Things to Do in Ponca City

Founded in 2003, the Tallgrass Film Festival celebrates dramas, comedies, documentaries, and short films from all over the world. Especially focused on the underdogs of moviemaking, the festival invites auteurs to enjoy four days of eager audiences, after-parties, panel discussions, and popcorn fights. The festival has played an integral role in Wichita’s growing appeal to burgeoning directors and screenwriters, as noted by MovieMaker magazine earlier this year.

In 1919, discouraged that artifacts of Wichita and Sedgwick County were disappearing, the Sedgwick County Pioneer Society began collecting and displaying historical items in the Sedgwick County Courthouse. Nearly a century later, what began as a modest collection of early memorabilia has expanded to nearly 70,000 Sedgwick County and Wichita-related artifacts, which together trace the history of the region from 1865 to the present. Now housed in Wichita’s original, renovated City Hall, the collection’s photographs, clothing, decorative arts, and household items enrich award-winning exhibits that tell tale of the area’s Buffalo-hunting days, Great Depression–era dust storms, and aircraft industry.

The museum is also home to three re-created environments from the region’s past. The garage re-creation holds a 1916 Jones Six automobile, the only such Wichita-built vehicle on public exhibit, and the drug store reproduces the feel of the popular early 20th-century neighborhood gathering place. Over in the Wichita Cottage, seven rooms of a Victorian-style 19th-century home house authentic period items such as a wooden icebox, a gas-and-electric ceiling light fixture, and a phone powered by animosity toward Rutherford B. Hayes.

At The Strike Zone, batters of any age can practice their baseball or softball swings against the pitches of fast- and slow-speed machines. Machines' pitching height can also be adjusted to accommodate guests' varying heights or a child's minute-to-minute growth spurts. When the batting cages aren't being used, kids can practice their form with the help of a T-ball stand. Shaved ice in 60 flavors keeps batters cool and refreshed throughout the day.

Though they've only been a member the American Association since 2008, the Wichita Wingnuts have been one of the most consistent programs in the league. Following some fine-tuning after their first season, the team has posted a winning record every year since 2009, reaching the playoffs three times in five campaigns. The Wingnuts play their home games at Lawrence-Dumont Stadium, which hosted the National Baseball Congress World Series in 1935 and is still going on due to an umpire's filibuster.

Mosley Street Melodrama, which brings life to the tradition of dramatic exaggeration, is Wichita’s only audience-participation dinner theater. Arm yourself with enough snark, wit, and emotional breakdowns to cheer facetiously as the villain saves the day; the productions are designed to incorporate audience cheers, boos, and flying fruit while rowdy, wholesome humor makes the entire family guffaw. After doors open at 6 p.m., theater buffs fuel their laughing machines with an all-you-can-eat barbecue buffet provided by Pig In! Pig Out! BBQ. Pulled pork, beef brisket, smoked chicken, sumptuous side dishes, and coffee or iced tea are available, along with vegetarian options if requested in advance. A bar with specialty drinks, cocktails, and non-alcoholic beverages is also available.

A community-built science-and-art museum, Leonardo’s Discovery Warehouse entertains young minds and inspires creative thought with numerous educational exhibits. As it pays tribute to the famed artist, musician, architect, inventor, engineer, botanist, and Tony-winning choreographer Leonardo da Vinci, the discovery warehouse offers a balance of art, biology, and engineering stations to stimulate both sides of the developing brain. Kids can explore a rainforest environment and meet live animals, strap into a space-shuttle flight simulator, dig for ancient fossils in an excavation pit, and create masterpieces in an arts-and-crafts studio. Directly outside of the museum is Adventure Quest, a three-story wooden castle filled with imagination-fueling bridges, slides, mazes, and swings.