The Parade Ground
Fort Larned was built just before the Civil War to protect travelers on the Santa Fe Trail. The fort consists of several buildings (barracks, officer's quarters, supply rooms mostly) arranged around a central parade ground. The fort has no walls, because the Native Americans did not attack en masse, preferring hit and run tactics on vulnerable groups. The number of soldiers at the fort was protection enough. It helps that the fort is protected on three sides by a river, and the fourth has a storage room that is designed to be a strong defensive position with rifle holes to shoot out of. The fort was decommissioned around 1880, and the fort was turned into a ranch.
Graffiti from the 1870's. The walls of the fort contained a lot of graffiti, mostly from the ranch years, but this one, the earliest I saw, was from when it was still a fort.
Full Name: Fort Larned National Historic Site
Location: South Central Kansas, near Larned, KS
Designated: August 1964
When I Visited: June 16, 2008
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