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Famous visitors to the little apple
With first-rate speakers in the Landon Lecture series and top-rate athletics in the Big 12 Conference, Manhattan has had more than its share of famed visitors. Here are some other big names who've visited the Little Apple.
Truman Capote, author of In Cold Blood
Some visitors to Manhattan merited celebrity attention. Among them was Truman Capote, the acclaimed author of Breakfast at Tiffany’s. He visited Manhattan while writing In Cold Blood, his account of the 1959 murders of the Clutter family in southwest Kansas.
His research brought him to Manhattan to build relationships in the tiny town of Holcomb; K-State president James McCain and some faculty members were close acquaintances of the Clutters. Capote arrived in Manhattan just four days after the murders, accompanied by close friend and research assistant Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird.
The two stayed at the Wareham Hotel downtown and had lunch at the brand new Union ballroom with professors who knew the Clutters. Word has it that Capote wore a pink velvet coat to the Union and cracked, “I bet I’m the first man who has ever come to Manhattan, Kansas, wearing a Dior jacket.” McCain replied that he was the first man or woman to wear a Dior sportcoat around here. Probably few have dared to don similar outerwear on campus since!
In Cold Blood, first serialized in the New Yorker, became Capote’s most famous novel and was the basis for the Academy Award-winning 2005 film “Capote” starring Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Theodore Roosevelt, 26th U.S. President
A visit from the president was unquestionably the highlight of 1903 for Manhattan residents. Theodore Roosevelt had been in office roughly 20 months when his whistle-stop tour arrived here before the 1904 election.
He was given a hero’s welcome upon his arrival at the two-year-old train depot, but he never left the train. Much of his 15-minute, 999-word address was directed at students. He concluded with these words:
“I believe in play and I believe in work. When you play, play hard, and when you work, do not play at all. I believe in having a good time. Get all the enjoyment you can, but do not let getting enjoyment interfere with your duty, with your work in the world. We have no place in our American society for the man or woman who fails to appreciate the need of effort, the need of work to justify his or her existence.”
Susan B. Anthony, leader of American women’s suffrage
K-State came into being in tumultuous times. The year was 1863—with the U.S. engulfed in Civil War—and free-state Kansans and pro-slavery Missourians often waged battle. The leader of women’s suffrage, Susan B. Anthony—born to an eastern family of anti-slavery sympathizers—brought the issue of women’s right to vote to Kansas.
She passed through Manhattan and declared in a speech on September 7, 1867: “Any man who voted against female suffrage was a blockhead.” She then collected almost 10,000 votes on a petition in favor of women’s suffrage.
The struggle for women’s voting rights continued well past Anthony’s death in 1906. In 1920, six months after the 100th anniversary of her birth, the 19th amendment to the Constitution gave women the right to vote.
Jesse Owens, track and field superstar
Three years after he electrified the world by winning four gold medals at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Jesse Owens showcased his stellar athletic abilities at Manhattan’s Griffith Field. By then he had been stripped of his amateur status for accepting commercial earnings, so he earned his living as an entertainer and sports promoter.
John Phillip Sousa, the March King
John Phillip Sousa, the composer of “Stars and Stripes Forever” and other march standards, performed with his band at K-State in 1925 and again in 1928, when he directed the school band. After that performance, 600 students and faculty members petitioned Sousa to write a school march for K-State.
The March King penned songs for only four schools—K-State, Marquette, Michigan, and Minnesota—so it was an honor for K-State to receive an exclusive Sousa march. But there’s lasting confusion over Sousa’s piece: the manuscript originally intended for K-State was never actually published, but we got a march Sousa had already written for an unknown recipient.
Bill Murray, actor/comedian
His Caddyshack fame as bumbling greenskeeper Carl Spackler makes BIll Murray a hit on the celebrity golf circuit. But when looking for a quieter round, he tees up at Colbert Hills, K-State’s golf course. The comedy legend also frequents Aggieville restaurants (he's been spotted at Coco Bolo’s and Rock-A-Belly Deli) when he visits his brother Brian Doyle Murray, co-writer of Caddyshack and Manhattan resident. Bill Murray saluted his improv tutor Del Close at a 2008 induction ceremony for Manhattan High School's hall of fame.
Tiger Woods, pro golfer
The world’s greatest golfer—and one of the most recognized faces on the planet—has a Manhattan connection. His father Earl attended K-State and grew up here. Earl Woods died in 2006 and is buried in Sunset Cemetery north of the high school. Tiger attended the ceremonies for his dad.
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