I think people around here know a lot about the ranching history in this area. Texas tends to be very much about itself with its own history. I think this particular history is more about middle american regional story that hasnt really been told. So its almost like the isolation of the ranching history is texas, texas, texas, but one of the things we talked about this show, we pitched it as like looking about rather than always looking within. We are in the panhandleplains Historical Museum, and the museum is the largest Historical Museum in the state of texas, if you count it by the number of artifacts and the exhibition cowboys andttle, culture kansas city and the amarillo, building an urban west. The fulltime curator here and i are natives to kansas city. We were always interested in why this place felt so familiar to us as having grown up there. Michael started looking at the number of objects in the panhandleplains Permanent Collection that related to kansas city. It turns out there were over 1,000 objects on a database that he pulled up. We looked at the objects and we found a good array of a variety of objects we thought we needed to do a show that the city sisterhood of amarillo and kansas city. A lot of people dont know that am rillo looked to dallas and to houston. This closeness is basically around the train system and cattle industry that drew those two cities together. We tell the story of that in this show. In 1870, cattle being driven by the cowboys, meaning walked across the plains, like for example from texas to montana. So, for example, longhorns were the best kind of walking cattle for those drives. But theyre not the best beast cattle. By 1887, the railroad had cut through denver and fort worth, amarillo as a city didnt exist until the railroad came through. By that time, there was more shipping of the cattle on the rails rather than doing the drives anymore. And those kind of cattle could be preferred and the beast cattle that we think of. So by the time they were linked, kansas citys Cattle Market started really booming based on the cattle being raised in the panhandle. So we helped each other to grow the cattle industry. With the train connecting the two. And then the other aspect is the culture and fashion and objects in the museum that tell the story of going to kansas city and finding goods and services that were bringing sophistication back here. Even cowboys would go buy spurs and boots. In kansas city. We didnt have local Business Owners that could sell those items to the cowboys. And i think people can really understand beyond this area its a local history and a regional history and its also a national history. So it works on a number of levels. We have a newspaper from cands city thats dated to the era of the border boom of oil. So border is a town. We have kansas city featuring amarillo as the wonder city of the texas panhanding. So this idea that the little city was the wonder city of he texas panhandle is something that sounds a little Old Fashioned but i think its very true back then. We have this blueprint above by an architect who deserves he deserves his own study. Er. Name is guy carland what we have is an image of the United States with the city of amarillo thats a larger than ny other city and its showing the networking of amarillo as a crossroads for the United States. It also says ideal location for capital and industries. You can see that the railroad between amroil and kansas city is just one straight shot of a line. Its an even almost quicker line than to dallas. By far houston isnt even on this map. So the idea that this network between am rillo and kansas city is what this whole show is about shows how close those two cities were for a number reasons ased on the cattle trade. Born in kansas city. Area, studied for a few years in pratt, kansas for college. And then he got a job at the Santa Fe Rail record. And so when he didnt get the raise he wanted after a few years of very good work on the santa fe, he decided to start out in am rillo and found his own firm and basically he lived out his life being an am rillo citizen and hi built so much of the landscape in this area. What were looking at here, a design by him. Its his signature but of the skyline of am rillo. After ex was discovered, ama rillo. After oil was discovered in ama so one of the facts that i think people wouldnt know is that after oil was discovered in the region in 1926, there was a building boom that happened in the urban space of amarillo and there were more sky scrapers that were erected between 1926 and 1930 than any other city in the United States. Now, mind you these sky scrapers were seven to ten stories tall. So one of the thing that is we did during the promotion is think back to the musical of oklahoma and when theyre singing about everything is up to date in kansas city they talk bout the lines, the building is seven stories is as high as the uildings ought to go. So this idea of scraping the sky at only seven stories is something for the period. It seems a little out of date for us but what you can see here is very proud of the skyline and he designed a number of things here. He designed the baptist church. But architects who designed many other buildings in downtown amarillo designed the amarillo building. One of the first buildings with a car garage attached to it. So this was also the era when amarillo went from the horse nd buggy to street cars to actual automobiles. So amarillo because it has the route 66 connection becomes an automobile city very quickly. And you can see evidence of that even in the structures. I think the importance is its interesting because its a big urban center for a large rural area. So we were interested in how, like, the development of cities and their urban landscape in the west occurred. And so the idea of kansas city being another city thats not as appreciated as it should be for its role in the united urbanity. Lopment of so we were tying those two together and i think people can understand beyond this area the local history but also a regional history and also a national history. So it works on a number of levels. You can watch this on the history of communities across the country at c span. Org cities tour. This is American History tv only on cspan 3. National Archives Holdings in College Park Maryland include about 13,000 film and video from the United States information agency. Between 1953 and 1999, the agency distributed a number of films around the world to educate people about the american system. Up next, harry s. Truman president of the United States. A short biography while the 33rd president was in his first term. The president of the united