2532. Go to Brown v. Board Education National Historic Park

Since this is our 5th trip to Arizona, we are running out of things to see along the way in Nebraska and Kansas. I discovered that we could go through Topeka and I could add Topeka to the list of state capitols that I've been to. I could also go to my first NPS in Kansas -- Brown v. Board of Education. So that's what we did.

Brown v. Board of Education is in downtown Topeka. It is the original school building that Linda Brown attended kindergarten in back in 1949. It was the start of desegregation in schools. It is open Tuesday-Saturday 9-5. Parking is across the street. There is no entrance fee. 

You can only visit the first floor of the old school building. Most of it is original but after the Topeka School District closed it, the building was bought by a construction company and when they left they took pretty much everything that wasn't nailed down. Three of the classroom are used for displays and then the kindergarten room is set up like when Linda Brown would have attended.

The displays talked about segregation and other court cases that were vital in this pivotal time in US History. Some of them were interactive but it was just a lot of reading. Yawn. I like to look at things and not read things. I did not find it all the exciting. I don't think hubby did either. It was all very well done and very informative. I just didn't want to read especially on the first day of vacation.

The kindergarten room would have been cool if there wasn't a field trip monopolizing the room. We really couldn't look around too much.

I did find the little bubbler very cool. 

You can also take a Topeka's Civil Rights History Driving Tour found on the NPS app. Due to time constraints and the hubby's lack of fondness for history, we skipped that. It has 14 different stops around Topeka that were important to Civil Rights.

I think anyone passing through the area should stop at Brown v. Board of Education to refresh their Civil Rights History. It is fascinating and the building is cool too. Just be prepared to do a lot of reading.