By KARI BLURTON
Hays Post

The Sternberg Museum of Natural History’s latest exhibit tells a story of our region’s hard-working settlers — and a story of the sea creatures who lived here well before them.

“Post Rock Country,”  on loan from the Historical Society of Rush County’s Post Rock Museum in La Crosse, features photography of historical limestone rock architecture throughout northwest Kansas — the churches, bridges, homes and post rock fences built between the late 1800s and 1940s. Many of the structures still stand.

Glenn Schniepp, 88, Bazine, helped open the exhibit last week with a demonstration on how post rocks are made using limestone quarried in Ness County.

Schniepp said the work is “backbreaking,” even with the electronic drills the 19th century “old timers” did not have when they settled in the regions of Rush, Ness and Ellis counties.

“Since there was very few trees, they couldn’t make any lumber, and this rock was readily available, although it’s very labor intensive to get it out,”  he said.

Lawrence Erbers, Historical Society of Rush County, said the the top layer of the limestone bed Schniepp was working with is approximately 60 million years old, adding the stone gets more dense and older as each layer is uncovered, revealing fossils of sea-life and shells trapped within the rock.

“Sea life perished and was laid down in those millions of years (0f layers) to form that particular bit of (limestone) bed,”  Erbers said.

As a boy growing up in Bazine in the the 1930s, Schniepp said saw many post rock and limestone structures built in his hometown, but only became interested in building post rocks himself 15 years ago.

He said he is keeping the tradition alive by teaching his son and grandson the craft as well.

Bradley Penka, author of the book, “Post Rock Country” and Sternberg staff member, said the exhibit will be expanded in January to include actual post rocks and interactive displays.