)
1999 - Jerry Bergman, "Steeped in Religion: President Eisenhower and the Influence of the Jehovah's Witnesses," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 21 (Autumn 1998)
1998 - Bill Cecil-Fronsman, "'Advocate the Freedom of White Men, As Well As That of the Negroes': The Kansas Free State and Antislavery Westerns in Territorial Kansas," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 20 (Summer 1997)
1997 - Nancy J. Hulston, "Our Schools Must Be Open to All Classes of Citizens: The Desegregation of the University of Kansas School of Medicine, 1938," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 19 (Summer 1996)
1996 - Milton S. Katz and Susan B. Tucker, "A Pioneer in Civil Rights: Esther Brown and the South Park, Desegregation Case of 1948," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 18 (Winter 1995-1996)
1995 - Patrick G. O'Brien, "Kansas at War: The Home Front, 1941 - 1945," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 17 (Spring 1994)
1994 - Homer E. Socolofsky, "The Bittersweet Tale of Sorghum Sugar," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 16 (Winter 1993-1994)
1993 - Paul E. Wilson, "How the Law Came to Kansas," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 15 (Spring 1992)
1992 - James R. Shortridge, "People of the New Frontier: Kansas Population Origins, 1865," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 14 (Autumn 1991)
1991 – Daniel D. Holt, “An Unlikely Partnership and Service: Dwight Eisenhower, Mark Clark, and the Philippines,” Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 13 (Autumn 1990)
1989 - Patrick G. O'Brien, Kenneth J. Peake, and Barbara K. Robins, "It May Have Been Illegal, But It Wasn't Wrong': The Kansas 'Balkans' Bootlegging Culture, 1920-1940," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 12 (Winter 1988-1989)
1988 - Donald F. Danker, "A High Price for a Lame Cow," Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains, 11 (Summer 1987)
1987 - James L. Forsythe, "George Grant of Victoria: Man and Myth," Kansas History 10 (Autumn 1986)
For more information about this award contact:
Kansas Historical Foundation
6425 SW 6th Avenue
Topeka KS 66615-1099
785-272-8681
Fax 785-272-8682
kshs.membership@ks.gov
