Kansas is often caricatured as a bastion of conservatism. Yet, at the turn of the last century, it boasted a dynamic mix of agrarian populism, unionism in Southeast Kansas and temperance societies. Some of these migrated to the Socialist Party. The publication that gave voice to these concerns was Julius A. Wayland’s weekly newspaper, Appeal to Reason. Wayland wrote and published the paper in Girard, Kansas, which included articles by many famous Americans. At its peak in 1910, it had 450,000 subscribers.

Julius Augustus Wayland was born April 26, 1854, in Versailles, Indiana. His parents had seven children. Just after he was born, his father and four siblings died in a cholera epidemic. His mother was swindled out of the family’s little house by the estate’s executor and left poverty-str

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