TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback thinks native son and President Dwight Eisenhower should have more than a sidewalk plaque to honor him on the Statehouse grounds.
The state unveiled the plaque Wednesday during a ceremony. It is the 11th on a “Walk of Honor” started in 2011. The event was a week before the 125th anniversary of Eisenhower’s birth in 1890.
During his remarks, Brownback proposed putting a statute of Ike outside the Statehouse and pointed toward a slope on the northwest side of the grounds. The governor later told reporters his office has been working sporadically on the project for about two years.
Eisenhower was a five-star Army general and supreme Allied commander in World War II before serving as president from 1953 to 1961. He died in 1969.
Mary Jean Eisenhower, granddaughter of Dwight D. Eisenhower, and her son Merrill Atwater, joined Governor Sam Brownback, General Victor J. Braden, Fort Leavenworth, Denorah Barker, Kansas Historical
Foundation, and Timothy Rives, Eisenhower Presidential Library, in adding President Eisenhower to the Kansas Walk of Honor Wednesday.
Eisenhower’s bronze plaque joins 10 other notable Kansans along the walkways of the Kansas State Capitol.
Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969) born in Denison, Texas, but grew up in Abilene, proudly considered himself a Kansan.
He graduated from West Point in 1915. He graduated first in his class from the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth in 1926. Promoted to brigadier general in 1941, Eisenhower directed the allied invasions of North Africa, Sicily, and Italy from 1942 to 1943 and then as Supreme Allied Commander, he planned and executed the Normandy Invasion, June 6, 1944, which ultimately led to victory in Europe the following May.
He served as U.S. President from 1953 to 1961 during a post-war period of prosperity for the nation. President Eisenhower authorized the Interstate Highway System, People to People International in 1956, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The walk was established in 2011 and highlights people who contributed on a state and national level and have significant connections to Kansas. The previous honorees are Clyde Cessna, Walter Chrysler, Samuel Crumbine, John Steuart Curry, Charles Curtis, Bob Dole, Amelia Earhart, Jack Kilby, Gordon Parks, and William Allen White.
The Kansas Historical Foundation, a 501(c)(3), is the caretaker of funds for the Kansas Walk of Honor. The public is encouraged to donate to this fund. The cost for each plaque is $2,000 including shipping.