Eighty years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, Spanish explorers visited Kansas. Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, seeking gold in New Mexico, was told of Quivira by an Indian called the Turk. Here were "trees hung with golden bells and people whose pots and pans were beaten gold." With 30 picked horsemen and a Franciscan friar named Juan de Padilla, Coronado marched "north by the needle" from a point in Texas until he reached Kansas. Here he found no gold, but a country he described as "the best I have ever seen for producing all the products of Spain." The Turk confessed he had deceived the Spaniards and one night was strangled. For 25 days in the summer of 1541 Coronado remained among the grass-hut villages of the Quiviran Indians, then returned to New Mexico. Padilla went with him, but the following year came back to Quivira as a missionary. Later he was killed by the Indians, the first Christian martyr in the present United States. Near this marker is the site of one of the largest villages of the "Kingdom of Quivira."

[Rob:] LewisFelt told this story, more or less, when he talked to Angie and the boys in the pool hall in Washington. The main variations were that he told Coronado the people of Quivara worshipped a CrossOfGold (which I know I have seen in some versions of the story), and that when Coronado's men finally got wise to The Turk, they erected their own cross of gold and crucified rather than simply strangled him (which I think I made up).

This story strikes me as more quintessentially American than many of the country's better known first contact / foundation stories: the pilgrim's first Thanksgiving, John Smith and Pocahontas, etc. Because Coronado and his men are out for gold in fine American fashion, and because even though the Turk was in a tight spot, he was a pretty clever proto-American con man: he knew that the only thing that would get those stupid Spaniards more excited than a city of gold was a Christian city of gold. Of course, he wasn't quite clever enough to save his neck in the end.

The precise location of the CrossOfGold and the Turk's demise is unknown, but wouldn't it be appropriate if it was the geographic center of the US? (See AmericaHasACenter.)

I've found refs on the web that it was in Lyons, Kansas (home of the Coronado & Quivara Museum). This is about 40 miles NW of Wichita, and about 50 miles south of Lebanon. http://skyways.lib.ks.us/towns/Lyons/museum/ (CT)

[Bryant:] Fifty miles south of Lebanon is well within the margin of error for the geodetic center of the US.