We need stories from Chase, Dickinson, Ellsworth, Lyon,Morris, Ottawa, Pottawatomie, Saline, and Wabaunsee counties!

Clay County:
Old Car Ingenuity Generates Royal Thanks

When Randy Rundle first learned to drive in a 1948 Chevrolet pickup, he had no idea that would eventually lead to his current livelihood. From his early driving days, he gained firsthand knowledge of 6-volt electrical systems and the problems associated with them such as hard starting, yellowish dim headlights and dead batteries.

The Clay Gourmet: A Special Place

If it is used on the Food Network, it can probably be purchased in Clay Center, Kansas.

Jason and Annette Smith opened The Clay Gourmet in October 2001 to carry cookware, bakeware, cookbooks, cutlery, tabletop items, seasonal items and more kitchen gadgets than one could ever imagine. Clay Center, population 4,564, may seem an unlikely location for such a specialized store, but the store’s customer base continues to grow. They also receive plenty of advice from Jason’s family. His mother has operated a successful gourmet kitchen shop in McPherson, Kansas, called The Cook’s Nook for the past 19 years. Customers who have been to the McPherson store will notice many similarities including the products carried, the checkerboard logo, and the attention to customer service.

I'll have a Kiowata on the Rocks

Water in the southwestern Clay County town of Longford has long been boasted as some of the best in Kansas. Now it is helping sustain this community of 89 people.

“Cecil” is Born In Kansas    
              
Imagine that you are the Marketing Director of a local hospital?  Okay, if that does not seem possible, how about being the CEO of a hospital? Or how about Director of Nursing? None of those fit? Okay, how about just working for a hospital that is a fun place to work, where everybody is encouraged to share ideas and work towards a common goal.  Okay so far?

Seeing Kansas By Rail         
            
With literally dozens of ways to tour Kansas, to see and experience all of the diverse beauty the state has to offer, most people go by car or truck, fewer by bus. But for a select, and lucky, few there is the Fairmont Motorcar.

Cloud County:

Taste the Journey of the Cloud County Tea Company

The journey has been swift, but not always smooth, for co-owners Johnita Crawford and Lorraine Palmer. However, their Cloud County Teas offered a quiet moment along the way.

The Future for Rural Kansas

The headlines today do not seem to have much faith in the future of rural Kansas. If we based Kansas’s future on the predictions of the news media, Globalization will take over rural Kansas and no one will live here anymore. However, I disagree with what the commentators and reporters say. I think that the Kansas that I have grown up in will continue to thrive for several reasons.

Geary County:

Gatherings on the Prairie

Rob Dudley often wondered about people who just one day walked away from seemingly great jobs with no real plans in place. Then one day he woke up and became one of those people.

Elk at Home on the Prairie

Photos by April Blackmon

More than 15 years have past since Elk were first reintroduced onto Fort Riley. During that time, the elk herd has evolved to become a symbol of Fort Riley, a symbol that has restored a native component to the Kansas Flint Hills. For those who have experienced the elk firsthand, it is a sight they most likely will never forget.

Custer House Brings Fort Riley Past To Life

A simple white picket fence borders one of several limestone houses on Fort Riley’s Sheridan Avenue. Unlike the other historic homes, though, Quarters 24 remains in its 19th century flavor.

A Ranch in Geary Photo Essay

Fort Riley, Then and Now

The early history of Fort Riley is closely tied to the movement of people and trade along the Oregon and Santa Fe Trails. These routes, a result of the United States perceived "manifest destiny" in the middle of the 19th century, extended American domination and interests into far reaches of a largely unsettled territory. During the 1850s, a number of military posts were established at strategic points to provide protection along these arteries of emigration and commerce.

Jewell County:

An Old Green Porch Swing

No “flash and fluff” with little substance here. Given the opportunity, Ron Willis, Jewell, provides inspiration rather than motivation as the true path to excellence in a keynote or seminar.

Fleminy children feeding birds (from left to right) Kyle, Levi and Amanda

Hobby Flies Into A Profitable Career

You can hear them early in the morning, cackling back and forth taking off just at daybreak: music to every upland hunter’s ears. That music means income to Mark Fleming, co-owner and co-operator of Fleming Farm Game Birds in Formosa. And Fleming wouldn’t have life any other way.

A Touch of Wheat

Kansas is the "wheat state" and visitors often purchase products made from Kansas wheat including flour, pancake mix or Butter Braids. But most don't consider taking the raw product home as a souvenir. However, members of the National Association of Wheat Weavers encourage visitors and residents to do just that.

Lincoln County:

"Creature Creations"

That's not an old combine: art dots Lincoln County landscape.

A Sedentary Rock: Limestone

During Sylvan Grove’s bicentennial in 1976, Duane Vonada along with many other community members pondered on their town’s heritage. After looking around, the answer became obvious. Stone, particularly limestone, was everywhere, and it truly was their heritage. After all, there are the old stone quarries, the limestone buildings, arch bridges and the countless post rocks for as far as the eye can see.

Village Lines Owner Wears Many Hats

Marilyn Helmer, owner of Village Lines in Lincoln, Kansas, admits that an occasional identity crisis comes with the territory when anyone has a deep passion for telling the local story.

Marshall County:

As Eyesight Dims, Waterville Muralist Turns to Home 

A painter leaves something of himself in each painting, embedded clues that if deciphered reveal an intimate biography. It can be a particular shade of color, the way light dances on softly-rounded hills, the casual fold of a skirt, the scampering of a rabbit, dark clouds building in the distance, or an expression caught between now and an uncertain future.

A Bird Named "Kansas”

When Megan Friedrichs raised her government-issued Leica binoculars to study a bird she’d been tracking on the north slope of Mauna Kea, she saw something that set her heart racing. There, beside an adult palila fitted out with a radio transmitter, was a second bird, hopping and fluttering its wings. As the adult began feeding the second bird, Friedrichs studied its legs and plumage. “Holy cow,” she thought. Then she fumbled for her radio.

“Kiss Me, I’m Irish Today”

“Kiss Me, I’m Irish!” Well, actually don’t because I’m honestly German. But, for one special day of the year, I can be Irish.

Marshall County Historical Tour

In March of 2006, I officially began what is now called the “Marshall County Historical Tour,” or MCHT. I persuaded a few of my friends to come with me to visit past and present townsites located in our county that I have found. We put in countless hours of research interviewing people and looking in numerous reference materials, be they books or something on the Internet.

Courtesy of MCRHS

Making Tracks of Memories

Preserving history keeps traditions alive; educating younger generations about their roots is the life blood of a community's past and future. Although history may exist largely in our minds, real, tangible artifacts still tell thousands of stories. When one of these artifacts is lost, we lose far more than a physical object. We lose our past, we lose who we are.

Mitchell County:

Greg and Cheryl Renter

Bored no more—Retired Couple Adds Finishing Touch to Restored Beloit Hotel

Take one derelict early-20th Century hotel, add one bored-to-insanity retiree, stir in a heaping measure of inspiration and sprinkle with the dust of dreams, and what do you get? The Porter House Apartments with the Porter House Coffee Shop and Bistro in downtown Beloit. The two are inseparable, like coffee and cream, biscuits and gravy, ham and Swiss, or pancakes and syrup. (All which the Bistro serves, and serves very well.)

From Suits to Pottery to Grills: Finding Success in Anticipating Customer Demands

When Rex Waggoner began working at James Clothing in downtown Beloit as a freshman in High School in 1964, he had no idea he would stay for good.

James Clothing was new to town in 1964, although owner Calvin James had been operating his original store in nearby Jewell, Kansas, since 1950. The store carried only men’s clothing when Rex began as a freshman.

Kansas in Snow

It's early, too early. It is a surprise of white that cheers the youth, slows the bold, marks the fools.

An Entrepreneur’s Story

“My first product was a TV tower that I started manufacturing because I saw a need for a good strong tower,” Ken says.

Small town has large “can-do” attitude

“The big focus has been trying to get the community back—to rebuild and grow the community,” says Tipton Mayor Adrian Arnoldy. “Building the school was the big thing because we wouldn’t be doing any of these other projects if it wasn’t for the school. Now we’re trying to keep things going and growing.”

More to Memorials than just Rocks

It’s not too often one can memorialize someone, decorate a kitchen, reward a deed and designate a homestead all in the same place. However, Bell Memorials in Beloit, provides an array of products that fit into these very categories. They customize one-of-a-kind memorials, granite countertops, etched glass, monument signs and post-rock yard
art.

Keeping the Ball Rolling

At 80 years old, Kay Thull is one example of the volunteer spirit that drives a town forward.

The Twine of a Town

It starts with the twine; but there's so much more.

The Art of Rural Lives

Artist Marilyn Hake finds inspiration for her pencil illustrations in her rural roots and her picturesque setting nestled in the rolling Blue Hills near Tipton, Kansas. “I am blessed with a peaceful location that’s quiet and I can just do work,” Marilyn says. “I get inspiration from being in a rural area and people like the rural-themed art for a variety of reasons.”

Winter Remembered

"O, the snow-footed, ice-armored winds of the prairie,
Rushing out mightily

It's Food, Glorious Food! in the Emerald City!

Devotees of exquisite foods, aficionados of rarefied chocolates, cognoscenti of the finest condiments, sauces, cheeses, olive oils, and imported Italian pastas, connoisseurs of wine and other possessors of sophisticated palates (and wannabees) can thank Stephen Balderson for talking his father, Clark Balderson, and Clark’s business partner, Larry Costlow, out of their hair-brained idea.

For the better part of three months they’d been brainstorming over a business venture for the town of Wamego. Ideas had been proposed, vetted, weighed, hammered out, hammered flat, dehydrated, rehydrated and resurrected. The best idea to date: a café specializing in grilled cheese sandwiches.

Republic County:

A Basement in Belleville

Cross through the weathered archway, the patio of retired Rock Island Railroad ties and beyond the suspended porch swing to the enchanting home of Bud and Pat Hanzlick. The door opens almost before the knock: every visitor is warmly welcomed into the unassuming headquarters of internationally known Bekan Rustic Furniture ...

Rags to Riches

North on Main Street, almost out of town, a subtle white metal building sets back among the trees. On a weekday, the parking lot is mostly full with a few spots marked "visitor" saved directly in front of the doors. A passerby might assume it's just another office building ..

Riley County:

John W. Bartleson Biography: Preface

John Wool Bartleson (J.W.) was born August 15, 1846 in Pulaski County, Illinois, and died in Beloit, Kansas, April 18, 1944.  Starting sometime in the late 1920’s, J. W. began transcribing his life story to Rachel Bates.  This catalog of his life, spanning nearly 84 years at its completion in May, 1930, provides a unique vision of the life and times of a generation who come to age in the Civil War, later settling and building the rural communities of Kansas.  These memoirs—typed by Ms. Bates later annotated and corrected in pencil by J.W.— are a historical trove of information. Alone they provide great historical record.  But J.W. started a process—continued in fits and starts—by his children, grand children and now great grandson in documenting and sorting the record of this settler into a meaningful narrative. 

Memoirs of John W Bartleson: Boyhood

Memoirs of John W Bartleson - Chapter Two (Part One) - Youth and War

A Konza Show: a Movie

A slideshow of pictures on the Konza Prairie Biological Research Station, near Manhattan.

Download CD (larger) version: 18.23 MB .mov file. Requires QuickTime or Real Player.

Tallgrass Prairie

As Lewis and Clark made their way up the Missouri River in 1804, they came upon an unexpected discovery.  In the Northeast corner of Kansas they took a left turn up a smaller, yet mighty river later to be named the Kaw. What they did not anticipate was the end of the deciduous forest and the beginning of the tallgrass prairie. 

Screech!!

Photos:

A Randolph Landscape

A Stone House

Tuttle Dam

Wabaunsee:

Mistake Puts Alma Couple on Stony Road to Success

Upon entering the showroom of Stone 1 there's so much to take in that my eyes get crossed. Small stones, big stones, oddly shaped stones, stones on shelves, on the floor and spaced along the walls, stones with Wildcats and Jayhawks, stones engraved with names, designs, company logos, flags, insects, mammals, cowboys: the variety is not only unexpected but tantalizing.

Washington County:

Beeeess by the Buzz-illion!

When asked how many bees he has, Jerry Brown’s standard answer is a “buzz-illion.” Seems fitting given that Brown’s Honey Farm, located at Haddam, is the state’s largest bee operation.

MarCon Pies, Inc.

The aroma of freshly baked pies filling the air and overwhelming the senses is noticed immediately upon arrival at this business. For Don Walsh, however, it’s just another day at the office and he’s not even aware of the tempting smell until someone else reminds him.

Our Daily Bread Bake Shoppe and Bistro

The main ingredient is family. “Our family has always been hospitable,” says Cindy Hiesterman, business co-founder. “Mom always had a saying that whoever put their hand in the cookie jar was family, and we try to carry that philosophy into our business.”