Kansas 150 photos

Phylliss Layland hugs her 3-year-old grandson Derek Grossnickle for the first time Wednesday, May 5, 1999, since her home was destroyed by a tornado Monday night in Haysville, Kan. A deadly tornado passed through the Wichita area, killing five people. Vice President Al Gore will tour the damaged area Thursday morning.

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Jaime Green / The Wichita Eagle

The Z-Bar Ranch in Strong City, Kan., will become the Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve with the passage of the Parks Bill Friday in Washington. The 10,800 acre ranch was built over a 100 years ago. The old schoolhouse will be included in the park.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

Shek Weber (red cap), Debbie Dunn (blue) and Fran Dunn look at an old flag Weber found in the rubble of the Dunn's home Wednesday, May 5, 1999, south of Haysville, Kan. Weber raised the flag on a piece of tree branch he erected in their yard. Weber and Debbie Dunn are engaged. The Dunn family drove away from their mobile home when they heard a tornado was coming. They ran into the tornado in south Wichita but escaped injury.

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BRIAN CORN / The Wichita Eagle

Wolf Creek Nuclear power plant near New Strawn, Kan., which went online in 1985, is expanding its spent fuel containment pool to house more depleted uranium.

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DAVID EULITT / Associated Press

Wolf Creek Generating Station's lake covers 5,090 acres. Wolf Creek produces more than 1,200,000 kilowatts of electricity per hour.

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Jaime Green / The Wichita Eagle

William Least Heat-Moon, author of "PrairyErth (A Deep Map): An Epic History of the Tallgrass Prairie Country," ponders the changes and comfort he found while revisiting the Flint Hills in the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Chase County.

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Mike Hutmacher / The Wichita Eagle

Kansas State University head football coach Bill Snyder is carried off the field Saturday evening after addressing the fans in the Bill Snyder Family Stadium. Snyder announced his retirement earlier in the week and stepped down from coaching Saturday after his Wildcats defeated Missouri 36-28.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

The centerpiece of the 11,000 acre Z-bar Ranch is the house built in 1881. The ranch, with its virgin prairie will become the first national park in Kansas.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

The Kansas Turnpike is seen Sunday, Aug. 31, 2003, one day after after floodwaters carried vehicles from the highway south of Emporia on Saturday night. Four children in one vehicle were killed and their mother is still missing in the floodwaters. Another man in another vehicle is also still missing.

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Jaime Green / The Wichita Eagle

A Greensburg resident looks for her 2-year-old's clothes and toys in the rubble that was her home in Greensburg.

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Fernando Salazar / The Wichita Eagle

Passengers on a United Airlines flight use the ladder of a Garden City (Kan.) Fire Department fire truck to get off of the plane, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, in Garden City. The United Airlines 757, Air Canada 727 and a US Airways Airbus 300 carrying hundreds of passengers landed safely at Garden City Regional Airport. Because the airport has no ramps that will reach the large planes, the fire department used its ladder truck to get passengers to the ground. The planes were part of a nationwide grounding after Tuesday's attacks on the East Coast.

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GRAHAM K. JOHNSON / AP

A Mid-Continent Airport passenger prays after learning about terrorist attacks at the New York World Trade Center.

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Mike Hutmacher / The Wichita Eagle

Great Bend principal Joyce Carter (left) and alumnus Jack Kilby, winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize for physics, unveil a plaque in his honor Friday afternoon during an assembly at Great Bend High School.

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Jill Chittum / The Wichita Eagle

Paramedics lay George Tiller onto a stretcher after he was shot by Shelly Shannon in 1993.

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Charlie Rollins / The Wichita Eagle

Jack Kilby, winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize for physics.

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Jill Chittum / The Wichita Eagle

Abortion protesters block the entrance to George Tiller's clinic during the Summer of Mercy protest in 1991.

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Kim D. Johnson / The Wichita Eagle

Firefighters continue to watch the flames at what used to be Woody's Appliance store in downtown Hutchinson four days after the explosion that rocked the city. The Kansas Gas Co. was unsuccessful in stopping a leak at the Yaggy storage facility Saturday, seven miles west of Hutchinson, which is thought to be responsible for the gas leaks in the city.

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Fernando Salazar / The Wichita Eagle

Wichita police officers attempt to remove an abortion protester from under a car at the entrance to George Tiller's clinic during the Summer of Mercy protest in 1991.

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Jeff Tuttle / The Wichita Eagle

A Hutchinson firefighter watches from atop a ladder truck in Hutchinson, Kan., Jan. 18, 2001, as a natural gas leak burns inside a downtown building. Officials believe natural gas from an old storage field caused the fire in addition to another explosion and numerous gas leaks reported in the community Thursday, The natural gas leaks and fires were voted the Kansas top story or 2001 in an Associated Press poll of the state's newspaper and broadcast editors.

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CHARLIE RIEDEL / Associated Press

Mike Kiselev runs down St. Francis carrying the torch after getting it from Harold Strother in front of the Coleman Museum. The Coleman company developed the torch that carried the Olympic flame.

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Larry Smith / The Wichita Eagle

Huge flames still erupt from the ground in what was a wedding supply store in downtown Hutchinson on Thursday afternoon. A gas explosion destroyed the building on Wednesday but officials have not been able to extinguish the flames that are being fed by an underground gas leak.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

Serial killer Dennis Rader stands before Sedgwick County District Court Judge Greg Waller Thursday afternoon as sentencing is read. Rader recieved 9 life terms and a "hard 40" for the ten murders he commited over nearly 30 years

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

Natural gas sprays 20-30 feet in the air Thursday afternoon on the east side of Hutchinson. A natural gas leak believed to be from a gas storage field several miles away caused two explosions and fires in Hutchinson.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

Dennis Rader prepares to sit in a Sedgwick County courtroom during the first day of testimony in his sentencing phase on Wednesday, August 17, 2005. Rader, also known as BTK, pleaded guilty to killing 10 people during a spree spanning 30 years in the Wichita area.

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Bo Rader / The Wichita Eagle

Framed by crosses commemorating the lives of five killed by raging flood waters Saturday night along the Kansas Turnpike, United States Geological Survey hydrologist Charlie Perry takes measurements Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2003, south of Emporia, Kan.

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Jill Chittum / The Wichita Eagle

Millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett waves to the the crowds gathered at Salina Airport on Thursday afternoon after crawling out of the Virgin Atlantic Globalflyer. Fossett became the first man to fly solo around the world nonstop on one tank of fuel.

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bo rader / rader

An aerial view of Greensburg, Kan., taken on Saturday, May 5, 2007, after a tornado blew through on Friday night.

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Jaime Green / The Wichita Eagle

American Airlines first officer Sean Pavlich answers travelers questions after returning to the Mid-Continent Airport terminal before take-off.

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Mike Hutmacher / The Wichita Eagle

Photo of George Tiller released by his attorney on 05/31/2009. Tiller operated Women's Health Care Services, in Wichita. One of three clinics in the country where late-term abortions are performed.

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Tiller Family / Courtesy

Russian President Boris Yeltsin works the crowd after his speech at McConnell Air Force Base in June 1992. The hat was a gift from someone in the crowd.

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Dave Williams / The Wichita Eagle

Attorney Gloria Allred hold a picture of George Tiller while taking with the media outside College Hill United Methodist Church Saturday.

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Fernando Salazar / The Wichita Eagle

Dennis Rader, booking mug. Rader is believed to be the BTK killer.

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ho / scan