Waconda Spring

Waconda Spring, or Great Spirit Spring, was a natural artesian aquifer located in Mitchell County, near the towns of Glen Elder and Cawker City in the U.S. state ofKansas. It was a sacred site for Native American tribes of the Great Plains and, for a time, became the site of a health spa for American settlers. With the completion of the Glen Elder Dam in 1968, the mineral spring disappeared beneath the waters of Waconda Reservoir.

Native American Beliefs

Waconda Spring was located in territory traditionally controlled by the Pawnee Tribe, although the name "Waconda" actually comes from the Kanza, or Kaw, word "Wakonda", meaning "Great Spirit." Native Americans believed that Waconda Spring marked the location of an underwater lodge where animals of differing species met to hold a sacred council. The animals were not revered as gods; rather, they acted as mediums in which individuals could acquire knowledge and power. The mineral spring was a natural stopping point for tribes traversing the arid western plains, and most Plains tribes visited and revered the site. Tribes known to have visited Waconda Spring included the Arapaho, Comanche, Crow, Kaw, Kiowa, Miami, Pawnee, Sioux, and Wichita. Even though the spring was located within Pawnee land, it was considered neutral territory. Native Americans believed that the water had healing powers. Many left offerings of beads, blankets, weapons, and other items in the pool to ensure safe travel across the plains and to ask for favorable conditions with the buffalo hunt. Native Americans also carved intaglios in the land near the springs, several of which survive to this day. The last recorded visit of Native Americans to worship at the site was in the early 1870s.

Waconda Spring in History

It is said that the first European explorer to visit Waconda Spring was Sir William Johnson in 1767; however, this is unlikely. The first recorded visit to the site was by General Zebulon Pike in 1806. Pike visited the spring during his exploration of the Great Plains after he had concluded a treaty with the Pawnee.

Settlement in the area did not take place until after Kansas became a state in 1861. The first settler in the region was in 1870 by a man named Pfeiffer, who took out the first claim on the property. Kansas Senator Samuel C. Pomeroy toured the region in 1870 and marveled at what he saw. Said Pomeroy, “At first I declared it the Crater of an Ancient Volcano. The Water occupying its hollow center is fathomless, and about 200 feet in diameter in a perfect circle! It is always brimming full and running over on all sides... The hills about it were as sacred to the Indians as those about Jerusalem."( [http://www.lasr.net/pages/city.php?City_ID=KS0806003&VA=Y&Attraction_ID=KS0806003a011 1] ) Pomeroy recognized the site's commercial potential and went on to predict that a health resort would soon be built in the region.

Within a few years, a man named Burnham constructed a bottling works on the site and began selling the mineral water as a health tonic. He called it "Waconda Flier". The sales of "Waconda Flier" piqued the interest of an eastern investor named McWilliams, who in 1884 invested in the site and began the construction of a stone sanitarium. The spring was fenced off and completely privatized. The building was completed ten years later, and under the management of G. W. Cooper, Waconda Spring became a hotel and health spa. Sales of "Waconda Flier" continued, and by the 1890s it was being sold in all parts of the country. In 1904, "Waconda Flier" won a medal for its superior medicinal qualities at the St. Louis World’s Fair.

In 1906, Dr. G. P. Abrahams purchased the property from McWilliams and continued operating the health spa and bottling plant until his 1924 death. In 1924, the property passed to Dr. Carl Bingesser, who had married Abrahams’ daughter Anna in 1907. Under both Abrahams and Bingesser, the hotel resort was improved upon and maintained a solid reputation as health spa and place of healing. It continued to do so even as the spa passed on to Dr. Carlos Bingesser, the third generation of the Abrahams-Bingesser family to own and operate the spa. The facilities were fully modernized and offered physical therapy, hydro-therapy, electro-therapy, and dietary regimens. Water from Waconda Spring was used for internal and external cleansing of the body. It was piped into every bathtub in the sanitarium, was served with meals, and used for enemas. A popular slogan used to lure tourists to the resort was, "It will clean works until your works work."( [http://www.glenelder.com/waconda_springs.htm 2] ) Waconda Spring was a popular, profitable enterprise for the Bingesser family.

Glen Elder Dam

In 1944 the Bureau of Reclamation and the Army Corps of Engineers announced plans for a large earthen dam on the Solomon River near the town of Glen Elder. The plan called for the inundation of Waconda Spring. The Bingesser family fought to stop the plan, but in 1951 greater than normal rainfall in Kansas led to massive flooding in Topeka and other Kansas towns. This led to renewed calls for dams and other flood control projects, including renewed calls for the Glen Elder Dam. Dr. Bingesser brought in a respected hydrologist to inspect Waconda Spring. The hydrologist concluded that Waconda Spring was unique and possibly the only spring like it in the world. However, commercial advocates in favor of the dam dismissed the hydrologist and dismissively claimed that Waconda Spring was nothing more than a "mud hole."

In the end, the developers won. Construction on Glen Elder Dam began in 1964 and was completed by the end of 1968. Engineers bulldozed the hotel and health spa then, adding insult to injury, dumped the debris into the pool of Waconda Spring. Water from the Solomon River began filling up the valley, and by 1970 it was full. The irreplaceable Waconda Spring was lost beneath the waters of the reservoir that now bears its name.

References

*Douglas R. Parks and Waldo R. Wedel, "Pawnee Geography: Historical and Sacred," "Great Plains Quarterly" vol. 5, no. 3 (Summer 1985): 143-176.

External links

* [http://www.glenelder.com/waconda_springs.htm History of Waconda]
* [http://www.lasr.net/pages/city.php?City_ID=KS0806003&VA=Y&Attraction_ID=KS0806003a011 Healing Waters]
* [http://www.kshs.org/cool3/waconda.htm Waconda Spring] at the [http://www.kshs.org Kansas State Historical Society]