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www.theactiveage.com June 2026 Kansas’ Largest Newspaper Printed at Valley Center, KS
Inside:
Bonnie Bing joins The Active Age
Vol 47 No. 7
Short and sweet
13 miles of Route 66 celebrated in Kansas
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By Joe Norris This year, America’s most iconic highway is celebrating its 100th birthday. Established in 1926, Route 66 was one of the first national highways, extending all the way from Chicago to Santa Monica. The historic route ran through eight states, covering a total of 2,448 miles. Only 13.2 of those miles are on Kansas soil. But there’s no shortage of fascinating sites and stories along our state’s short section of the Mother Road. Baxter Springs, one of only three Kansas towns on Route 66, is a good place to start a road trip. It sits down in the southeast corner of our state, next door to the Missouri state line and even closer to the Oklahoma border. If your Model T loses its radiator cap in Baxter Springs, it could easily bounce into the Sooner State before rolling to a stop.
Motoring north through Baxter Springs, you’ll see a beautifully restored 1930 Phillips 66 station in the distinctive Tudor Style. It now houses the Kansas Route 66 Visitors’ Center, and Dean Walker serves as unofficial ambassador it’s on the National for Route 66 in Galena, which has several events Register of Historic Places. This is a great planned this month for the road's centennial. much any question you have about the place to pick up some tourist tips and history of the area. Route 66 souvenirs. But it’s staffed In 1863, a massacre by Quantrill’s entirely by volunteers, so if the visitors’ Raiders took place here. After the center happens to be closed, head over Civil War, Baxter Springs became to the Baxter Springs Heritage Center Kansas’ first cowtown — the end and Museum. of the trail for Texas longhorns on You’ll probably find Mary the Eastern Shawnee Trail. Soon Billington at the front desk. She’ll afterward, it became a thriving zincprovide you with a Route 66 map and and-lead mining town, attracting new passport guiding you to all the local sights. Mary can also answer pretty See Route 66, page 9
Justice Together a 'game changer' on local issues
By Amy Geiszler-Jones When Bob Nelson heard his pastor talk about a new faith-based social justice coalition in Wichita, he was wary. “I told her this could be dangerous and divisive,” said Nelson, who initially associated justice with revenge or polarized politics. After attending the initial meetings when Justice Together was forming in late 2022, he came to see it as a nonpartisan way to find solutions to important community issues. When he left a long career in health care in 2023, volunteering became a worthy cause to retire to, he said. And then last summer, he and his wife needed to call 988 during a mental health crisis and got the help they needed through a mobile crisis unit he and other Justice Together volunteers had advocated for. See Justice page 6
Volunteers deliver pets to loving homes
Edith Clark is shown with two dogs she recently helped transport from western Kansas to permanent homes in Missouri and Iowa.
By Sherry Graham Howerton Edith Clark has put over 300,000 miles on her 2013 Subaru Outback. She hasn’t logged all those miles taking cross-country vacations. Clark, who lives in Newton, has racked up more than 100,000 miles transporting homeless animals in the seven years since she retired. Clark is one of many older volunteers who participate in pet transport, which is the moving of animals in need of care from high-kill shelters to no-kill pet rescue organizations and, hopefully, permanent homes. In April alone, she transported 160 dogs. “I love knowing these animals are going to a better life,” Clark said. “Some of them have had such terrible back stories. It feels good knowing they’ll find a home instead of being
Questions about services?
Central Plains Area Agency on Aging/Sedgwick County Department on Aging: 316-660-7298 or 1-800-367-7298
chained up or neglected. And, of course, there’s all the puppy kisses I get.”
Second chances
With pet populations being at all-time highs, thousands of dogs, cats and other domestic animals end up in shelters across the country. Many are at risk of being euthanized, having never had the chance to find a loving home. That’s why animal rescue groups and concerned individuals work with area shelters to find homes for these pets, taking them journeys often referred to as “freedom rides.” Some journeys involve 10 or more interchanges between drivers before a pet reaches its destination. Clark recently collected eight-week-old sibling puppies that had been driven See Pets, page 7
Butler County: (316) 775-0500 or 1-800-279-3655 Harvey County: (316) 284-6880 or 1-800-279-3655