Michael Stubbs
Kansas Historical Foundation
Board of Directors
Elected to board: 2006, honorary board 2019
Michael Stubbs was born in Hillsboro and raised in Topeka. With grandparents in Rice and Marion counties, he comes from a family with many ties to Kansas. He is a long time resident of Wabaunsee County where he is active in efforts to preserve the county's historic, natural, and cultural assets.
In his career as a film location manager, Michael traveled thousands of miles on the back roads of Kansas and Nebraska scouting locations for films such as Sarah, Plain and Tall and Oh, Pioneers!
He is a member of a number of boards including the Wabaunsee County Historical Society and the Symphony in the Flint Hills Advisory Board. He was active in establishing the Freedom’s Frontier National Heritage Area in eastern Kansas and western Missouri. He has conducted extensive research on the Underground Railroad in Kansas and has registered three sites with the National Park Service's Network to Freedom Program.
As president of the Mount Mitchell Prairie Guards Stubbs led the effort that created the heritage prairie, a historic property formerly owned by the state. He began his association with the Kansas Historical Society at age 16 as part of the archeology investigation at the Pawnee Indian Museum State Historic Site in Republic. He was first elected to the Kansas Historical Foundation Board of Directors in 2006. He was nominated to the honorary board in 2019.
“I have spent a lifetime learning the stories that comprise Kansas history. When I drive through our state I see in my mind’s eye the events of history that took place wherever I happen to be. My days are rich with images of Native Americans, explorers, abolitionists, cowboys, gold seekers, immigrants, suffragists, and so much more. We Kansans live where events that shaped the destiny of our country are sill present in the landscape of our daily lives. I feel it’s our obligation to know these stories and pass them on to those that come after us.”
