Ad Astra Publishing

Angela Bates is a Nicodemus, Kansas descendant, historian, author, and educator, and currently lives in the Nicodemus area.  She spends her time working at the historical society museum, performing her one-woman show and other educational programs, selling real estate, substitute teaching, and writing.  Her love for her family and the town of Nicodemus was finally recognized when she received the 2005 Ralph Waldo Emerson Jones, Jr. Lifetime Achievement Award, for working to establish the Nicodemus National Historic Site—a unit of the National Park Service.  Her new childrens series, The Adventures of Nicodemus Annie, has been a long time coming.  Getting Mail is the first installment in the series, but as she says, “They will just keep on coming - too many stories to tell in my life time. Watch for the next in the series when Annie is ready for another adventure!”

“Welcome to The Adventures of Nicodemus Annie.  This is the first in a series of books about the historic all-African American town of Nicodemus. You will be taken back to Nicodemus during its early years of settlement and learn firsthand what it was like to settle and live in an all-black town, on the open plains of northwest Kansas. My favorite movies are Westerns, and when I was a child, we never saw blacks in the Westerns. I knew better, because I came from a family who settled in the old western town of Nicodemus. When I was young, my brother and I played cowboys and Indians, and I always played the Indian. I’d use the scar on my left cheek as evidence of my make-believe war battles. As an adult, I still love Westerns, but now I can make a difference in the lives of young readers who have developed a liking for Westerns too. Here are some real stories about the old west that include black people. I wrote this book for you, the reader, and also to preserve the rich history of African Americans of the “Old West!” – Taken from the Preface of The Adventures of Nicodemus Annie: Getting Mail.