A Closer Look at the Kansas State Flower: the Sunflower

March 12, 1903

On this day, the Kansas State Flower was officially selected.

Governor Willis Bailey signed the legislation that designated the wild native Sunflower or Helianthus as the state flower.

Next door, Nebraska was also considering the Sunflower during that same period.

But when Kansas made it official, Nebraska dropped its bid.

And so today, Kansas remains the only state that can officially claim the Sunflower.

In the years leading up to the official selection of the Sunflower, many Kansans were writing about its beauty.

The Topeka Capital wrote:

Kansas boasts a number of men who can write a good Sunflower verse, but none of these can do it more entertainingly than Ed Blair.

Ed Blair was a Kansas poet and author, and in 1901, he wrote an ode to the Kansas Sunflower. Here's a little excerpt:

Oh, Sunflower the Queen of all flowers,

No other with you can compare

The roadside and fields are made golden

Because of your bright presence there.

Several Sunflower fun facts may surprise you.

First, they are native plants to the Western hemisphere.

Through the ages, Sunflowers have been used for dyes, oil, food, and even medicine.

In fact, in Mexico and Native American tribes, the Sunflower was used to treat chest pain.

Now, most gardeners will attempt to grow Sunflowers at some point, so if you want to try it a try. Here are a few things you should consider.

• Sunflowers do need a ton of sun. Don't be stingy with the sunshine and put them in part shade. These are plants that appreciate all the rays they can get.
• Second. Sunflowers not only grow in full sun, they follow the sun. They exhibit behavior that's known as Heliotropism. In the morning, the Sunflower heads will face East. Then, the Sunflower heads will move to track the sun throughout the day. As they mature, this tracking movement will become less pronounced as the stem loses its flexibility to support the large mature bloom.

Now, in terms of botanical history, there is a story about the Sunflower that I love to tell.

In 1972, a young student named Charles B. Heizer Jr. wrote a lovely tribute about his mentor and teacher, the botanist Edgar Anderson, called "Student Days with Edgar Anderson or How I Came to Study Sunflowers." 

Edgar once wrote Charles,

"What an incredible gift good students are…

If you are tired of [Helianthus] and don't want to look at 'em anymore for a while, why by all means put them aside.

Don't let anybody's advice, including mine, keep you from what you are happiest doing."

And here's another fun Sunflower story.

When the Russian Tsar, Peter the Great, saw Sunflowers for the first time in Holland, he fell in love with them and brought them back to Russia.

The Russian public also loved Sunflowers -  but not just for their happy flowers.

Unlike other cooking oils, the oil from Sunflower seeds was approved for use by the Russian Orthodox Church during Lent.

By the early 1800s, two million Acres of Sunflowers were planted in Russia yearly.

Ironically, over the next century, immigrants from Russia would bring Sunflower seeds with them when they immigrated to the United States.

Even though these plants were originally native to the Western hemisphere, the Russian hybrids had evolved and had bigger blooms than the original American varieties.

Finally, Mabel Thompson, a resident of Kansas, wrote a poem called “When the Sunflowers, Bloom,” it was shared in the Chanute Daily Tribune in July of 1903 - just three months after the Sunflower was made the official state flower.

I found Mabel's poem charming, and I thought I'd close the show with it today.  

I've been off on a journey. I just got home today. 
I traveled East and North and South and every other way. 
I've seen a heap of countries and cities on the boom, 
But I want to be in Kansas when the Sunflowers bloom.

You may talk about your lilies, your violets and roses, 
Your asters and your jazzy-mins, and all other posies.
I'll allow they all are beauties and full of sweet perfume, 
But there's none of them, a patchin’ to the Sunflowers bloom.

Oh, it's nice among the mountains, but I sorta felt shut-in. 
It'd be nice upon the seashore if it wasn't for the din.
While the Prairies are so quiet and there's always lots of room. 
Oh, it's nice, still in Kansas when the Sunflowers bloom.

When all the sky above is just as blue as can be. 
And the Prairie's are waving like a yellow drifting sea. 
Oh, it's there my soul goes sailing, and my heart is on the boom
In the golden fields of Kansas. When the Sunflowers bloom.