"Home on the Range" is the official state song of Kansas. This is cache #14 in a series of 27 caches honoring the state symbols of Kansas and Nebraska along State Line Road.
"Home on the Range" was written by Dr. Brewster Higley as a poem entitled, "My Western Home" in the early 1870s in Smith County, Kansas. Dan Kelley later put the poem to music. Kelley was a friend of Dr. Higley. During the early 20th century, it was arranged by Texas composer David W. Guion, who is often credited as the composer. It was officially adopted as the state song of Kansas on June 30, 1947 and is commonly regarded as the unofficial anthem of the American West.
Verse 1:
Oh, give me a home, where the buffalo roam,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word,
And the skies are not cloudy all day.
Chorus:
Home, home on the range,
Where the deer and the antelope play,
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word,
And the skies are not cloudy all day.
Verse 2:
Where the air is so pure, the zephyrs so free,
The breezes so balmy and light,
That I would not exchange my home on the range
For all the cities so bright.
Verse 3:
Oh, give me a land where the bright diamond sand
Flows leisurely down the stream;
Where the graceful white swan goes gliding along
Like a maid in a heavenly dream.
Verse 4:
The red man was pressed from this part of the West,
He's likly no more to return
To the banks of Red River where seldom if ever
Their flickering campfires burn.
Verse 5:
How often at night when the heavens are bright
With the light of the glittering stars,
Have I stood here amazed and asked as I gazed
If their glory exceeds that of ours.
Verse 6:
Oh, I love these wild flowers in this dear land of ours;
The curlew I love to hear scream;
And I love the white rocks and the antelope flocks
That graze on the mountain-tops green.
Verse 7:
Then I would not exchange my home on the range,
Where the deer and the antelope play;
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day.