By DARRELL HAMLIN

Special to The Hays Daily News

LAWRENCE -- For those who have ever wished to go back in history, last month the trip was only as far as Lawrence.

Humorist Will Rogers, evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, writer Zora Neale Hurston, and politicians Huey Long and Franklin D. Roosevelt all stepped out of the 1930s to present their own perspective on events of their day, with a little help from the Kansas and Nebraska Humanities Councils.

From June 18 to 22, "Bright Dreams, Hard Times: America in the Thirties," a Kansas-Nebraska Chautauqua, offered workshops, exhibitions and big tent performances. Audience members from eighteen states and as far away as Holland and Paraguay made the most of their chance to encounter living history.

"We had about 1,300 people total for the evening tent programs," said Tracy Quillin, director of communications for the Kansas Humanities Council.

According to Quillin, about 300 people attended the daily workshops, and about 225 attended the Dust Bowl exhibition at the Watkins Community Museum. Quillin said that prior to Lawrence, the Chautauqua had also had a successful run in Beloit.

At the tent performances, the historic figures were portrayed by visiting scholars who crafted their live presentations from research on their subjects. After their speeches, the scholars answered questions from the audience in a session moderated by Will Rogers, as portrayed by recently retired Oklahoma Baptist University English professor Doug Watson.

"Got a teacher over here," Watson deadpanned when one audience member asked Roosevelt, portrayed by University of Central Oklahoma emeritus history professor Patrick McGinnis, about New Deal educational programs. Costumes, physical gestures and props such as Rogers' famous lariat and FDR's visible steel leg braces added authenticity to the work of the scholars.

During one exchange, gasps and chuckles could be heard from the audience when a small girl asked Roosevelt how he handled being "crippled with polio," a fact hidden from most Americans during the time Roosevelt was president.

"Oh, I am somewhat lame, but it is only temporary, and it cannot keep me from my work for the American people," McGinnis replied with a hearty laugh and the famous FDR grin.

After answering questions in character, the scholars responded to audience questions as themselves, offering advice, for example, on the best books available on the characters they portrayed. They also revealed the process behind their performances.

"I have drawn from several fireside chats and speeches Roosevelt delivered," McGinnis told the crowd. "FDR had so many memorable lines that it was difficult to confine myself to things he said prior to the spring of 1935," when the Chautauqua speech was imagined to have occurred.

Other scholars included Johnson County Community College historian Fred Krebs, sporting a white linen suit and a gaudy tie as he bellowed Sen. Huey Long's "Share the Wealth" program.

Krebs has been portraying figures such as William Allen White and L. Frank Baum since 1985, and as recently as this year traveled to Hays to bring Benjamin Franklin to local elementary and middle school students.

Aimee Semple McPherson's "Four Square Gospel" was brought to life by University of Nebraska-Lincoln doctoral candidate Tonia Compton, and actress and writer Wanda Schell portrayed Zora Neale Hurston.

"It's a great pleasure to help people laugh, and it is satisfying to speak words that seem like common sense wisdom, even today," Watson said of his work as Will Rogers, perhaps the most celebrated entertainer of his day.

Audience members were also treated to a live radio performance of "The Adventures of Flash Gordon" by the Vintage Players, a Lawrence community theater group.

The Kansas-Nebraska Chautauqua will continue its run through various locations in the two states in the summer of 2009 and 2010, including Colby.

"The Chautauqua's theme of the 1930s will hopefully educate Kansans on this important historical era and will help make connections between the major issues of the 1930s -- the economy, environmental devastation, the use of new media technology -- and today," said Quillin.

"We hope that Kansans use the Chautauqua as a starting point for conversation."

A complete schedule for future Chautauqua events is available at kansas humanities.org.