Clyde W. Toland

Clyde W. Toland received a BA in history in 1969 from the University of Kansas, and in 1971 a MA in history from the University of Wisconsin- Madison. He received his JD from the University of Kansas in 1975. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and the Or- der of the Coif. Mr. Toland is a semi- retired lawyer in Iola, Kansas.

As a grade school student, he became fascinated by his local Allen County, Kansas, history and by Frederick Funston’s early adventurous life in Death Valley, Alaska, the British Northwest Territory, and Cuba. For more than thirty-five years, he has been a student of Funston’s life. As president of the Allen County Historical Society, Inc., in Iola, Kansas, he was the driving force in the successful move in 1994 of Frederick Funston’s rural childhood home to the Iola town square and in its subsequent restoration and opening as a museum in 1995. He did the research and writing for most of the eleven exhibits in the Funston Museum and Visitors’ Center, which opened in 1997 next door to the Funston Home Museum.

Mr. Toland founded the Buster Keaton Celebration, a nationally known humanities event held annually in Iola, Kansas, from 1993 through 2017. He served as co-chair of the Keaton Celebration Commit- tee for the first five celebrations, and continued as a committee member through the 2005 celebration. He is a member of the committee which revived the Buster Keaton Celebration on September 24 and 25, 2021.

At age fifteen he became a Life Member of both the Allen County Historical Society, Inc., and the Kansas State Historical Society. Mr. Toland and United States Senator Nancy Kassebaum Baker in 1996 were the two first recipients of the Alumni Distinguished Achievement Award from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences of the University of Kansas.