Abstract:
The people of Kansas have always taken a great interest in education. Early in Kansas history, schools had been established. Shawnee Mission, in Johnson County, was established when the entire white population of the territory was less than one thousand. One of the first, if not the first school districts in Kansas had its schoolhouse near the present town of Marion, and the district extended from thence south to the state line, and west to the state line. In 1860, the territorial population had increased to seven thousand of school age, and the annual school expenditure was $20,000. Today, there are close to five hundred fifty thousand children of school age and almost twenty thousand teachers. The yearly expenditure has been conservatively fixed at forty-one million dollars.
