It’s that time of year again when the weather starts to cool down and everyone looks forward to Fort Larned’s annual Candlelight Tour.
This year’s tour theme is all about dealing with bad food. A shipment of flour delivered to Fort Larned turned out to be bad. Some of the enlisted men had to sift through the flour to find out just how much was bad. What difference did that make you might wonder? Well, the commissary officer could have been financially responsible for the bad flour and needed to know just how much of it there was.
The tour vignettes highlight the important role food shipments played in the life of a frontier fort, and how a shipment of bad food could affect the whole fort’s operation.
The tour will be on Oct. 8 with reservations beginning on Sept. 26 at 8:30 a.m. Reservations can only be made by phone at (620) 285-6911. The first tour will leave at 7:30 p.m. and then every 15 minutes after that until the last tour leaves at 10:15 p.m. for a total of 12 tours. Each tour has space for 20 people and reservations will be taken on a first-come, first-served basis.
The health and safety of our visitors, employees, volunteers, and partners continues to be paramount. Our masking status and indoor group number limitations are based on the CDC’s COVID-19 Community Level tool and can change from week to week. Details on where the tours will start and end, and whether masks will be required, will not be known until closer to the actual tour date. Updates will be provided by email for people registered for tours, and on the Fort Larned website: www.nps.gov.
Fort Larned National Historic Site is located six miles west of Larned on Kansas Highway 156. Information on visiting is on the internet at www.nps.gov/fols, or by calling (620) 285-6911, or email to [email protected]. For information on area tourism partners, lodging, dining, and community services go to www.larnedks.org or call (620) 285-6916.