February 24, 1835 — When Ink First Met Kansas Soil

Here, Missionary Jotham Meeker admires his first edition newspaper!

Did you know that long before Kansas was ever a state… oh yes fellow Kansans, I’m talking long before there were cattle drives, oil booms, and words like “Bleeding” used to describe it… there was a singular printing press. And it changed the way that people thought about information.

On February 24, 1835, at the Shawnee Baptist Mission near present-day Kansas City, missionary Jotham Meeker pulled the first printed pages from a press that would soon make history. The publication was called the Shawnee Sun, and it became the first newspaper printed in what would eventually become the great state of Kansas.

Yes, my friends, we all live amongst wild and crazy times, but for one second… just one… stop and think about the marvel of this man and what he meant for our future.

You see back then, Kansas wasn’t a state. It wasn’t even officially a territory. It was just a vast stretch of prairie, mission settlements, trade routes, and Native lands. And yet, someone believed in the power of words, and that they mattered enough to set them in ink.

Now here’s where it gets freaking gnarly!!!! Even you hipsters can appreciate this. Meeker didn’t just print his paper in English. That’s right, The Shawnee Sun was produced in the Shawnee language, serving as both a religious and educational tool. It wasn’t flashy. It wasn’t political. It didn’t spark riots or shape elections.

(OH THE SIMPLER TIMES)

But though it did something quieter, it was just as powerful.

This man and his work proved that Kansas was a place where stories were meant to be told. And that they deserved a rightful place to be shared, documented, and remembered.

That specific press marked the beginning of a tradition that would define this state: bold headlines during frontier conflicts, abolitionist papers during turbulent territorial years, small-town weeklies chronicling harvests and heartbreak, sports victories and school board debates. From the Wichita Eagle to the Kansas City Star, we are a state of news and wonderful stories.

And it all came to fruition on a humble day in February of 1835, when one man and one paper grew a culture of Kansas journalism that still lives on in community papers, digital platforms, and local storytellers who believe our towns still matter.

And dammit, that’s the heartbeat that unites us at Kansas Weekly. Sure, we are 100% a B.A. advertising agency, but everything we do is centered around the stories of local people and their communities.

Before there were massive universities and professional sports teams; before major highways and institutions; hell, even before our statehood… there were stories. And luckily, Kansas had ink on its hands.

As we now know, once a place starts telling its story, it never really stops. And we are honored at Kansas Weekly to continue this tradition.