Kansas was never Wisconsin’s peer when it came to putting the levers of power into the hands of Socialists. And yet, as the authors point out, the Great Plains state was a locus of activity. America’s most widely circulated Socialist newspaper was published in Kansas, and Socialist presidential candidate Eugene Debs lived there for a time. Not unlike Milwaukee’s “sewer socialists,” Kansas’ “gas and water socialism” stressed practicality over ideology—at least among those Socialists elevated to public office. Many other Kansan Socialists squabbled fiercely and accomplished little. Much of When Sunflowers Bloomed Red is a reminder of the American left’s historic tendency to factionalize.
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