Play Ad Astra Per Aspera: The Kansas Town Game

Your ancestors who settled Kansas in the 1800s suffered mightily. Kenneth S. Davis claims "a perusal of the published diaries and letters of frontier families leaves the impression that the average Kansas pioneer was ill to the point of incapacitation for at least a solid month out of every year." (Kansas: A Bicentennial History, page 73)

Chris Rippel tries to capture the optimism and hardship of settling a Kansas town by creating a game called "Ad Astra Per Astra: The Kansas Town Game". The first draft of the game was like Kansas Kandyland. It did not honor those Kansas settlers or live up to the promise of its title. So, following my wife's guidance, I added challenges.

The game below is still in beta. Literally no one has never been played it yet. I hope someone will play it over the holidays and give me feedback on how to make it more fun.

In January I will post/release Version 1861.0.

Here is the game.

• Game board (pdf) Though the game is on only 9 sheets of  8.5" X 11" paper, these sheets have  lots of graphics and so it may take several minutes to download.
• Rules
• Trivial questions sheet
• Trivial answers sheet
• Score sheet

This game contains lots of photographs from Kansas Memory created and maintained by the Kansas Historical Society. This is an awesome resource or photographs and documents. Go there and look up your town. .