Twelve minority and women-owned companies, three individuals and one corporation from across the state are being recognized for their support and efforts to create new opportunities. The recognition is coming via the Kansas Department of Commerce Minority Enterprise Development Awards.
In the Service Industry Firm category the Loving Arms Childcare and Preschool of Junction City is one company receiving recognition.
Military retirees of all services and their spouses, widows or widowers are invited to Fort Riley’s annual Retiree Appreciation Day on Saturday, Oct. 12 at Riley’s Conference Center. Doors open at 7:30 a.m. and the program begins at 8:30 a.m.
Guests will hear the latest information on TRICARE, veterans affairs, legislative issues, post exchange and commisary updates and Honor Flights.
The Executive Director of the Applied Aviation Research Center at Kansas State University Polytechnic – Salina, Air Force Col. Kurt Carraway, will discuss the present and future use of unmanned aircraft systems, commonly called drones in many walks of life from business to education during a luncheon address.
Those who plan to attend lunch must register by Oct. 4 by calling the Retirement Services Office at Fort Riley, 785-239-3320, or by emailing debra.k.shelkey.civ@mail.mil. The luncheon cost is $18.
Additionally, military retirees can get influenza shots, along with inoculations for tetanus, pneumonia and shingles, from noon to 4 p.m.
Visitors to Fort Riley ho do not have a Department of Defense ID card will need to stop by the Visitor Control Center, Exit 301 off I-70, to get a one-day pass. The Visitor Control Center opens at 8 a.m. on weekends. Passes can be obtained in advance. Under the Trusted Traveler program, Department of Defense ID cardholders may vouch for up to seven other people in their vehicle.
The 13th annual Touch-A-Truck program sponsored by the Dorothy Bramlage Public Library will be held on Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon at Gordman’s Plaza on East Chestnut Street. Families can get an up-close look at a host of working and recreational vehicles.
The vehicles featured in the event will run the gamut from small recreational vehicles to large industrial equipment. They will be furnished by multiple sponsors ranging from the Junction City Police and Fire Departments, Geary County Sheriff’s Department, the rural fire department, Geary Grain, Moyer Farms, Carlyon and Son, Inc. and others.
The vehicles featured in the exhibit along with many others are also the topics of a number of books shelved in the juvenile nonfiction collection in the Young People’s Section of the library. That includes titles on ambulances, police cars, big rigs, airplanes, helicopters, tow trucks, buses and muscle cars.
By Dewey Terrill and Photos by Javon George
JC POST
The new Junction City High School construction process is moving forward toward a long-term completion target of August 2021.
The Superintendent for Hutton Construction, Cody Simon, said they received a building permit last week, and 
that allowed work to begin on footings for the building. “We’re going to get into some really deep footings that we’ve got under some of the mechanical areas first to get those done and back filled. Then we’re going to take off with some other crews and really knock out the footings and under slab.”
Simon estimated some of the pre-cast walls would begin going up in late October or early November. “That’s the auditorium, auxiliary gymnasium and wrestling room have pre-cast panels. We need to get those walls up first just because of how this structure builds around those areas.”
Site preparation began in March and included the movement of 411,000 cubic yards of dirt to level the site for the building, parking lot and football stadium. “So that’s largely complete. The contractor still only has to mix some sub-grade underneath the asphalt parking lots in the next few weeks.
Along with the site there has also been work on site utilities. Simon stated that mile of pipe have been buried, “for sanitary sewer, storm sewer, water and eventually gas to the site. Site utilities are about 75% complete and that installation will continue through the fall.
In about two weeks there will be a large excavation in the area of the main mechanical room, said Simon. “There’s a cooling tower pit that’s about 20 feet deep, 10-feet wide each way. We need to get those footings, that underground structure in first simply because of the size of the excavation it’ going to take to do that safely and back fill it.”
The new high school site is located on the north side of K-18 Highway on the west side of Junction City.
By Ron Wilson, director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at Kansas State University.
Who is the only native Kansan ever to be elected President or Vice President? (If you guessed Dwight D. Eisenhower, you would be wrong. Although Eisenhower claimed Abilene, Kansas as his home, he was born during his family’s brief stay in Texas.) Who is the first Native American Indian ever to be elected President or Vice President? The answer to that question is the same as the correct answer to the first one: Charles Curtis is the first native Kansan and first Native American Indian to be elected to the nation’s second-highest office. His life is an amazing example of how education and hard work created a rags-to-riches success story. Thanks to the Kansas Historical Society and the U.S. Senate website for this information.
Charles Curtis was born in north Topeka. His father was Orren Curtis and his mother was Ellen Pappan who was one-quarter Kaw Indian. Charles was the great-grandson of White Plume, a Kansa-Kaw chief who had offered assistance to the Lewis and Clark expedition. White Plume’s daughter married a French-Canadian trader, so Charles grew up speaking French and Kansa before he learned English.
His mother died in 1863 at about the time his father left to fight in the Civil War. Charles was raised by his grandparents at the Kaw Reservation near the rural community of Council Grove, population 2,051 people. Now, that’s rural.
Young Charley learned to ride Indian ponies bareback. He became a successful jockey. He was also the hero of a cross-country run to warn Topeka about upcoming Cheyenne Indian raids.
After his grandfather’s death in 1873, Charles was headed to Indian territory. His grandmother advised him to get a formal education instead. “I mounted my pony and with my belongings in a flour sack, returned to Topeka and school,” Curtis recounted. “No man or boy every received better advice, it was the turning point in my life.”
In Topeka, he attended school while living with his other grandmother, a strong-minded woman. It was said of her that “she regarded being a Methodist and a Republican as essential for anyone who expected to go to heaven.”
Charles did well in school and went on to study law, supporting himself by working as a custodian and driving a horse-drawn taxi. When he had no customers, he would stop under streetlamps to read his law books.
After being admitted to the bar, the young lawyer opened his own firm, invested in real estate, and married Anna Baird. He was elected Shawnee County Attorney. Known as a law-and-order prosecutor, he won an upset victory over Democrat and Populist opponents for a U.S. House seat in 1892.
Curtis rose through the ranks in Congress. He was elected to the Senate where he ultimately served as majority leader. A strong advocate of farmers, he sponsored numerous bills related to agriculture and to Indian affairs. He was a master tactician who built strong relationships with both the conservative and progressive wings of his party. One senator described Curtis as “a great reconciler, a walking political encyclopedia, and one of the best political poker players in America.”
At the 1928 Republican convention, Charles Curtis was nominated for Vice President with Herbert Hoover. They were elected in a landslide but defeated for re-election in 1932.
After his term concluded, Curtis practiced law in Washington and continued his interest in politics. He liked to tell audiences that he was “one eighth Kaw and one hundred percent Republican.”
Curtis died in 1936 and is buried next to his wife Anna in a Topeka cemetery. The Charles Curtis State Office Building in downtown Topeka is named in his honor.
When the Curtis gravesite was rededicated, Vice President Dick Cheney sent a letter lauding Curtis as a “champion of the farmer and an advocate for women’s suffrage” and as a strong supporter of legislation granting citizenship to Native Americans.
Who was the first native Kansan and Native American Indian to be elected Vice President? It was Charles Curtis, whose education and hard work would make a difference and transform his life. We can be proud to claim him as a Kansan.
Audio and text files of Kansas Profiles are available at https://www.kansasprofile.com. For more information about the Huck Boyd Institute, interested persons can visit https://www.huckboydinstitute.
Column by:
Ron Wilson
The Junction City Rotary Club meeting this week was the site for a presentation on legislative issues by State Sen. Jeff Longbine.
Longbine spoke on topics including the school finance formula, KPERS and the good fiscal condition of the state. He address upcoming issues in 2020 including Medicaid expansion, three possible constitutional amendments, judicial selection, reestablishment of insurance caps, state tax deductions, election year politics and the U.S. Senate race.
( Photo and information provided by Charles Volland and Susan Jagerson ).
There is an effort under way to help improve employee morale at Geary Community Hospital.
Radiologic Technologist Devin Muir informed the hospital board this week that there is an effort to address the dip in morale lately at the hospital and a disassociation between base level staff and upper administration.
Muir told the Hospital Trustees a committee will roll out a new acknowledgement system recognizing employees for good patient care, employees can submit ideas for change in the hospital and how ideas are submitted will be revitalized. Fun events and mixers will be held so employees can gather and meet. The first event, a BBQ, will be this Thursday at an area next to the emergency room portion of the hospital facility from 4-8 p.m. That will allow employees from all shifts to attend.
There will be a forum for Junction City Commission and Geary USD 475 Board of Education candidates on Thursday, Oct. 10 from 7 – 8:30 p.m. at the 12th Street Community Center.
Mary Snipes notified JC Post about the non-partisan forum. It is being hosted by the Geary County Democratic Party, Junction City Moms Demand Action and Legalize Bully JC.
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — The trial of a Kansas man charged in an infant’s death ended in a hung jury.
The jury on Tuesday could not reach a unanimous verdict in the first-degree murder and child abuse trial of D’Khari Lyons of Manhattan. Lyons was charged after 2½-month-old Michael Calver Jr. died in November 2018 while Lyons was watching him.
When Michael’s mother returned home, the boy was having trouble breathing and was bruised. He died three days later at a Kansas City hospital.
Officials ruled Michael died from head trauma after sustaining severe internal injuries.
Prosecutors alleged Lyons hurt the child to stop him from crying. Lyons testified he wouldn’t hurt a child and didn’t know what caused Michael’s injuries.
Judge Meryl Wilson set a hearing for Oct. 7 to determine how to proceed.
Don Smithburg has been tasked to help guide Geary Community Hospital through what he termed a “precious situation.” Smithburg has been named the new interim chief executive for the hospital.
Smithburg told a Hospital Trustees meeting audience that Geary Community Hospital is at the end of the beginning, and it will take rigor and discipline to bring the hospital back to stability. GCH has been facing major financial challenges.
Smithburg works with Community Hospital Corporation, that specializes in hospital management and distressed hospital situations. “I’ve been a hospital executive and CEO for over 30 years. When Geary reached out looking for support that’s how I made my way here.”
Smithburg has most recently been living in Tennessee but is returning to Kansas. He said the recovery at Gedary Community has already begun. “This board ( Hospital Board ) really took the bull by the horns as soon as it was clear that there were some issues that had to be dealt with operationally. ” He added that none of it has to do with the great quality of care at GCH, which is still strong. “But we have to address changing reimbursement from government and try to improve our processes internally.
Smithburg moved into the interim CEO role following the recent resignations of former CEO Dr. Joe Stratton and former Chief financial Officer Steve Doherty.
