Adventures in Kansas, January

Some people make New Year's resolutions.

I didn't do that, but one thing we thought we would like to do this year is to be intentional in exploring places in Kansas; in particular places we've not seen before. Our goal is to try to pick one place to visit each month.

This month we decided to stay fairly local.

We went to Wichita, to Old Town to the Museum of World Treasures. We thought with it being such a cold month, we would like to do an indoor excursion. We have never been here before. At least since it has been turned into a museum. My Bible study friends and I came here several years ago when it was filled with fun shops. I used to love coming here.

But now, we were coming for a new adventure.

When we arrived at the museum, we were greeted by T-Rex.

These bones were found right here in Kansas!

This is a part of the Berlin Wall!

The 2ND floor of the museum is filled with war memorabilia.

This is Herman Goering, who was a minister of the Third Reich under Adolf Hitler. In the Second World War, he was the Commander-in-Chief of the German air force. Göring (as it is spelled in Germany) was responsible for the creation of the concentration camps and the Gestapo, the official secret Nazi police. In 1941, he gave Reinhard Heydrich the order to arrange the Final Solution to kill millions of Jews.

Göring was one of the 25 people charged at the Nuremberg Trials. The court decided he was guilty. The judgment on 1 October 1946 said that he was to be hanged, but he killed himself by eating cyanide poison before his execution.

We have a family story that his wife and child were Christians and begged him to ask forgiveness from the Lord.

The reason we are interested in Herman is because we have been told that we are related to him. This is what the family claims. Here is a picture of Grandma B - Edna Goering who we have been told is Herman's cousin. (Al's Dad, Grandma B. holding Jill, Allen and Josh)

Here is the Goering family after they immigrated to the United States in 1874. In the back row, you will see the picture of the man pasted into the photo. That is the brother who stayed behind and we have been told is Herman's father. The family claims that they changed all the information about the family (names, etc) in the family book so that no connection can be made to their evil relative. Some say this could not be true, but our aunt and several other family members say that in the 60's a relative from Germany came to visit and he confirmed it was so. So, who knows.

This gentleman was a volunteer who came to share stories of the war. He spoke to us about his service in the military and showed us pictures of his crew who went on bombing raids over Tokyo. He was 21 at the time. There was a model of the plane he flew and he explained about that too. He said they dropped flyers over the city to warn people that they would be bombing and that they should get out, but the Japanese militia picked up the flyers.

Incidently, this man is a Gideon now.

There was some interesting information about Bernard Montgomery who was a general in Great Britain. What was really interesting to us was the letter.

Do you see who it is written to???

"Dear Graber"

What relative of ours is this?!

We saw lots of Biblical pieces that were really interesting to us.

Neo-Babylonian and Persian spears and daggers!

Baal!

So interesting to see things we read about in our Bible!

This next one is gross and quite scary! I'm posting it just for Hannah who has a curiosity for Egyptian "mommies"!

Sophia saw this mummy and she does not ever want to go to a museum ever! Especially since she saw "A Night At The Museum" and believes that all of things come to life at night!

This mummy was a young adult female who lived some time between the 21st and 26th dynasties of Egypt. They think she was in her late 20's when she died. The scientists determined that she suffered from scoliosis. X-rays revealed some of the details of her mummification. The brain was removed from the nose. When the Egyptians removed the eyes of mummies they were often replaced with artificial eyes, but this mummy's eyes were not replaced. (Ok that is just too gross)

Here is another interesting thing for Hannah - a rock from the planet Mars! We will just have to go there another time with Hannah. She would just love this place! Hannah LOVES anything to do with outer space.

This museum had many other interesting things - like the map of Kansas when it first became a state. Did you know that the city of Wichita was non-existent at the time, but the town of Whitewater was on the map?

This is a picture of Wild Bill Hickok - Al's Dad's namesake. Al's Dad's real name is Elmer, but when he was a little boy, he pretended to be Wild Bill Hickok so much they ended up calling him Bill. And he goes by that to this day - Bill Graber.

This was such a fun place to go. We are making plans about where to go in February.