The History

It all began in 1869…

The City of Eskridge was founded in 1869 by Colonel Ephraim H. Sanford and named after his friend, C.V. Eskridge, the publisher of an Emporia Newspaper. When the ATSF railway laid tracks nearly 12 years later, they moved the existing town to its current location.

Eskridge thrived—

Once the railroad came to town, the population surged, and business boomed—especially the cattle business. The railhead became one of the leading shipping points for cattle. Stories are told of herds of cattle being driven down Main Street to be loaded on cattle trains. Eskridge became a bustling community with everything a person could need.

But disaster struck

First in 1890, a fire destroyed much of the west side of the 100 block of Main St, but the town quickly rebuilt and recovered. In 1911, a severe tornado blew through town, damaging much of the East residential area, including 2 churches and the Eskridge School—injuring 20-30 students in the process. And again, in 1913—fire. The fire destroyed 9 buildings on Main St—the very same that were damaged in 1890. Once again, the town rebuilt.

And then came the park

On the 18th of May, 1903, John Y. and Sadie Waugh, pictured here, sold the land, called ‘Block 32’ to the City of Eskridge for $500 for the sole purpose of creating a public park. The land, an entire city block, now exists as the Eskridge City Park, between 4th and 5th, Main and Pine Streets.

Five years later, construction of a band stand was approved and completed at the west edge of the Park.

The following year, 1909, Eskridge marked its 40th Anniversary with a 3 day “Home Coming” celebration, a gala affair that brought over 5,000 attendees, including Governor W. R. Stubbs and U.S. Senator Charles Curtis. The event centered around its brand new bandstand. Later, it was determined the bandstand was built too tall, which caused difficulty in hearing speakers and music, so in 1913, the bandstand was shortened and relocated to the center of the Park, an area of lower elevation, where it remains today.

Time Marches On

Eskridge thrived for many more decades. However, as with most small towns, prosperity slowed down drastically in the 1970s, when the highway systems made their way across America. In 1972, the ATSF closed the train depot in Eskridge, and sold the land off to nearby landowners. Thus began the period of the ‘bedroom community,’ where small town residents began commuting to larger communities to work, taking business elsewhere.

Hope lies ahead

In 2015, the Eskridge City Council joined small towns across the nation in a bid for a Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) specifically for city parks. Sadly, Eskridge did not win the grant. Amid feelings of frustration, Bruce Waugh persuaded the Council to create a board to help guide and encourage the future of the Eskridge Park—and so, in October 2016, the Eskridge Park Board was formed. The following January, Bruce Waugh, with Dale Nims, succeeded in placing the historic bandstand and park on the National and State Register of Historic Places.

Later that year, the Eskridge Park Board joined the Kansas Rural Communities Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation which acts as a mechanism for communities to raise money and improve their communities.

The Eskridge Park Foundation was born

In December 2017, the Eskridge Park Foundation hosted its first event—a free visit from Santa in the Park, who arrived by fire truck, with hot cocoa and cookies. The bandstand was bedecked in Christmas lights, a new tradition.

For the next year and a half, the EPF would host various Bingo game and Trivia night fundraisers, to raise initial funds and promote awareness of the group’s efforts to the community. We also hosted Progress in the Park (PIP) events to clean up and beautify the Park. We met a steady attendance at each event and had a great time interacting with our community, but bigger steps were needed ahead to meet our goals.

Time to Fundraise

In 2019, the EPF launched the 110 Campaign in honor of the 110th year of the historic bandstand. Mailers, various events and social media were all used to promote the culminating event, the Emporia Area Match Day hosted by The Emporia Community Foundation on Veteran’s Day. The event resulted in $8,589 in donations, with a match of $2576, resulting in a total of $11,165.88 raised.

The wonderful results of this fund drive allowed us to take a big leap at our first grant process. With the help of Ben Moore Studio, we applied for the Heritage Trust Fund Grant through the Kansas Historical Society for the restoration of the 1909 historic bandstand. All our hard work paid off—in early 2020, we were awarded an 80% match of $43,324 of a $54,155 budget for the project. Our first success! The process is currently ongoing and slated to be complete by summer 2021.

We also worked with Dea Brokesh of LDB Landscape Architecture and Engineering to develop a master design plan of our vision for the park. Those plans can be viewed in detail here.

Challenges in 2020

We moved into 2020 on a very exciting note but, as we all know, a worldwide pandemic and shutdowns altered the plans of everyone. Still, we continued to try to plan events—a summer festival to coincide with Symphony in the Flint Hills, as well as the Eskridge Fall Festival, both of which were shut down in different phases of planning.

But we did see an outpouring support with another fundraising campaign—the 2020 Match Challenge. The Flint Hills Bank and the City of Eskridge sponsored the EPF by each donating $0.50 for every dollar the EPF earned from October 1st to December 31st up to $15,000. The generosity and support of our community and beyond blew us away by giving $25,906, for a total fundraiser of $40,906.

A Great 2021

We followed up a difficult year with one filled with successes. The restoration of the historic Bandstand with completed with the joint efforts of the Heritage Trust Fund Grant, the Eskridge Park Foundation and its donors funding, Ben Moore Studios, and Riley Construction. While 2020 drastically affected the budget for the project, the construction came in ahead of plans the the project was completed in great time. This beautiful piece of history should stand for another 100 years with continued TLC.

The EPF went on to host a National Endowment of the Arts and Kansas Department of Commerce grant-funded summer music festival with the help and musical stylings of House Rent Records and Americana Music Academy. Delayed a day due to unusually rainy July weather, the event provided the special opportunity for the newly finished Bandstand to be rededicated. An estimated 200-300 attendees brought lawn chairs and blankets, drank a beer and enjoyed the beautiful day and great music.

On the last Saturday in October, the EPF and Eskridge Fall Festival committee joined to make the 97th Annual Fall Festival the first Festival to happen in the Park—and the results were amazing! Not only was the weather a perfect 66 degrees, but the Park was filled to the brim with festival goers. They had craft and food vendors, games including axe throwing, inflatables, a haunted school bus, etc, a car show, and a parade to celebrate the day. The event was deemed a success by all and estimated 500 attendees.

Moving forward…

The Eskridge Park Foundation is always looking forward. We continue to fundraise, to reach out to the community and raise awareness of our progress and goals, and make plans for wonderful changes to come.