About Per Aspera

To the Stars Through Difficulty

Exploring Kansas's complex history through immersive audio storytelling.

Our Team

Kara Heitz

Kara is a historian, educator, and storyteller. She runs a media production company that creates historically-focused podcasts and documentary films, including the award-winning film “A New Deal for Public Art in the Free State,” and the multi-award-winning Humanities Kansas podcast “Kansas 1972”. She is also a historical consultant, specializing in the New Deal era and Midwest regional history. And she teaches history and film at the Kansas City Art Institute. You can find out more about her work at: https://karaheitz.org/

Producer, Director, Researcher, and Host

Jay Price

Jay M. Price is a Professor of History at Wichita State University, where he also directs the Local and Community History Program. With a focus on local and community history, his current works include a biography of Kansas Governor and Archivist of the United States John Carlin, a photo history of the Wichita LGBTQ community, explorations of entrepreneurship in Wichita and a number of architectural history projects. He currently serves on the Kansas Historic Sites Board of Review, the board of The Kansas Historical Foundation, and the Kansas US 250 Commission. 

Consulting Historian
Audio Engineer and Editor

Emily Milner

Emily is a multimedia and audio-visual artist in Kansas City with a diverse practice ranging from documentary filmmaking, music videos, and live video performance to sculpture, costuming, and practical SFX.

Curriculum Design Specialist

Casey Meier

Casey is a History teacher and International Baccalaureate Coordinator at Campus High School in Haysville, KS.  In addition to serving on the Kansas Council for History Education and being a Teacher Leader Consultant for Social Studies for the Kansas Department of Education, he is the KSDE representative on the Kansas 250 Commission. 

The Per Aspera podcast is a project of the Kansas 250th Commission, made possible by generous support from Creative One, Walmart, and America250.