Every Jan. 29, Kansans celebrate the state’s birthday, but Kansas Day is more than a yearly shout-out to statehood. Kansas Day began in 1877 in a Paola public school classroom. By 1882, a pamphlet titled “Kansas Day for Kansas Schools” was distributed statewide, providing teachers with lessons, songs, poems and historical information. That publication marked the beginning of the statewide Kansas Day celebrations still familiar today. Despite this rich past, Kansas Day is not about promoting a single “Kansas mindset.” Wynn argues that there is no one way to define what it means to be Kansan.