Emporia Living 2014

Handcrafted

SCIENCE Winter 2014

INSIDE

Java Cat Coffeehouse creates locally roasted coffees with a blend of art and science

Crafting a Legacy

Builder of Emporia

Called to Serve

Tyler Schmidt follows in the family tradition by becoming a master craftsman

Although few remember him today, Hiram C. Whitley helped build Emporia

Russ and Etta Bauck followed God’s calling all the way to the Philippines

Publisher Chris Walker Art Director Justin Ogleby Sales Director Ronda Henery Contributing Writers Jan Huston Morgan Chilson Melissa Lowery Photography Dustin Michelson IM Design Group Dan Ferrell Design Layout IM Design Group Ad Services Margie McHaley Dan Ferrell Phillip Miller Devin Parkman Katie Potter Copy Editors Ashley Walker Ben Fitch

Table of Contents 5 8 10 Spaces

Editor’s note

Emporia Living Magazine is a publication of

43

Olpe community calendar for 2014.

From a former press room to an upscale studio, IM Design Group has built a creative space.

18

Chase County community calendar for 2014.

54 People

Facebook.com/ emporialiving

For more information, please contact: 517 Merchant Street Emporia, KS 66801 620-342-4800

Dr. David Edwards’ path has him taken from the operating room to the forge, where he has crafted a successful career in blacksmithing.

Advertising index

Online emporiaksliving.com

Twitter @emporialiving

44 Art

20 Business

Java Cat Coffeehouse creates locally roasted coffees with a blend of art and science.

34

Madison community calendar for 2014.

36 Home

Tyler Schmidt follows in his family’s legacy by building custom cabinets.

Mitch Reed’s love for restoring classic cars has led him down an interesting road, from digging ditches to meeting celebrities.

66

Council Grove community calendar for 2014.

68 Career

Chase County native Ryan Kohlmeier makes the big leagues playing baseball for the Baltimore Orioles before returning to Emporia as a dentist.

79

Coffey County community calendar for 2014.

80 History

Although few remember today, Hiram C. Whitley helped build Emporia.

90

North Lyon County community calendar for 2014.

92 Faith

Russ and Etta Bauck followed God’s calling all the way to the Philippines.

On the Cover:

Nic Baker of Java Cat Coffeehouse pours freshly roasted coffee beans into a burlap bag.

[Photo by Dustin Michelson.]

Emporia Living | 3

4 | Emporia Living

Editor’s Note

Welcome to our newest edition of Emporia Living Magazine!

Our community is filled with so many interesting stories and the hardest part of producing Emporia Living is selecting just eight to profile in the magazine.

We hope you enjoy the stories, and we hope you learn about the people who make our community a better place to live, work and play.

The magazine would not be possible without the hard work of many people, so here are our thank yous: First, and foremost, is to the advertisers who made this magazine possible. We hope you will thank them by spending your shopping dollars at their businesses.

Second, we want to thank the entire staff of The Emporia Gazette. They worked hard to deliver this high-quality publication to your doorstep.

Third, thank you to Dustin Michelson, the photographer for Emporia Living Magazine. A lifelong Californian, Dustin is new to Kansas and The Gazette photo staff. He has worked on high profile magazine photo shoots in California and New York. Now, he’s bringing his talent to small-town America, and taking beautiful photos in Emporia.

Finally, a big thank you goes to Justin Ogleby and the staff at IM Design Group who pulled the photos, stories and ads together to deliver the newest edition of Emporia Living Magazine.

We had fun doing this magazine for you and we hope you enjoy it.

Chris Walker Editor & Publisher

Jennifer Esau, DO Family Medicine

Bryce Heitman, DO Family Medicine

Newman Newman Newman Newman Newman

Kimberly Speaks, APRN-C Tammy Patterson, APRN-C Family Medicine Family Medicine

Marcia Hendricks, APRN-C Family Medicine

Joan Grother, APRN-C Family Medicine

Cardiology Family Medicine Orthopedics & Sports Medicine Pediatrics Surgical Specialists 1301 W. 12th Ave. • Emporia KS 66801 Newman Madison Clinic 205 W. Main St. • Madison, KS 66860 Newman Osage Clinic 528 Market St. • Osage City, KS 66523

Semhal Abbay, MD Psychiatry

Mulugeta Fissha, MD Interventional Cardiology

Lillian Kaltenbaeck, MPA, MBA, PA-C Cardiology

Tim Harris, DO General Surgery

Matthew Turner, MD General Surgery

Derek Brown, MD

Joel Waxman, MD Ear, Nose & Throat

Lindsay Garret, PA-C Orthopedics & Sports Medicine

Helena Stormont, APRN-C Orthopedics & Sports Medicine

620-342-HART 620-343-2376 620-340-6181 620-340-6164 620-342-6161 620-437-2200 785-528-2640

Pediatrics

Michael Yost, DO Orthopedics & Sports Medicine

Emporia Living | 5

A full moon rises during a colorful fall sunset over Emporia.

[Photo by Dustin Michelson]

Emporia Living | 7

Advertisers Index 96 one The Wave. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Across the Borders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Adams Lumber & Homestore . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Alexander Artworks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Allegre Rexall Drugs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 The Arnold Group. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Bennett Dental Group. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Bluestem Farm & Ranch Supply . . . . . . . . . 95 BobbyD’s Merchant Street BBQ. . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Brady Optical. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Broadview Towers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 Brown-Bennett-Alexander Funeral Home . . 18 Buckeye Supply Co.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Carpet Plus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Casa Ramos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Chase County Consignment . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Citizens State Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19, 35, 79 City of Emporia. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 City of Madison. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 City of Lebo. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 City of Olpe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 City of Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

8 | Emporia Living

Clint Bowyer Autoplex. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Coffelt Signs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Commercial Street Diner. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Corner Garage & Tire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Cottage House Bed & Breakfast. . . . . . . . . . 66 Cottonwood Falls Collectables. . . . . . . . . . . 18 Country Pride Restaurant. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Do-B’s. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Dustin Michelson Photography. . . . . . . . . . 42 Ek Real Estate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Emma Chase Cafe/Prairie Pasttimes. . . . . . . 19 Emporia CVB . . . . . . . . . . Inside Front Cover Emporia Main Street . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Emporia Orthodontics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Emporia Presbyterian Manor. . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Emporia Realty Group. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Emporia State University. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 ESB Financial. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Back Cover E-Town App. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 EVCO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Evergreen Design Build . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Everything’s Fabulous. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Express Tire. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Farm & Home Real Estate. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Farmers & Drovers Bank. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 First Start Rental . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Dr. Marlin Flanagin, DDS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Flint Hills Beverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Flint Hills Community Health Center. . . . . 72 Flint Hills Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Flint Hills Shopper. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Flint Hills Technical College . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Floyds, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Food 4 Students. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 Golden Living Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Grand Central Hotel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Griffin Real Estate & Auction Service, LLC. 19 Grimmett Masonry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Guion’s Showcase. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Hannah Orthodontics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Hays House Restaurant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Hill’s Pet Nutrition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 Holiday Resort. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 IM Design Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Internal Medicine Associates, LLC. . . . . . . . 61 Java Cat Coffeehouse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Jim Bell & Son. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 John North Ford, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Junque Drawer Emporium. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Kansas Maid Frozen Pastries. . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Karma Hair Boutique. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Kari’s Diamonds & Bridal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 King Liquor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 KISS 103.1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Kitchen and Bath Trends of Kansas . . . . . . . 84 Dr. Ryan Kohlmeier, DDS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 La Hacienda Mexican Restaurant. . . . . . . . . 66 Liquor Locker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Longbine Auto Plaza . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Lyon County State Bank . . Inside Back Cover Lyon County Title. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 The Madison News . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Matfield Green. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Mathis Physical Therapy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 Medicine Shoppe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 The Miracle Cafe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Modern Air Conditioning, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Muckenthaler Incorporated. . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 Mulready’s Pub. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Murphy Oil Food Mart. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 The Nesting Place, LLC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Newman Regional Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Olpe Chicken House. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Olpe State Bank. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Plumbing by Spellman, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 Ray’s Apple Market . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Regional Development Association . . . . . . . . . 6 Reynolds & Anliker Eye Physicians & Surgeons. 91 Rhinestones & Rust. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 River City Art Gallery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Roberts-Blue-Barnett Funeral Home . . . . . . 96 S&A Telephone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Sacred Heart School. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 Satterfield Body Shop. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Schankie Well Service, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Schmidt Custom Cabinetry. . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Spartan Staffing Services. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Star Construction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Studio 11. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Subway. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 Sutherlands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Tallgrass Antiques. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Thomas Property Management . . . . . . . . . . 57 Thomas Transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Tom Van Sickle, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Topeka Ear, Nose, and Throat . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Town Crier. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Trail Days Cafe & Museum. . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 U Drive Kansas Driving School. . . . . . . . . . 84 USD 253. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 Valerie’s Gifts & Such. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 ValuNet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64, 65 Vektek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 Wagner’s Automotive General Services. . . . . 35 Walmart. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 Williams Automotive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Wheat State Telephone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Emporia Living | 9

OLD NEW SPACE LIFE IM Design Group has

transformed a former press room into creative studio Written by

Morgan Chilson

T

he average person spends almost 2,000 hours at work every year. For small business owners like Shawn Honea and Tracy Holroyd, that number is probably a lot higher.

As owners of Emporia’s award-winning IM Design Group, Honea and Holroyd know their hours are dictated by their customers, and they wouldn’t have it any other way.

But, there are things that can make those 2,000-plus hours go a little easier, and that’s spending the time in an environment that’s efficient, conducive to creativity and beautiful.

Relocating last year into space at The Emporia Gazette building at 6th Ave. and Merchant St. gave that setting to IM Design Group.

Temporarily located in a space that was too small and not as professional as they wanted, the two began looking around Emporia to find something that fit the needs of their business.

One, Holroyd said, “looked like a doctor’s office,” which wasn’t exactly the feel they wanted for an established design firm.

But when Gazette owner Chris Walker showed them the former newspaper press room, the high ceilings, striking brick walls and large windows seemed like the perfect fit.

“Tracy and I immediately saw the value and beauty of this location,” Honea said.

The remodel undertaken by IM Design Group and by the contractors took just over two months. The quick work of Walker and the city to get plans and permits approved allowed construction to get done smoothly.

“It was well worth the mess and the noise as we worked,” Holroyd said.

Emporia Living | 11

Brandon Stiner discusses web design and social media with clients.

Family owned over 60 years.

Since 1945

“Clients who come here comment that this looks like a big city studio, like something out of New York or Chicago,” Honea said. “I feel our new space allows clients to escape their environment and enter one that encourages creativity.”

For Holroyd, her love for The Gazette location was cinched when she stepped into a small courtyard-like area that sits behind a room they use for a photography studio.

“It’s just a little narrow area that’s got walls all the way around it. Over the years, this little space was created and there was no access to it from the outside,” Honea said.

The area wasn’t in good shape and needed quite a bit of attention. But with some work, a few strings of lights and a new door, IM Design Group created a great escape.

“The courtyard was what really sold me,” Holroyd said. “I fell in love with it. Working on a computer all day, you don’t always get to see the

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620-342-1163 • 800-835-3509 906 E. 6th Ave. • Emporia, KS • ICC # 67234 Emporia Living | 13

U

IM Design Group’s photographer Shawn Honea shoots commercial photography in the new space.

Above, the studio space was used as the press room for The Emporia Gazette until 2009. Right, the space had to be remodeled, including the addition of a door to the north side of the building.

14 | Emporia Living

sun a whole lot. I sit out there and think or write and be creative.”

The courtyard area wasn’t the only structural change that The Gazette needed to do to the space before their new residents moved in. For the design studio to gain access to the new space from the north side of the building, the business had to get architectural plans and go before the city commission for approval to install a door and create a new address for IM Design Group.

After city approval, the next challenge was actually getting through the four layers of brick in order to put in the door. Grimmett Masonry managed to make it work and early Fall 2013, a reclaimed glass door – that looks like it’s always been there – was installed and began welcoming clients into IM’s new home.

Walker has enjoyed seeing the transformation of the loud, old press room into a serene place for creativity and design.

“We knew we had a special place here with more than a hundred years of papers being rolled off the press day after day,” he said, “and we haven’t rushed into finding a new use for it.”

But when the opportunity for IM Design Group came up, he felt like it was the perfect fit.

“We couldn’t ask for a better use for the space. It just feels right.”

Beauty and structural design aren’t, of course, the only considerations for a work environment. Holroyd and Honea appreciated the high ceilings that let them keep light directly off their computer screens, which is essential for assessing colors accurately.

IM Design Group hired their long-time client Schmidt Custom Cabinetry to build computer desks and the cabinet that separates their work area.

“Tracy and I worked up designs, then we worked really close with Tyler Schmidt allowing him creative freedom to make adjustments. It’s fun to design furniture but it takes real know-how to actually build it and that’s why we chose Tyler. Our place wouldn’t be so amazing if it wasn’t for the furniture,” Honea said.

Settled into their new office, with business growing rapidly, Honea and Holroyd are seeing the benefit of being in a space that reflects their creativity.

“When we have clients come in, especially our out-of-town clients, from Kansas City or Chicago, I think it helps them feel better about using a small-town agency like us,” Honea said.

Emporia Living | 15

*Nontraditional jobs pay 20-30% more than traditional female jobs.

Flint Hills Technical College offers 20 Technical Certificate and Associate of Applied Science degree programs. Short-term and customized training is also available including CNA and EMT. Programs Include:

*Automotive Technology Business Administrative Technology *Computer Program Design & Development *Computerized Machine Tool Engineering *Construction Technology Dental Assisting Dental Hygiene *EMS Dispatch Technology Emergency Services Technology *Graphic Arts Technology Healthcare Administration/Management Health Occupations Technology (HOT) Hospitality/Culinary Arts *Industrial Engineering Technology *Interactive Multimedia Design *Network Technology *Power Plant Technology Practical Nursing Sustainability Studies *Welding Technology

16 | Emporia Living

IM Design Group may be located in a small town, but it is competing with design agencies on a national level. The economy in the last few years created challenges in doing that, but a solid work portfolio, focus on customer satisfaction and a creative staff keeps them competitive.

“We’ve definitely grown this year,” Holroyd said. “Sometimes it’s a blur of meetings, phone calls, emails, and projects. But the number of jobs we’ve put out this year has grown by leaps and bounds. We’ve probably done 20 to 30 percent more jobs this year over last year.

We’ve brought in web designer and social media expert Brandon Stiner and graphic designer Justin Ogleby to provide extra man power in the design and development of marketing and creative strategies. We are incredibly lucky to have found the extra help and talent exactly when we needed it.”

It’s busy, and that’s a good problem for any business. But, at least there is a courtyard to take a moment from the busyness, large windows that stream light across the floor and an attitude of success.

Those 2,000 hours just fly by. ¶

IM Design Group shared their newly transformed space with clients and friends with an open house last October. The open sky offers an outdoor feel, yet is private enough for meetings or just dreaming of creative ideas.

Emporia Living | 17

CHASE COUNTY CALENDAR 2 0 1 4

Thursday, April 10, 6:30pm

Friday, April 11, 7:30pm

Saturday, April 12, 10:00am

Friday, April 18, 7:30pm

Friday, April 25, 7:30pm

Saturday, April 26, 8:00pm

SEMINAR for PRAIRIE FIRE FESTIVAL Speaker/Topic – TBA Emma Chase Café PRAIRIE FIRE FESTIVAL. Edition of K-177 BLUEGRASS acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall IMAGES OF THE FLINT HILLS, Photography Exhibit, throughout the downtown shops TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall SPRING BALL – Flint Hills Victorian Dance Society, Emma Chase Music Hall. Period Dress admired

May 2014 MEMORIAL DAY CEREMONY – VETERANS MEMORIAL – Swope Park chasecountychamber.org

January 2014

Friday, January 3, 7:30pm

Friday, January 10, 7:30pm Friday, January 17, 7:30pm Friday, January 24, 7:30pm

Saturday, January 25, 8pm

Friday, January 31, 7:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall K-177 BLUEGRASS acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session STATEHOOD BALL – Flint Hills Victorian Dance Society, everybody welcome Emma Chase Music Hall. Period Dress (circa 1861 – 1873 strongly encouraged) PICKIN’ THE BLUES Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

Friday, May 2, 7:30pm

Friday, May 9, 7:30pm

Friday, May 16, 7:30pm

Friday, May 23, 7:30pm

June 2014 Chase County Chamber of Commerce River Suite on the River Bridge, Cottonwood Falls, chasecountychamber.org Flag Day Retirement Ceremony at dusk, Veterans Memorial – Swope Park chasecountychamber.org for details.

February 2014

Friday, February 7, 7:30pm

Friday, February 14, 7:30pm Friday, February 21, 7:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall K-177 BLUEGRASS acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

March 2014

Friday, March 7, 7:30pm

Friday, March 14, 7:30pm

Friday, March 21, 7:30pm

Friday, March 28, 7:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall K-177 BLUEGRASS acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

April 2014

Friday, April 4, 7:30pm

Monday, April 7, 6:30pm

Tuesday, April 8, 6:30pm

Wednesday, April 9, 6:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall SEMINAR for PRAIRIE FIRE FESTIVAL Speaker/Topic – TBA, Emma Chase Café SEMINAR for PRAIRIE FIRE FESTIVAL Speaker/Topic – TBA, Emma Chase Café SEMINAR for PRAIRIE FIRE FESTIVAL Speaker/Topic – TBA, Emma Chase Café

A Tradition of Caring & Service Serving Families of the Flint Hills Since 1881

Telephone: (620) 273-6311 201 Cherry • Cottonwood Falls, KS 66845

bbafh@hotmail.com www.brown-bennett-alexander.com 18 | Emporia Living

May 24-26 Friday, May 30, 7:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall K-177 BLUEGRASS acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall COTTONWOOD 200 BICYCLE RIDE PICKIN’ THE BLUES Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

Flint Hills Rodeo FLINT HILLS FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL edition of K-177 BLUEGRASS PICKIN’ on the lawn of the historic Chase County Courthouse (weather permitting) Saturday, June 14, 10am to 5pm FLINT HILLS FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL, on the lawn of the historic Chase County Courthouse (rain or shine)

Saturday, June 14 ROY McCLURE MEMORIAL BANJO CLINIC at FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL 10 to 11am on the lawn of the historic Chase County Courthouse

Saturday, June 14 GARY HUGHES MEMORIAL FIDDLE CLINIC, 1 to 2pm at FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL, on the lawn of the historic Chase County Courthouse Saturday, June 14, 7:30pm CONTRA ON THE GREEN, on the lawn at the historic Chase County Courthouse

June 5-7 Friday, June 13, 7:30pm

Chase County Something for everyone!

New in Cottonwood Falls

Consignment in Croy’s

HRS: Tues-Thurs 9-5, Fri. 10-7, Sat. 8-3

Symphony in the Flint Hills – Rosalia Ranch, Butler County Sunday, June 15, 10am to 4pm FLINT HILLS FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL, on the lawn at the Historic Chase County Courthouse

Friday, June 20, 7:30pm TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

June 27-29 Chase County High School Alumni Association Weekend

Friday, June 27, 7:30pm OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

Saturday, June 14

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Gridley • New Strawn • Emporia Madison • Burlington • Hamilton LeRoy • Lyndon • Cottonwood Falls

July 2014

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Music Jam Session Emma Chase Music Hall Friday, July 11, 7:30pm K-177 – BLUEGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall Friday, July 18, 7:30pm TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall Friday, July 25 7:30pm OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall Friday, July 4, 7:30pm

August 2014

Friday, August 1, 7:30pm

Friday, August 8, 7:30pm

Friday, August 15, 7:30pm

Friday, August 22, 7:30pm

Friday, August 29, 7:30pm

TALLGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Country Music Jam Session Emma Chase Music Hall K-177 – BLUEGRASS PICKIN’ acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall TALLGRASS GOSPEL acoustic Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall OLD TIME ROCK & ROLL and VINTAGE COUNTRY Music Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall PICKIN’ THE BLUES, Jam Session, Emma Chase Music Hall

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Emporia Living | 19

Handcrafted SCIENCE

Java Cat Coffeehouse creates locally roasted coffees with a blend of art and science

Written by Photography by

Melissa Lowery Dustin Michelson

Emporia Living | 21

W

Nic and Angie Baker purchased Java Cat Coffeehouse in August 2011, it was the beginning hen

of a caffeinated education that lead to a change in location, a focus on handcrafted coffee, and, their latest endeavor, roasting their own coffee beans.

The Bakers moved to Emporia from Idaho in 2009, after Nic accepted a position at Wolf Creek Nuclear Plant. Angie worked in the Nurse’s Office at Lowther Middle School for the first couple of years, but when the school was scheduled to be shut down in 2011, she decided it was time to do something different.

When they first moved to Emporia, Angie was disheartened by the state of the downtown area. However, by the time she began looking for other job opportunities, she had seen a marked improvement.

“The downtown has improved, and continues to improve, exponentially,” Angie says, cupping a steaming mug of coffee in the living room of the couple’s home. “We wanted to be a part of that.”

By now, the couple had come to know several people who owned businesses downtown, and she knew that was where she wanted to be.

“Owning a business in the community was a good way to get involved in the community.”

Scott Bolley approached them about buying Java Cat-5, as it was called then, in the spring of 2011.

Neither Angie nor Nic knew much about coffee or running a coffee shop at the time, but the idea appealed to them.

Angie spent the summer at the shop, learning the ropes from manager Jorge Cazares, before taking over in August. She and Nic both credit Cazares with instilling in them a passion and respect for coffee to get them started on the right path.

Emporia Living | 23

“He had a depth of knowledge for coffee that I had never seen. His passion for it rubbed off on both of us,” Nic says with fervor. “Credit where credit is due, he taught us so much.”

Cazares, a national culinary award winner during his training at Flint Hills Technical College, has since gone on to study at Johnson & Wales College of Culinary Arts in Denver.

The Bakers keep in touch with their mentor, though. They were looking forward to sitting down to enjoy a cup of coffee with him when he came through Emporia the next day, anticipating what he would think of the shop’s new location.

After ten years on the 600 block of Merchant, Java Cat Coffeehouse is now located at 608 Commercial Street, a change that did not come easily for the new owners.

“Kristi (Henrikson-Mohn, a partner at Emporia Realty Group) had approached us about moving to the new location in October 2011, just a couple of months after we bought the coffeehouse, but we’d just done a major facelift, so we said no,” Angie recalls with a chuckle.

After taking ownership of the shop in August, the Bakers had changed the coffee shop’s name from JavaCat-5 to Java Cat Coffeehouse, and updated the logo and overall style. After all that work, Angie was looking forward to settling into running the place for a while.

“But the lease on the building was coming due,” Angie says. “And the other business in the building was talking about moving, so we started to think about the opportunity to be on Commercial Street.”

Another business had already committed to the space in the repurposed former furniture store, but when it fell through the Bakers jumped at their second chance. They now share the first floor with ERG and Studio 11 in a unique configuration that has worked out better than Angie expected.

“People love our space,” Angie says with a hint of pride. “Sharing with Studio 11 and ERG, they think it’s awesome.”

Visitors to Emporia in particular have positive things to say about the unexpected space, and the new location on Commercial Street puts Java Cat right in the middle of downtown happenings.

Emporia Living | 25

26 | Emporia Living

“[The move] might have increased overall business a little bit, but when there are parades and midnight madness and events, we get swarmed where we didn’t before,” Angie reports. “It’s amazing what a difference it makes to be on Commercial Street.”

The couple is excited about new businesses opening on their block, drawing people back to the area, and they hope to nurture that by providing an environment that promotes a sense of community and a desire to spend more time downtown.

Angie is in charge of the shop’s décor; her style is both bold and soothing. She blends urban, rural, vintage, and rustic elements to create an eclectic, yet cozy vibe. Visitors have a choice of overstuffed couches and comfortable chairs arranged to encourage discussion or a variety of tables, large and small, to facilitate studying, working, or just hanging out with friends.

One of Angie’s goals is to promote local artists, so she enlisted James

Ehlers, a Professor of Engraved Arts at Emporia State University, to help her find art to feature. A reception for a new exhibit of lithograph prints

by ESU students was on tap for that evening, along with music from Emporia native Corey Anderson.

Angie is already on the lookout for the next artist to host.

“I am in pursuit of local artists whose work we can feature,” she says. “I want to be constantly rotating the art on our walls because I know we have a lot of talented people around here.”

The quest to source as locally as possible is what led Nic to begin roasting coffee beans for the shop earlier this year. Java Cat Coffeehouse is the only place in Emporia that roasts their own beans, something the couple sees as an extension of their desire to promote handcrafted coffee. If they could grow their own beans, they joke, they would.

In July, Nic brought the idea of roasting their own beans to Angie, who was skeptical at first.

“She said ‘You can’t do that, you can’t just roast, it’s a science.’ And I said, ‘Well, it’s a good thing I’m a scientist,’” laughs Nic. Angie admits that her initial reaction was based more on not knowing anything about the process herself than a lack of faith in Nic. “He’s never let us down, so in hindsight, yeah, it was silly to doubt him.”

Nic had already researched the process as well as the different kinds of roasters on the market before bringing up the idea, so once he convinced Angie of the benefits, he was ready to pull the trigger.

He named the new venture Gravel City Roasters, purchased a fluid bed air roaster, and bought his first bag of beans.

Roasting requires heat and movement, explains Nic, and there are two main styles of roasters – a drum roaster – “like a glorified clothes dryer” – and an air roaster – “like an air popcorn popper.” Nic opted for the air roaster because the utilities already in place at the shop could support it without requiring immediate upgrades.

“Part of the allure of the roaster that I bought was that I could use my existing electrical,” Nic says, “and that the parts are easy to get. I do have some ideas for tweaks and upgrades.”

The availability of replacement parts was a major factor in Nic’s choice of roasters. After experiencing the complicated, and expensive, process of repairing the shop’s espresso machine, he wanted something that he could fix himself without the need to special order parts.

“I wanted something that was domestically sourced with parts that I could just run down to see our friends at Waters and get a heater or a blower off the shelf.”

Nic likes working on “low tech” stuff, he says. His collection of vintage guitars and workshop full of old lamps in various states of refurbishment are a testament to his affinity for working with his hands.

“There’s a hands-on aspect to having vintage guitars and old lamps,” Nic muses, “and there’s a hands-on aspect to roasting, too.”

Practical reasons also influenced the decision to roast their own beans.

Green (unroasted) coffee beans have

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a shelf life of up to a year, but once they’re roasted, the shelf life diminishes to about a week before the beans start to go stale. By purchasing green and roasting in-house, the couple can better control their supply to meet fluctuating demand.

The couple is passionate about preserving the origin characteristics of the beans they roast. Just like grapes used in wine-making, beans grown in different locations have subtle differences in taste. Nic and Angie want to help their customers learn to identify and appreciate those differences, and roasting the beans themselves gives them a great opportunity to do so.

30 | Emporia Living

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Nic begins the process of roasting by pouring two-and-a-half pounds of green coffee beans into the roasting pan of the gleaming red and chrome machine, then he sets the loft and turns on the heater.

“With air-roasted coffee, the beans are constantly in loft, so they’re constantly moving, they’re not touching hot metal,” Nic explains.

If the beans stop moving, fires start.

“I’ve had some beans get smoky,” he says, “but never catch fire.”

At this point Nic watches the beans as they turn from green to light yellow to golden to brown.

Chaff starts flaking off the beans, which exhausts into the filter bag, and he listens for “the first crack.”

“It sounds like popcorn popping,” he says.

Once the beans reach an internal temperature of around 426 degrees, they expand and the kernel cracks open. This is usually where Nic stops the process, unless he’s making his espresso base which requires a slightly darker roast, and moves quickly to the next step.

32 | Emporia Living

“The most crucial part of the whole thing is the timing – I turn off the heater, my lovely assistant pulls the cover off the cooling pot, and I quickly dump the beans in the cooling pot. The blower now blows on the beans to cool them and stop the roasting process as quickly as possible.”

Once cooled, the beans are allowed to sit overnight and “off gas,” releasing the CO2 produced by sugars in the coffee combusting during the roasting process. Then, the beans are ready to grind and brew.

“It’s that simple, and that complicated,” Nic says with a grin. “You think it’s all science, but then you realize that some of it is sight, sound and smell. Roasting is an art. It took me a grand total of about a week to figure that out!”

A single batch takes about 12 minutes for a light City roast, the preferred roast at Java Cat. Both Angie and Nic have spirited opinions about dark, or French, roasts because they burn off the origin characteristics of the beans.

As Nic explains, really getting into the topic, “Central American beans are bright, South American are balanced, African can be combination of tart and a nuttiness, Indonesian have these odd spices. We just got some beans from India that we love. They grow in close proximity to pepper plantations, so you get a sweet pepper note. But, take any of those beans and take them to a dark roast, and they all taste the same.”

A common misperception by coffee drinkers is that the darker the roast, the more caffeine the coffee contains. In reality, says Nic, by the time the bean gets to a dark roast, most of the caffeine has been cooked off along with the origin characteristics. Just one more reason to stick with the lighter roast.

“I think it’s a shame to take a good quality, specialty coffee bean and make it like every other coffee bean out there. I want to taste the sweetness, or the nuttiness, or that delicate subtle spiciness that’s in a bean,” Nic says.

Angie agrees.

“There’s a vast difference between getting coffee at a diner or a restaurant or a McDonald’s or even Starbucks than going into a specialty coffee shop,” she states. “It goes back to what Nic was saying about preserving origin characteristics. Somebody nurtured that plant for a long time, and somebody else picked those beans.

There’s a whole process between growing the plant to the trader who buys the coffee to getting it to us. It’s a respect for the coffee and preservation of the whole process. We are in the specialty coffee business, and we have a responsibility to uphold the standards of the specialty coffee business.”

Learning to discern, appreciate, and respect coffee beans and making coffee has been part of the process of running Java Cat and turning it into the type of business they envisioned.

“Being able to tell the difference between the two coffees was the first step into being discerning. It’s been an evolution for us, from, ‘yeah, this is coffee’ to ‘this is magic’,” says Angie.

The couple feel like roasting their own coffee is another way to

serve the community, a foundation of their business plan.

“The reason we bought Java Cat was to get involved in our local community,” Angie says fervently, “so we have a responsibility to make it as local as possible. By roasting, I think we’re doing that.”

Nic plans to roast off-site eventually, and upgrade his process to allow him to roast larger batches at a time.

He foresees distributing the beans to area businesses, but, in keeping with their desire to support locally sourced products, is not seeking to rival the big coffee distributors.

“If I supplied roasted coffee to people locally, in East Central Kansas, then I’m perfectly fine with that.”

The Bakers are constantly looking for opportunities to nurture the sense of community that has been at the core of their vision for Java Cat. Angie has plans to offer more coffee cuppings and is considering a Zen doodling class, where customers could enjoy a cup of a coffee and art supplies. She would also like to have more frequent art receptions, along

with live music, to support local artists and continue the trend of eclectic décor at the shop.

All of this would combine with the already diverse crowd who call Java Cat a second home.

“We have a group of guys that come in every Monday through Thursday morning,” Angie said.

“We’ve got some ladies who come in on Wednesday mornings and quilt, then there’s a group of ladies that come in on Wednesday afternoons that talk politics and local things. There’s a group of ladies that have met every Friday morning for 11 years. Then there are the ladies from Ellie Lou’s who come in and sort buttons that they’ve purchased at auctions. They spread them all over the big table and look them over. You never know what you’ll see when you come into Java Cat.” And that’s just the way the Baker’s like it.

Java Cat Coffeehouse is located at 608 Commercial Street. Visit them on the web at javacatcoffeehouse.com or facebook.com/JavaCatCoffeehouse. ¶

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Emporia Living | 35

36 | Emporia Living

Crafting a Legacy

Written by

Morgan Chilson Photography by

Dustin Michelson

n college at Emporia State, Tyler Schmidt envisioned a life spent teaching and coaching.

But instead, he found the joy of building – of creating – was woven into his DNA, and he’s now the third generation of his family to work in construction.

The transition from teacher to cabinet maker/business owner was subtle, Tyler said. During college, he worked part-time at his parent’s business, Doug Schmidt Construction, in Olpe, to make money, primarily building custom furniture.

The tipping point was when a customer asked Tyler to design custom cabinets. With only a few specialized woodworking tools and very little space to work in, Tyler jumped into the project, never dreaming those cabinets would become the foundation for a new business.

Emporia Living | 37

38 | Emporia Living

An employee removes cabinet doors from the drying rack after being stained.

Schmidt Custom Cabinetry builds more than just kitchen cabinetry.

They also create custom desks and benches for homes and businesses.

Today, Tyler co-owns Schmidt Custom Cabinetry with his parents, Doug and Laurie Schmidt. This small Olpe business is in almost a constant expansion mode.

The first few years of business were slow but steady, and mostly through word of mouth from satisfied customers. Tyler continued to operate out of his father’s business in Olpe, and it wasn’t until 2006 that he and Doug began stamping their work as a cabinet company.

Business began growing quickly enough that Tyler realized he had outgrown the space at Schmidt Construction. In November 2011, he opened in a 7,200-square-foot building of his own in Olpe.

The phenomenal growth has continued. “We quadrupled our

production within the year of opening our new facility,” Tyler said.

Recently, they purchased a CNC machine, which takes computer drafted designs and automatically cuts them out.

“It was a five-year goal and it happened in about five months,” Tyler said of the CNC purchase, which runs into six figures. “It’s a large step. But when you’re putting more into something, it’s making you money back.”

The CNC, which cuts the pieces for the cabinet box, is efficient and makes Schmidt Cabinetry more competitive, he said. It also avoids a lot of human error involved in the measuring and cutting process.

New equipment made the company more efficient, but Tyler also saw tremendous benefits just in relocating.

Emporia Living | 39

Tyler Schmidt explains the capabilities of the CNC machine used to cut and router most of the cabinetry.

At the old shop, he would set up the table saw in the middle of the shop to cut cabinet pieces, and then have to move it out of the way to do the next step in production.

“If you forgot a door, oh, man,” he said, shaking his head at what a pain it was to move equipment around the smaller area. “We devised ways to use every square inch – I’m not even going to say square yard.”

Now, the new shop is sectioned off into different areas for different parts of the work, including a spray booth for finishing that keeps wood dust out of the end product.

The growth has occurred primarily in the local area, Tyler said, with 90 percent of their jobs there.

“Lyon County has kept us very busy, even during the economic recession,” Tyler said, adding that his dad has always emphasized the importance of taking care of your local customers first.

Growth is not without its challenges for Tyler, who is used to having his hands on every part of every project. “I think the hardest part has been having to give up some of my responsibility,” he said.

Still, he’s around for almost every stage of a project, (“I’m a jack of all trades – I can push a broom or sell some cabinets,” he joked.) including those first all-important consultations with clients. The planning part of a project – whether it be a commercial office or a kitchen renovation – is critical.

“People come in with a pretty good idea of what they want,” Tyler said. “Ninety-nine percent of the time, I visit the site. I like to listen to the client. You could spend hours going in the wrong direction.”

Tyler typically will work with the clients to draw a priority list, making sure he knows what things can be adapted and what are “must-haves.”

From pencil to CAD to production to installation, the process is truly a custom hands-on approach.

No two projects are identical.

40 | Emporia Living

Emporia Living | 41

He also uses his experience with designing cabinets to encourage them to think outside of the norm. Sometimes, that also means pulling them back a little in their design choices.

“Sometimes, people try so hard to be unique that it’s not user friendly,” Tyler said of some design ideas. “And some are worried about what everybody’s going to think.

We have to convince them that it’s their space. Not everybody’s going to love it.”

The fun of custom cabinetry is that clients can meld styles and designs and get something that truly fits their spaces and personalities.

“We can work from a rough sketch and it grows into something,” he said. “Some jobs are on a time crunch and budget-limited. We’re very flexible.”

That ability to adapt to each job is a lot of what makes the company successful. For Tyler, much of his focus right now is on managing the growth and continuing to provide high-quality work and excellent customer satisfaction.

“We don’t want to overstep ourselves,” he said. “We want to stay strong.” ¶

42 | Emporia Living

Cabinet Trends Like other home décor, things are “in” and “out” in cabinets, although Schmidt Custom Cabinetry owner Tyler Schmidt said people still tend to be drawn to different styles that fit their personality – regardless of what the trends are.

And today, with access to thousands of design ideas online, people tend to go with what they like, regardless of trends. “This is a great time for us – everything from traditional, very rich cherry to mission-style is in,” he said.

That being said, things tend to move in cycles, and a few stand-outs in the cabinet world are: • European, or frameless, styled cabinets • White cabinets • More painted cabinetry, which leads to the next trend: • More color • Part painted and part natural wood cabinets

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44 | Emporia Living

Forging a Passion Written by

Dr. David Edwards’ career path takes him from the operating room to the forge

Morgan Chilson

Photography by

Dustin Michelson

Emporia Living | 45

O

rthopedic surgeon David Edwards spent his entire career in a sterile operating environment. In stark contrast, his retirement years are awash in black soot, fire and beautifully rendered pieces of iron.

As he approached retirement years in the mid-1990s, Edwards took a cue from his grandfathers, both of whom puttered in woodshops after retiring from the railroad. He knew he wanted to do something in a “big enough” way that he would find the work interesting and make a little bit of money.

As he looked around, Edwards found the rather unexpected answer to his future was blacksmithing.

After watching a blacksmith ply his trade, he was drawn toward the beauty and challenge of morphing sticks of iron into works of art.

“When you see that metal moving – it’s just captivating to me,” he said.

While there are some similarities to his two professions – both blacksmiths and orthopedic surgeons use tools a lot, Edwards pointed out, and both involve chemistry, physics and math – the opportunity to be more creative in his second career was exciting. As a woodworker and woodcarver throughout his life, and as the son of a painter mother and pencil artist father, Edwards knew it was time to really delve into his own creativity.

Persimmon Forge was born.

Not overnight. Accumulating the knowledge, training and tools to run a blacksmithing studio required tenacity and thoroughness, two things Edwards has in abundance.

It helped, too, that he was stable financially because he was able to travel, working and learning from other blacksmiths around the country, Edwards said. Being what he called “obsessively business oriented,” he tackled the project with the idea of setting himself up to be in business.

This wasn’t going to be a hobby.

“You have to make a decision about how much you’re going to get into it,” he said. “It took me about five years to build the shop up to where I could do what I wanted to do for clients.”

46 | Emporia Living

An overhead view illustrates the layout of the studio as Edwards works with Ken Johnson on a piece of iron.

Emporia Living | 47

Edwards puts a rod of iron into the forge with careful consideration. At a certain level within the coals, the conditions are ideal for heating the metal.

Brushing the freshly hammered iron gives a preferred finish to the metal.

Edwards specializes in botanical themed artwork.

48 | Emporia Living

Fifteen years later, at age 70, Edwards is a full-time, successful blacksmith, with his art featured in books and sold all around the country.

His time away from the operating room has been carved into his hands, which are always streaked with black, small scars and scabs from wrestling tools.

“If I’m not bleeding, I’m not working,” Edwards said wryly.

And he’s working plenty. Edwards is finally at the point in creating iron art where he can be a little picky about what projects he takes on. He doesn’t advertise, but instead lets word-ofmouth bring people to his studio.

Over the years, Edwards developed his own particular style. He turned his great love of the outdoors into a specialization in botanical artwork, but he hasn’t limited himself to that subject matter. The gallery on his website, persimmonforge.com, features a broad range of work.

Creating iron art begins with a design, which in recent years Edwards has begun to do online with Google SketchUp, an online program for creating illustrations. It’s not always

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simple to take a design and transfer it into iron. Edwards will experiment with techniques to get exactly the look he wants, as he’s doing currently on a palm tree wall sculpture.

The design has to take into account the weight of the finished project, how it will be transported, how it will hang, and other issues. Such issues mean looking at hollow forming and other processes that will cut out any waste material to lighten the final project. In his studio, Edwards shows where he’s been playing with different ways to get the unique cross-hatching look of a palm tree trunk.

“The design I think, to me, is the most interesting and challenging because you have to solve all those issues,” he said, adding about the artistic process: “I try not to get too tied down to what I originally presented. The material you’re working with seems to have a life of its own.”

To give depth to his artistic design, Edwards said he creates stories about each project. An iris wall sculpture completed for a Louisiana client this year, for instance, was patterned in his head after a botanical illustrator’s work from 400 years ago. The

detailed, beautiful work by Basilius Besler’s drawings were a turning point in scientific illustration, Edwards said, and so he created an iron iris he thought of as “Besler’s Iris.”

“I’m really into what I think of as novelty,” he said. “If you live somebody else’s life, you know how that turned out. Live your own life.

In my shop, I’ve gone where other blacksmiths don’t go.”

Edwards uses many dies in his work, something he said many blacksmiths believe isn’t following traditional practices. He also uses power equipment, even more so as he’s gotten “older and stiffer and everything was popping.”

Blacksmithing is hard on your body, wrestling heavy materials and tools, and operating in a forge that burns between 1500 to 1700 degrees. Edwards works with an assistant, Ken Johnson, a retired organic chemistry professor, who is a tremendous help with many of the tasks.

In working with hot metals, it’s usually critical to work fast, Edwards said.

“You do your thinking in the fire,” he said. “When it comes out of

Top, Edwards’ time away from the operating room has been worn into his hands. Bottom, a flower indicative of the style of Edwards’ work sits in his coal soot covered hands.

Emporia Living | 51

52 | Emporia Living

Edwards specializes in botanical artwork. He creates various insects, flowers and animals. His pieces can be both decorative and functional.

the fire, that’s when you’re going to move metal.”

One of the interesting aspects of blacksmithing is building your own tools, Edwards said. He walked through his studio pointing to a treadle hammer and other machines he built; he invented a pedal hammer that he made and sold before deciding to offer the plans for free online.

With 10 to 15 projects ongoing, Edwards pushes through a full day, every day. He rises about 4 a.m. and works on project plans and drawings, and also blogs on his website in an IronArt Journal section. He’s usually in the studio by 9 a.m. and spends the day there.

The blog, he said, has been an experience in sharing his knowledge

Various tools hang in front of the forge as the fire heats up enough to start working the iron.

and love for his art. When he was blogging once a week, he got about 30 hits a day. With his usual wholehearted focus, Edwards decided two months ago to commit to writing at least two paragraphs every day and posting more pictures. Now he’s getting 300 hits a day.

Surgeon. Blacksmith. Inventor.

Artist. Blogger.

It makes you wonder what this Renaissance man will be up to next. ¶

Emporia Living | 53

Thunderb

54 | Emporia Living

bird Man Mitch Reed’s love for

restoring classic cars has led him down an interesting road

Written by

Morgan Chilson Photography by

Dustin Michelson Emporia Living | 55

Reed stands against his 1956 Meteor Rideau Victoria, which has appeared in several movies and TV shows.

M

itch Reed’s career path

follows a hopscotch pattern that jumps across the country hitting Florida, New York, California and Kansas, among others. His jobs have included four years in the Navy during Vietnam, gas station owner, ditch digger, truck driver, and hot dog seller.

After all that, he ultimately ended up in a career restoring classic 1955-1967 Thunderbirds.

Reed is blasé about that final career, shrugging, “It was easier than any of the other jobs.”

No, Reed isn’t one to overwhelm you with adjectives describing his work on classic cars, unless those descriptors are about motors and body parts. But, his passion for Thunderbirds – and other classic cars, too – is evident in his Olpe home. A six-car garage on the lower level of the two-story house is jammed with jaw-dropping cars, including a ’57 T-bird that’s missing the dash (it’s in the basement) and a bright yellow ’55 T-bird that’s enough to make a person work two or three jobs just to claim ownership.

That’s not all. He’s got two “normal” cars in the upstairs garage, one of which he drives over to his nearby workshop, which houses another five classic cars. At least. Not all are his because he’s working on a couple for other people.

Emporia Living | 57

Reed owns six Thunderbirds right now – two 1955s, one 1956 and three 1957s. He supplemented his collection outside the T-bird family with two 1956 Canadian Meteors, a 1963 Corvette and a 1965 Rambler Marlin. He recently sold his Model A, he said, pointing to an empty spot.

The Corvette was his brother Ray’s car, and Reed bought it when Ray died of leukemia. Like Reed’s passion for T-birds, Ray loved Corvettes, he recalled, smiling.

The gorgeous and very rare Meteor Rideau Victoria, with its white swoosh separating gleaming light and dark blue, is one of the jewels in his collection and has its own claim to fame.

“It’s been in several movies and TV shows,” Reed said, including “That Thing You Do” with Tom Hanks, “Cobb” about Ty Cobb, and it made appearances in the “Quantum Leap” TV show and a Superman movie.

“We used to go to a lot of shoots when I was in LA,” Reed said.

Not only did his cars pull him into the movie scene, but Reed’s business, Mitch’s T-birds, brought him into contact with some of the show biz people who owned the cars he worked on: Vin Di Bona, producer of America’s Funniest Home Videos; both the Carpenters, Richard and Karen; and actress Amy Aquino, whose husband had a ’57 T-bird, Reed said.

Tony Shalhoub of Monk – “I sold him a Mustang convertible. He had an old Jeep Cherokee,” Reed recalled. Like a server who knows customers by their orders, Reed remembers the cars.

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It’s an impressive customer list, but Reed was a lot more interested in what they were driving than he was in showbiz. Doing an excellent job was, and still is, important to him.

“I don’t have to please you,” he said of his approach on taking care of classic cars. “I please me, and I’m harder to please than you are.”

Reed may not go on and on about his love of classic cars, but he is eloquent nonetheless. It’s in the careful hand he slides across a piece of chrome to wipe away any trace of dust and the way, when asked if he takes the cars out in the rain, he’ll answer, “Well, this thing here has got wet a few times. But it’s painted underneath,” as if anyone would know you don’t drive precious cars like these in a Kansas thunderstorm.

Cars are an integral part of his life. He’s a tech editor for the Classic Thunderbird Club International (CTCI) and travels to car shows around the country. His basement has given up most of its pretense at being a normal room in the house and is home to upholstered seats, that ’57 T-bird dashboard and other car parts.

Reed and his wife, Billie Jeane, moved to Kansas from California in 2008 to be near family. She passed away at the end of October from a brain tumor, he said. Reed’s grief is a tangible thing that sits with him at his kitchen table.

He’s learning to do life on his own right now. Billie Jeane was secretary for CTCI for 16 years before she retired, and she used to help him answer the tech questions.

“I’d write it down and she’d always send it out for me and clean up my spelling,” he said, adding that he’s learning to email by himself with the help of someone from the nearby tech school.

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Keeping busy on the cars is helpful now, just as it’s always been.

“I’ll probably never retire. I’d sit around on Sundays like this,” Reed said, twiddling his thumbs.

There’s certainly not time to sit around right now. And, even if Reed finishes the cars he owns and the ones he’s working on for others . . . well, that’s just not going to happen.

He wouldn’t want it to. ¶

62 | Emporia Living

Bennett Dental Group...

DRS. Bennett & Malone NEW PATIENTS

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Emporia Living | 63

myvalunet.com

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2914 West Hwy 50 Suite A, Emporia 64 | Emporia Living

Over the last several years, you have likely seen ValuNet trucks driving around town and heard advertising promoting their Internet, phone, and television services. Emporians may question what makes ValuNet and their services different from others and why should a person change from their current service.

Four years ago, a group of Emporians, Steve Sauder, Stormy Supiran, Bobbie Agler and myself, set out with a business plan to connect every house within the Emporia city limits with a state-ofthe-art fiber optic network similar to what Google Fiber has offered in Kansas City. The term “Fiber Optic” may not be understood by many, but what it means to our community is amazing.

Fiber optic technology can carry a virtually unlimited amount of data with virtually no slow downs or bottlenecks.

This is the reason why it will be the backbone of our communication networks for decades and generations to come. Fiber optic technology will be just as transformative to Emporia as when copper wires were strung from house to house in the early 1900s to carry telephone calls, or the 1970s when coaxial cable was installed to deliver television.

While other services like DSL, cable or satellite can provide video, phone

and Internet, they will eventually experience slow downs and service issues because they cannot handle increasing data needs. Fiber optic technology is the only technology that can carry the amount of data that consumers are starting to demand.

Fiber optic service can let family members simultaneously watch movies, surf the Internet, and listen to music with no buffering or slow downs. Businesses can send huge amounts of information with no slowdowns, errors or other problems inherit in DSL or cable.

The former partners of Emporia’s ValuLine telephone company realized years ago the community benefit of fiber optic cable and set out in 2009 to bring a fiber optic network to Emporia.

Encouraged by the support of 51 Emporia investors raising almost six million dollars to start the company, ValuNet began to build the Emporia network in 2012. Across the country, less than ten percent of all communities have fiber optic service, putting Emporia in a very elite group.

ValuNet is invested in Emporia’s future by providing state-of-the-art telephone, Internet and television services, as well

as 27 local jobs. ValuNet understands the need to provide excellent customer service to its customers. This means you can call the office and talk to a live person immediately and receive assistance; it means you walk into the office and talk face-to-face with a person that can help you; it means the people behind the desk may be friends and neighbors that you know and can trust.

Currently, ValuNet is in the process of bringing fiber to every neighborhood in Emporia. The complete infrastructure build is scheduled to be done by 2016. To check service availability in your area or request service for your neighborhood, call 620-208-5000 today!

ValuNet stands behind its product by offering service with no long-term commitments, no contracts and no data caps. If you choose to terminate your service, you can do so without penalty.

ValuNet customers have nothing to lose and a lot to gain.

Visit the ValuNet showroom to see the difference for yourself.

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Emporia Living | 65

COUNCIL

GREAT

GROVE KANSAS CALENDAR 2 0 1 4

Contact Council Grove/Morris County Chamber of Commerce & Tourism at 620-767-5413.

April Spring Crank Up Tractor Show, Alta Vista Business Expo, Council Grove May-September Morris County Farmers Market June Mud Run, Alta Vista Washunga Days Festival, Council Grove Run-Shunga 5K Walk/Run, Council Grove Arts in the Park, Council Grove July Fireworks on the Santa Fe Trail, Council Grove Independence Day Boat Regatta, Council Grove Independence Day Celebration, White City 3rd of July Celebration, Wilsey Santa Fe Trail Ranch Rodeo, Council Grove Ladies Night Out, Council Grove Morris County Fair, Council Grove August Morris County Youth Rodeo, Council Grove

September Old Settlers Days, Alta Vista Mother K 5 K Walk/Run, Council Grove Labor Day Celebration, Burdick An Evening on the Riverwalk, Council Grove Community Wide Garage Sales, Council Grove Voices of the Wind People Pageant, Council Grove MCHF Golf Tournament, Council Grove

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115 E.Main Council Grove (620) 767-5219 66 | Emporia Living

Ryan Kohlmeier

The

DENTIST of CAMDEN YARDS Written by Morgan Chilson | Photography by Dustin Michelson

D

r. Ryan Kohlmeier didn’t follow the “usual” career path to his Emporia dental practice. In fact, unlike most little boys who want to be sports stars of some kind, he was pretty determined to do something in medicine.

But his darned baseball skills kept getting in the way. Growing up in Cottonwood Falls, population about 900, Kohlmeier played just about every sport – baseball, football, wrestling, track. His pitching skills earned him a 34th round draft pick from the Colorado Rockies, right out of high school.

He turned them down. “It was a surprise deal,” Kohlmeier related. “I had no intentions of signing with them.”

Instead he went to Butler County Community College, still thinking about a medical career. But, then came the bigger temptation – a 14th round draft pick in the 1996 amateur draft by the Baltimore Orioles.

68 | Emporia Living

Emporia Living | 69

Kohlmeier performs a root canal during a normal day at the office.

“It was a tough decision,” Kohlmeier said. “I still didn’t really plan on signing. I was interested in medicine.”

He played through the summer on a league designed for college players that the team monitored, Kohlmeier said.

“So, the following year in August, as a 19-year-old stupid kid, off I went to Lakeland, Fla.,” he said.

Kohlmeier played for the Orioles, working through different levels from A to AA to AAA in 2000. That year, he was called up to the major leagues in late June.

Those early years allowed him to acclimate to the pressure that’s put on major league players – high expectations from fans, teammates and team owners.

“The pressure – that’s something you find out at a pretty early age if you can deal with that or not,” he said. “It was a lot of pressure, a lot of nervousness from probably the first five or six times I ran out of the bullpen onto the field. My stomach was doing somersaults, my thought was ‘Please don’t let me fall down.’”

70 | Emporia Living

The baseball world brought with it challenges for Kohlmeier and his wife, Tyla. The two married after his first year in the minor leagues, having grown up together in Cottonwood Falls.

“Baseball is a tough life with all the moves,” Kohlmeier said. “You’re never in the same place for more than four or five years.”

Tyla agreed. “It was very hard, but it was also exciting to travel and see the places we got to see,” she said.

“We lived out of suitcases and parents’ basements. I think I counted up at one point and we have moved 35 times. It made us probably a stronger couple and just more self-confident in ourselves and each other.”

Things weren’t quite going as well on the field as Kohlmeier hoped. In 2001, he was sent back and forth between the majors and AAA, he said, and was then traded to the White Sox, moving to Charlotte, N.C. “I did okay with them but never got back to the major leagues,” he said. “It was a little disappointing going back to AAA after being in the major leagues.”

Thoughts on Youth Sports Dr. Ryan Kohlmeier was a professional baseball player for the Baltimore Orioles before he became a dentist. His years spent pursuing a sports career have given him a unique perspective on kids and sports.

That volatile subject has gotten some media attention in recent years, as kids are playing more competitively at younger ages. Kohlmeier shared his thoughts: The more experience you personally have in sports, he said, the less seriously you take youth sports.

“There is plenty of time to get dedicated, to get super-involved and invested in sports,” he said. “I feel sad for a lot of the kids and even a lot of the parents. It honestly doesn’t matter how good you are. It’s just not worth it pushing kids all the time. There’s plenty of time in high school to be that competitive.”

What he saw in the minor and major leagues was that it was always about talent, although there were of course the “phenoms” who blew everyone away, Kohlmeier said.

“In professional sports, it’s more dedication and more commitment and more discipline than it is talent,” he said. “I tell that to kids all the time. In dental school, there were brains who could blow your mind. But they might not be the best dentists, they might not work at it as hard.”

Emporia Living | 71

By 2004, the couple had a young son, Cade, and travel became harder.

Kohlmeier and Tyla made the tough decision: “Unless something happens and I was sent back to the big leagues, I think this is it,” they decided in 2004.

In August 2004, the two came home and Kohlmeier began to pursue his original career path. He enrolled in Emporia State University, intending to become a doctor or a pharmacist. Another son was born, Cal, and Kohlmeier plugged away as a non-traditional student, a little unsure of his exact medical path.

A visit to his Emporia dentist cleared that indecision up.

Dr. Gary Ace told Kohlmeier, “You don’t want to be a doctor. You need to be a dentist.” That consideration wasn’t even on his radar, the former baseball player admitted.

“I think it was God, honestly. We were doing a lot of praying about it,” he said, adding that he was on a reserve admissions program at the KU’s medical school. “I was in if I wanted it.”

He decided, instead, to attend dental school and has been grateful for the decision Ryan Kohlmeier has a collection of memorabilia at his home from when he played for the Baltimore Orioles.

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Emporia Living | 73

ever since. Those years in dental school were tough, too, with a strenuous time commitment required for school.

Kohlmeier also had a young family: two sons by then.

“I really approached it like a job,” he said. “I got there early in the morning and I would stay until I got my stuff done. When I got home, I wanted to be home.”

“He’s very focused and disciplined, goal oriented,” Tyla said. “He works hard.”

Kohlmeier joined Dr. Ace in practice, which was what that well-known and well-loved Emporia dentist was angling for when he got Kohlmeier in his dental chair and suggested that he shift his career path.

“He had an awesome practice,” Kohlmeier said. “He had an excellent reputation in town. I couldn’t have walked into a better situation.”

Settling in Emporia, close to their family, was something they didn’t think would ever happen, but Tyla is happy.

“We’ve always been someplace knowing that we wouldn’t end up there,” she said. “The fact that we are unpacked and I don’t see an immediate future of having to pack a box or move anything. . . I’m glad to settle here.”

The couple – who, in addition to their boys, have a daughter, Cora – keep busy with work, church and running with the kids. Their oldest son, Cade, is a sports

Kohlmeier’s pitching skills earned him a 34th round draft pick from the Colorado Rockies right out of high school.

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Emporia Living | 75

nut, and that keeps Kohlmeier and Tyla, who has a degree in sports medicine and exercise science, still on the field in a variety of sports.

Their spirituality is an important part of their lives, Kohlmeier said.

“I think that in baseball, that’s where a lot of my spiritual growth happened,” he said. “You’re thrust into a situation where you really have very little control over what’s happening.”

He found himself saying, “God, I’m trusting you on this. I know I’m not in control.”

Despite the sometimes scandalous stories of behavior in professional sports, Kohlmeier and Tyla said there was an incredible amount of spiritual support through the baseball organization. Baseball Chapel is an international ministry that works with all teams, Kohlmeier said, even offering Bible studies during three-week instructional leagues.

“Our spirituality impacts every decision that we make,” Kohlmeier said. ¶

Kohlmeier’s spirituality is an important part of his life, which he learned while playing professional baseball.

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76 | Emporia Living

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COFFEY

COUNTY CALENDAR 2 0 1 4

April • Easter Egg Hunts: Burlington, LeRoy, Waverly, Gridley – Saturday before Easter “totally unexpected”

May • Senior Honors Banquet

June • Lebo City Wide Garage Sale 1st Saturday in June • Burlington Cruise Night 2nd Saturday in June • LeRoy Homecoming • Strawn Fest • Coffey County Relay for Life

September • OK Kids October • Waverly Craft Fair 1st Saturday in October • New Strawn Halloween Party • Burlington Taste of Fall Festival • Gridley Trunk & Treat – Halloween Night

July • Gridley 4th of July Celebration • Lebo 4th of July parade & fireworks display • Bob Ellis Memorial Truck & Tractor Pull Weekend before July 4th Lebo • Ohio Days – 2nd Friday of July – Waverly • Coffey County Fair • Wild Blue BBQ

November • Burlington Christmas Craft Festival Saturday prior to Thanksgiving December • Christmas in Lebo Celebration 2nd Saturday of December

August • Burlington City Wide Garage Sale 1st Saturday in August

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• American Legion & Auxiliary Memorial Day Celebration

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Hiram C. Whitley, center with the cigar, circa 1900, was the former Chief of the Secret Service appointed by President Ulysses S. Grant. The opera house he built was the center for cultural entertainment in Emporia.

80 | Emporia Living

Hiram C. Whitley A Builder of Emporia Written by Jan Huston

L

ong before the Granada Theatre, there was the Whitley Opera House.

The Whitley stood on the northeast corner of Sixth Ave. and Merchant Street and was a center for cultural entertainment for Emporia and the surrounding area for 32 years, from 1881 until 1913 when it was destroyed in a fire.

Across the street where the Broadview Towers stands today, stood the original Whitley Hotel.

If anyone still living remembers

the original Whitley Hotel, he or she must have been alive in 1921 when that auspicious building also burnt to the ground. So successful were these two businesses in Emporia that owner/builder H.C. Whitley also acquired an overflow hotel on the southwest corner of Fifth Ave. and Merchant Street known as the Whitley Annex. When the original Whitley Hotel burned in 1921, the Annex became The Whitley Hotel and served the city until 1959.

H

This illustration from circa 1890 show the Whitley Opera House that stood on the northeast corner of 6th Avenue and Merchant Street until it was destroyed in a fire in 1913.

82 | Emporia Living

iram C. Whitley was a true entrepreneur born in Camden, Maine, in 1834. After graduating from Western Reserve Seminary at the age of 16, he moved to Lawrence, Kansas, in 1857 to participate in the building of a new state. After only two years in the grocery business there, he moved on to Colorado.

With the advent of the Civil War, he found himself in New Orleans working as a Secret Service agent for the Union. Following the war, he was employed by the Internal

to the Emporia Gazette’s obituary of Whitley of October 1919, this was “probably his most outstanding achievement … a task he carried out with marked ability.”

But for Emporians, his greatest achievements centered around his energetic involvement in building our fair city. Why he chose to settle in Emporia after his secret service glory days is unknown. Perhaps he was seeking the peace and quiet of a new town far from the strife and rebellion of Washington, D.C., but by 1881, his was already a go-to name

Revenue Bureau investigating fraud cases in various parts of the country, including Kansas. He was even engaged in trying to secure information to be used for the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson.

Finally, during President Grant’s administration, Whitley’s work was found so valuable by the President, that he appointed Whitley Chief of the Secret Service, and charged him with the responsibility of suppressing the Ku Klux Klan’s criminal activities in the South. According

in town. A hastily formed committee of Whitley and four others filed a charter and organized a company to build an opera house for Emporia. Rarely were operas performed in these theatres. Rather, traveling lectures, impersonators, hypnotists, masters of the black arts and psychic phenomenon, puppet shows, vocal and instrumental soloists, and local and traveling musical and theatrical groups were the main attractions in these opera houses.

Built like most opera houses

across the Kansas, the Whitley housed business establishments on the ground floor while the opera house was located on the second floor. With Emporia’s prime location along both the Santa Fe and Katy railroad lines, the town was easily accessible to citizens of other towns wishing to spend the night and see the shows. According to the Emporia Daily Republican, “The elite of Burlington to the number of about fifty of her most intelligent men and best looking women came to Emporia on yesterday for the purpose of attending the splendid entertainment at the Whitley Opera House last evening. The central section of the parquette was reserved

by Col. Whitley for their special accommodation.” (Feb. 2, 1882) Col. Whitley understood the importance of serving his clientele.

Already he had established himself as an hotelier of note, having bought one of the prime hotels when he first arrived in town, the Coolidge House. He was responsible for building another hotel, remodeling two others and then donating $35,000 that made possible the construction of the Whitley Opera House. The Gazette claimed he had “the distinction of putting more bricks together than any man in Emporia.”

The title Colonel was only an honorarium given most hotel men in the late 1880’s. His actual military title from the Civil War was Major; however, before the close of the war he was commissioned a lieutenant colonel but was never mustered in that rank.

When all Whitley memorabilia was disbursed in 1964, the most elaborate gift to the museum was a citation of the Commander in Chief of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion engraved with the following citation: “Major Hiram Combs Whitley, commanding the Seventh United States Colored Troops, especially distinguished for maintaining the honor, integrity and supremacy of the government of the United States, is received as a Companion

The Whitley Opera House staged traveling lectures, impersonators, hypnotists, masters of the black arts and psychic phenomenon, puppet shows, vocal and instrumental soloists, and local and traveling musical and theatrical groups.

Emporia Living | 83

The Whitley Hotel stood on the northwest corner of Sixth Avenue and Merchant Street where Broadview Towers currently stands.

of the First Class of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, September 1889.”

When dressing for important events, Whitley wore this superb decoration that is now on exhibit at the Lyon County Historical Museum.

William E. Connelley, secretary of the Kansas State Historical Society for many years, said of Whitley that he was one of the most interesting men in the state of Kansas in the post-Civil War period. Perhaps the fact that Whitley wrote of his

Civil War and Reconstruction period activities in his very readable little book entitled “In It” gave an appreciation of the dangers he had faced.

His book tells of the criminals, or “Thugs” as Whitley called them, who terrorized the city of New Orleans and controlled elections and politics before and in the early part of the war. Whitley maintained that murders were a daily occurrence and “there was not a tile in the floor of the rotunda of the great St. Charles Hotel, on St. Charles Street, which

had not had its baptism in human blood … . A twirl of the thumb or the twinkle of the eye proved a cause for war, and in an instant a knife or revolver might be whipped out and the deadly work begun,” he wrote.

When General Benjamin Butler entered the city in the spring of 1862 as military governor, he found Thugs such as Bob Johnson, Arthur Guerin, Pedro Capdiville, the three De Pratts, Red Bill No. 1 and Red Bill No. 2 and a score of others were all under the protection of city authorities, but Butler put an end to that. Whitley, with his ability to pass as a Southerner, moved easily within various sections of the city and even drilled with some rebel regiments being organized in the city. Always he would take sick and have to be excused just when ranks were almost filled. Butler used Whitley’s spy talents in numerous assignments.

When General Banks replaced General Butler, Whitley was finally made major in a union regiment raised largely from New Orleans for the defense of the city. A number of times he was exposed to dangers from the “Thugs”, and he became an

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important factor in the military rule that eventually brought order to the city. Many of the “Thugs� lost their lives. Major Whitley personally shot and killed Pedro Capdiville, one of the worst desperadoes who had kept the city on the verge of terrorism for several years.

A

fter the war, Whitley went to Washington bearing letters of recommendation from General Butler and others.

He was successful in getting an appointment to the revenue service prosecuting internal revenue frauds.

Whiskey frauds became his specialty, and after working on the larger cases of whiskey frauds in the North, he was sent to Virginia to look after moonshiners. While there, he raided 36 stills and had many exciting encounters with illicit whiskey makers in the mountains. “We dodged from point to point with such rapidity, that the moonshiners had hardly time to catch their breath before we were on to them. We would ride up to a distillery, jump off of our horses, pick up an axe, dislocate and thoroughly

A parade marches by the Whitley Hotel in October of 1912.

Emporia Living | 85

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destroy the copper boilers and wormpipes, making a clean knockout as fast as we came to them,” he wrote.

One day he read in the Lynchburg newspaper that Major H.C. Whitley had been appointed chief of the Secret Service division of the United States Treasury. Although he had not asked for this position, Whitley wanted it just the same. When he turned in his final reports of his activities in Virginia, his boss asked him to stay in the bureau with a reasonable pay raise, but Whitley replied that he would rather be chief of the secret service than President of the United States. In introducing Whitley to the Secretary of the Treasury, his boss said, “This is the most active man of my bureau.”

President Grant had high regard for Whitley, expressly directing him to pursue the Ku Klux Klan. Whitley wrote, “Against this infamous organization alone we secured over two thousand indictments.” He remained Grant’s chief of that division for his two terms, altogether spending 14 years in the secret service. He claimed that he was also responsible for breaking up organized gangs of counterfeiters in the North, arresting more than 3,000 persons with at least half of them convicted and sent to prison. Whitley’s book and scrapbooks detail the many cases he worked on while in the secret service. It was Whitley who appointed the man who took the transcripts of the records that convicted Boss Tweed in New York.

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hitley’s move to Emporia after his retirement benefited the city in many ways. His enthusiasm led in the efforts to build bridges across both rivers. When considering his hotels and opera house, it is said he was one of the largest taxpayers on real estate in Emporia. A Republican, he was also a member of Post 55, Grand Army of the Republic. He wrote the biographies of every member of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion In fact, he wrote extensively, including a book about the Ku Klux Klan that was circulated by republican leaders in pamphlet form. He also wrote many stories, principally concerning the detection of criminals. These stories often appeared in magazines and newspapers.

Neither Whitley nor his eight siblings had any children, nor did his wife or her siblings. Instead, he and his wife adopted two daughters, one of whom never married.

One daughter, Sabra Austin, Mrs. Jason Austin, continued to run the Whitley Hotel until 1959. The opera house burned in 1913, and the original hotel burned in 1921, two years after Col. Whitley’s death.

But the overflow Whitley Hotel, sometimes called the Kynaston on 5th Avenue, continued to house visitors to Emporia for another 38 years under Mrs. Austin’s direction.

Mrs. Austin described the old opera house as having wonderful acoustics and able to seat 1,000 persons, the largest seating capacity of any theater in the state at the time. The auditorium was illuminated by a 24 light chandelier hanging from the dome of the building. Twelve double bracket lights hung above and below the balcony area all with cut glass globes. Sixty-five feet wide, 90-feet long and 60-feet deep, the opera house was built with great precautions taken against fire. A fullsized street main was introduced into the auditorium with 50 feet of two-inch hose attached. Behind the drop curtain on the stage was another water main with sufficient hose to reach over the flys.

Originally the seats of the opera house were on a level, but within a month, the chairs were secured in successive rises in order to give a good view. The plan for removal of seats for dancing had to be scrapped. Two entrances led into the opera house, one for actors and unloading baggage; the other off of Merchant Street was used by the audience. A double door entrance led to a stairway to the second level where the auditorium was located. The lower left box seat was reserved for Col. Whitley.

The Emporia Daily Republican gave the following description of the interior: “The walls have been frescoed a beautiful pink that is restful to the eye. The balcony front is painted a delicate green with the panels pink; the boxes are corresponding colors. But it is the curtain and scenery that have been given the artist’s touch…A sliding curtain represents a large picture of a rolling lake shore set in a heavy gilt frame, around and above which is a rich red plush, artistically draped with gold cord.”

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www.dentistsemporiaks.com Onlookers survey the remains of the Whitley Opera House after it was destroyed by a fire in 1913.

T

he fire that destroyed the opera house began late on June 18, 1913.

The most commonly accepted theory was that defective wiring in the ceiling of the first story of the building started the fire. When Probate Judge W.W. Parker discovered the fire, thick clouds of smoke poured down the baggage stairway at the southeast corner of the building. At first the fire was confined to the dressing room area beneath the stage, but firemen could not control the fire.

Water pressure was insufficient to lift streams of water high enough.

Within 45 minutes of its discovery, the fire had burst through the roof, and within another 22 minutes the entire building was burning. The destruction of the Whitley Opera House was a blow to the city.

Six years later, Col. Whitley died in his apartment in the Kynaston Hotel of an inflammation of the bladder. Within three days his wife also died on Oct. 22, 1919. Just

two years after that, his beautiful hotel was also swept in fire. In her memories, daughter Sabra Austin reflected on the gracious period of the opera house and the original hotel. Parties were elegant affairs, she reported, often featuring an orchestra for the afternoon or evening engagement at only $15. Decorations were luxurious and refreshments elaborate. At special events in the hotel dining room, Mrs. Austin recalled how the waiters armed with fans closed all the windows except one and drove the flies out before the dining hour.

In describing the conveniences of the hotel, she told of how each room was provided with a coal stove for heating in winter and a wash bowl and pitcher. Coal lamps originally lighted the rooms but were later replaced with gas lights which proved very unsatisfactory. Wellsbach burners that kept a clear steady light were preferred until electricity arrived in 1900.

Colonel Whitley replaced the coal

Emporia Living | 87

The Whitley Hotel was destroyed by fire in 1921.

The Broadview Hotel was later build in its place.

stoves with a steam plant imported from the Ramsey Company in St. Louis. He even had to import workmen from St. Louis who knew the workings to install the plant. Mrs. Austin reflected on the fine linen tablecloths and napkins used at the Whitley. When linen became harder to get and cotton was coming into use, the hotel cook claimed that if the time ever came when they couldn’t get linen, she’d quit.

On the night when the hotel burned, Mrs. Austin related that a special dinner had been scheduled, and a large quantity of chickens and ducks had been dressed for the occasion. The feathers and entrails had been deposited in a barrel to be carried away by the garbage collector.

With the hotel built with four outside walls and a center courtyard, the fire was so intense that it destroyed everything with not so much as a sheet or pillow found that had not been burned. Only the outer brick walls remained standing along with the contents of the garbage barrel.

With the move to the Fifth Avenue Hotel, never again was dining service a part of the hotel’s operation.

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Sabra Austin and her husband Jason ran the Whitley until 1959 when it finally came time for retirement.

Five years later Mrs. Austin died leaving many mementos of Emporia’s age of elegance. Some were sent to Whitley Austin’s home in Salina and to a daughter in Iowa. Whitley Austin, then editor of the Salina Journal, wrote of his grandfather, “He was a man of many parts, a Union Soldier, a business man, chief of the United States Secret Service, an individualist.”

Austin regretted the change and migration of families such as his.

With his mother’s passing there would no longer be any descendants of Hiram Whitley left in Emporia, one of the prime developers of our city. Austin with a catch in his throat realized that Emporia would no longer be his home. “Secretly, until now, it always has been,” he wrote even after being gone for 30 years.

He knew then that his family and his own memories had always been interwoven with Emporia. And so, the name of Hiram Whitley is nearly lost in Emporia’s history, but his gifts to our town were towering. ¶

Emporia Living | 89

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Russ and Etta Bauck, former Emporians, have served as missionaries in The Philippines since 1996. Pictured left are Russ and Etta along with their children, Bethany, Aubrey and Whitney.

CALLED TO SERVE

Written by Morgan Chilson

When you have a calling to serve God, it’s persistent. It sits in your head and heart, nudging and prodding.

Russ and Etta Bauck found that out after they graduated from Kansas State University in the ‘80s.

They became interested in mission work through Campus Crusades for Christ, but moved to Emporia to pursue their careers. Still, through 12th Avenue Baptist Church, they continued to come in contact with missionaries and listen to a mission-oriented pastor.

The calling became stronger. “We really loved our jobs, we were very involved with the youth group,” Etta recalled. “But, this little bug that had bitten us in college just kept getting bigger, and it wouldn’t go away and leave us alone.”

So they followed God’s voice and their hearts and began a journey that brought them to the Philippines.

Twenty years later, via Skype, they shared a peek into their lives.

Getting to the Philippines wasn’t easy. They began the process of preparing for their life’s work, and that meant another five years in school for graduate-level biblical and theological training. This, in the midst of starting a family (“We went with one baby and came home with three,” Etta said). Once back in Emporia, they connected with OC International, their mission organization, and began raising funds to support their trip.

That took more than two years.

But finally, in January 1996, they loaded their family onto an airplane for a trip that would take about 24 hours and landed in the Philippines.

Their three children ranged from a second-grader to a three-year-old.

Eighteen years later, all three children are back in the United States: two working after they graduated from college and the youngest still in school. Russ and Etta continue their work in Manila, but it’s a little harder with their kids so far away.

Etta teaches at Faith Academy, a school started for the children of missionaries but that has become an international Christian school, and works with Children’s Garden, a local program helping children who were living on the streets.

“A lot of our families live and work in some of those cultures that we study. It’s very real to these students because they already live in a multi-cultural situation with different religions,” she said. “In ethics, we study things like wealth and poverty, and those things are in our faces all the time, every day around Manila.”

Russ works on a team in the northern Philippines, and most recently, he’s involved in a research project that’s assessing the country to find out where churches are established, and where new churches are needed. Although he doesn’t directly use his engineering education, he uses the skills all the time, Etta said.

Emporia Living | 93

Etta teaches at Faith Academy, an international Christian school in Manila.

Russ works on a northern Philippines team, involved in a research project that’s assessing the country’s need for more churches.

94 | Emporia Living

Being missionaries has been about more than offering their help in the Philippines. It’s been about growing their own faith, seeing outside of their personal belief systems to embrace a faith bigger than what they knew.

“Living overseas, you do begin to see things where your Christianity is very culturally influenced,” Etta said.

“I think when you live in another culture and see how their Christian faith is lived out, you do begin to kind of pull apart some of the things that you thought were Christian and you realize it was more your own culture.

We feel like we’re all on the same page for the most part, we’re brothers and sisters here. Some of the things that really divide Christians in America are less important here; they feel less important to me.”

“We were very much challenged by some of the first pastors that we met here,” Russ said. “We looked at each other and said why are we here, these people are quite capable and they seem to have a very strong faith and much more belief that God would want to do something beyond the normal than maybe what we would.”

Seeing people who didn’t have finances or education to rely on, who still lived in the attitude of “well, we really don’t know the resources or the way or whatever, but we know what God wants to do, so let’s pursue that” has been life-changing, Russ said.

“We have many really great friends in America and great Christian friends that we love and respect so much, but I just feel like some of the outer trappings of culture have been pulled apart from us here,” Etta said.

“It’s a more simple, a more basic, Christianity in some ways. We have been so humbled here.”

Despite a growing Filipino economy, there is still much real need.

“So many people that are completely untouched by the development that’s taking place. The poverty – it is in our faces all the time,” Etta said. “Beggars at your car window, at your gate, asking for help with a prescription, and then these tensions that you feel about what you have and what it’s okay to have, and what you can do and what you can’t do.

People needing things all the time. It really is just emotionally wearying. I think all of us do develop our own

Brandi and Evan Morris of Emporia traveled to The Philippines last summer with a group from 12th Avenue Baptist Church to serve alongside The Baucks. They helped with vacation Bible schools and other outreaches.

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Emporia Living | 95

A group from 12th Avenue Baptist Church traveled to The Philippines last summer to serve alongside The Baucks, helping with vacation Bible schools, among other projects.

strategies. You’ve got to have some kind of thing worked out in your own head, in terms of what you can do, what’s reasonable, how to respond.”

Emporians Brandi and Evan Morris went on a 10-day mission trip last year to the Philippines with a group from 12th Avenue Baptist Church and saw first-hand the need there. It wasn’t a shock to them because they’ve done other mission trips, both to China and Evan also to Thailand.

The couple helped with vacation Bible schools and other outreaches, some through Kids International Ministry, which is run by a Kansas group that started an orphanage and a school, Brandi said.

“Sometimes Bible school was literally on the street, wherever homeless street kids were around,” she said. She also taught women to make fabric flowers that they could sell for an additional source of income.

Evan worked some with VBS, and also with Children’s Garden, the organization for street kids that Etta and Russ volunteer for. Like the Baucks,

the Morrises what they learn from the people they are serving outweighs what they bring to the country.

“You go there and you have a desire to want to do whatever you can to serve the people there,” Russ said, “to show them God’s love and to just encourage people who are Christians and to help the people who don’t know the Lord. You are floored by the people you meet. A lot of them have way less than what we have, and they’re not as spoiled as we are.

Their attitudes of grace and kindness that they had towards us and each other and serving their own people – a strong desire and passion to reach out to their own people and how effective they are at doing it – just kind of blows me away.

“I’m not here to teach them anything,” he said. “I’m here to learn from their love and discipline.”

Anyone interested in learning more about OC International missions can check out their website at onechallenge.org. To reach Russ and Etta Bauck for information about their work or to financially support their mission, email russbauck@oci.org. ¶

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