Bill Kurtis Comes Back Home

Within 10 years of their mid 80s start down the tourism road; Sedan had built up a tourist trade of around 30,000 people/year with their Yellow Brick Road attraction and the Emmett Kelly Museum, located in the former 1885 Sedan Opera House. Kelly was born in Sedan in 1898. The efforts of a handful of local citizens were starting to pay small dividends for tiny Sedan.

Their big break came in 1996 when Bill Kurtis of television journalism fame bought a large ranch, renaming it the Red Buffalo Ranch, a mile from Sedan after visiting his parents in nearby Independence and driving through the Flint Hills near the town. Kurtis said that the scenery reminded him of the plains of Africa, one of his favorite places.

The efforts of the SOS group to increase tourism and jobs in Sedan impressed Kurtis who began buying older, run-down buildings in the downtown and working with the group to increase tourism not only in Sedan but on more of a regional basis. Kurtis’ vision was not to just bring tourists into one town for a couple of hours but to make the region a destination location by combining tourist attractions regionally. It’s a strategy that too many towns don’t step back and look at like Kurtis.

Today Kurtis has acquired over 10,000 acres of ranchland including land that his parents and grandparents owned at one time. One of his holdings is the 3,000 acre setting that inspired Laura Ingalls Wilder to write the book, later made into a popular TV series, Little House on the Prairie.

Kurtis has purchased 14 buildings in Sedan’s downtown, fixed them up and rented them out for $1 for the first year to allow new entrepreneurs a chance to get a start in this burgeoning tourist town. He’s doing the same thing in Coffeyville and Independence, KS and Bartlesville and Pawhuska, OK. He’s investing millions of dollars into the region, brought great publicity to the region and given back greatly to his hometown region.

And, it might never have happened if a dozen local citizens in Sedan hadn’t sent out an SOS (Save Our Sedan) in 1988. Tomorrow, what you’ll find in Sedan.