Monthly Archives: October 2021

Government

Mandatory ten-digit dialing begins Sunday in area codes 785 and 620 

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TOPEKA – Kansans that live in area codes 785 or 620 will be required to use 10-digit dialing when making local calls beginning on Sunday, October 24. At that time, local calls dialed with only seven digits will not go through, and a recording will inform you that your call cannot be completed as dialed.  This change, while it may take some time to get used to, will make it easier for persons in crisis to reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.

Last July, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved 988 as the new abbreviated number for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. As a result, any area code that uses the 988 prefix in telephone numbers is mandated to adopt 10-digit dialing.  That includes Kansas area codes 785 and 620, which cover the majority of the state. In total, 82 area codes in 36 states will make the change.

The FCC initiated a practice period in April allowing both 7-digit and 10-digit dialing to help callers adjust to the change. On Sunday, 10-digit local calling becomes mandatory with the exception of any three digit abbreviated numbers available in the community, such as 911. Callers will still dial 1 + the area code and telephone number for all long distance calls.

With the switch to 10-digit dialing about to take effect, residents are encouraged to make sure any services with automatic dialing equipment, such as life safety systems, medical monitoring devices, security systems and fire alarms, mobile phone contact lists and call forwarding settings are reprogrammed if needed.

Beginning July 16, 2022, callers can reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline by calling 988. Until then, callers will continue to dial 1-800-273-8255 (TALK).

More information about the change to 10-digit dialing is included in a flyer titled “Ten things to know about 10-digit dialing” which is available on the Kansas Corporation Commission’s website at https://kcc.ks.gov/images/PDFs/telecommunications/10_DigitDialing.pdf.

Business, Fort Scott, Fort Scott Chamber of Commerce

Chamber Coffee at Sleep Inn on Oct. 21

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Join us for this week’s
Chamber Coffee hosted by
Sleep Inn & Suites
Thursday, October 21st
8 am
302 E. Wall St.
Fort Scott, Kansas
Let’s celebrate with
Managing Partner Bill Michaud & staff
on their 7th anniversary of providing
award-winning hospitality!
Click herefor Sleep Inn & Suites website.
Click hereto visit their Facebook page.
Contact the Fort Scott Area Chamber of Commerce for more information at 620-223-3566 or [email protected].
UPCOMING CHAMBER COFFEE’S
10/28 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by Trinity Lutheran Church
11/4 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by VFW
11/4 ~ Chamber After-hours Event hosted by the Fort Scott Area Community Foundation at Landmark National Bank
11/11 ~ No Coffee… Veterans Day
11/18 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by FS Compassionate Ministries
11/25 ~ No Coffee…Thanksgiving Holiday
12/2 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by Fort Scott National Historic Site
12/9 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by Sunshine Boutique
12/16 ~ Chamber Coffee hosted by City of Fort Scott
12/23 ~ No Coffee…Christmas Holiday
12/30 ~ No Coffee…New Year’s Holiday
Art, Entertainment, Fort Scott, History, Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes

Lowell Milken Center Features New Exhibits and Expands

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The unveiling of the exhibit honoring African American Suffragettes Mamie Dillard and Carrie Langston Hughes by Lowell Milken Center Docent Rhonda Hassig, left, and Miah Lugrand, the principal of Pinckney Elementary School, Lawrence, KS. Both Dillard and Hughes lived in Lawrence.

The Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes, 1 S. Main, has expanded its’ exhibits into the park south of the building.

On October 8, the center hosted an unveiling of two Kansas black women who were suffragettes in the movement to allow women to vote. The exhibit was sponsored by a Kansas Humanities Grant and featured Carrie Langston Hughes and Mamie Dillard.

In addition, that day several new exhibits were unveiled in the green space area south of the center, named the Unsung Heroes Park.

“The objectives of the park are to provide a place for visitors to enjoy the pleasant outdoor scenery, learn about unsung heroes, and offer a centralized community gathering space for programs and activities, while also complementing the downtown area,” according to a prior LMC press release.

To view the  press release on the park:

New Unsung Heroes Park in Downtown Fort Scott

 

A Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes screen announcing the new exhibit featuring Kansas Suffragettes Carrie Langston Hughes and Mamie Dillard.

The new outside exhibits in the Unsung Heroes Park are inter-changeable and will be occasionally switched out, Ronda Hassig, LMC Docent, said.

“We are still awaiting murals that will be placed on the north side of the center, facing Wall Street and also on the south side of the center, facing the park,” she said.

The biggest part of the funding for the park was by the center’s founder Lowell Milken. Milken believes “education can awaken the mind, sustain curiosity and strengthen our engagement with others. More importantly, … education has the power to instill in people the impulse to take initiative for the good of others,” according to the LMC for Unsung Heroes website.

Others who helped with the park funding: the American Association of Retired People Challenge Award, The Timken Foundation, and a Sunderland Grant, Hassig said.

Lowell Milken Center Director Norm Conard, left, welcomes the crowd to the unveiling of new exhibits on Oct. 8. Megan Felt, LMC Program Director; Ronda Hassig, LMC Docent; Robert Nelson who sang a moving spiritual as part of the program and Gordon Parks Museum Director Kirk Sharp look on.

 

Norm Conard, left, watches as Kirk Sharp and Robert Nelson unveil the Gordon Parks exhibit, which is part of the new expanded space for exhibits south of the Lowell Milken Center in downtown Fort Scott.
The storyboard, also called a story rail, of Gordon Parks, who had a humble beginning in Fort Scott and went on to be a famed photographer, journalist, author, and film producer.
One of the new exhibits features Mary Anning.
Chester Nez, a World War II Veteran, who was a Navajo Code Talker in service to his country, is featured on the new story rail in the Lowell Milken Center Unsung Heroes Park.
Juanita Moody is a new featured exhibit in the Unsung Heroes Park.
Amos Bronson Alcott is newly featured in the Unsung Heroes Park.
A waterfall feature adds to the beauty of the Unsung Heroes Park.
The greenspace south of the Lowell Milken Center at Main and Wall Street in downtown Fort Scott has new exhibits in the expanded area. The picture is taken from the southside of the center looking south. Main Street is to the right.
Bourbon County

DAR Honored By The City of Fort Scott

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Members of the Fort Scott Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.  Front row: Martha Scott, Terri Townsend, Bernice Hill, Nolene Whiteside. Back row: Dee Ann Davis, Barbara Ritter – Regent, Brenda Collinge and Peggy Cummings. Submitted photo.

On Tuesday, October 19, 2021, Mayor Josh Jones of the City of Fort Scott, issued a Mayoral Proclamation honoring the Molly Foster Berry Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, on their 110th anniversary.

The original Fort Scott group was organized on October 19, 1910. Those  members who attended the city commission meeting are pictured here outside city hall after the proclamation was received.

 

Submitted by Martha Scott

Entertainment, Fort Scott, Schools

FSHS Presents the New Musical “Ranked”

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The Fort Scott High School Performing Arts Department presents the new musical “Ranked” by Kyle Holmes and David Taylor Gomes.

 

Performances are Nov. 9 and 11 at 7 p.m. and Nov. 13 at 2 and 7 p.m. at the FSHS Auditorium, 1005 S. Main. Over fifty FSHS students are involved in the acting, singing, dancing, and technical aspects of the show.

 

“Ranked” presents a dystopian high school where the theme, “Buy your grades. Buy your future. But what happens when the rest of the world finds out?” comes to the surface.

Rankedmusical.com describes the plot this way: “Lily is Above the Average, barely. Soon the giant, and very public, academic leaderboards will update everyone’s class rank, and for another day, everyone will know their place. If you fall Below the Average – say goodbye to college, and pretty much everything else… In the face of an intense and perverse culture of performance, Lily must find her place in the status quo as she watches friends and enemies alike destroy themselves and each other to score their way to the top. When an impossible lie is discovered, the fate of these students’ futures hangs in the balance.”

The new musical was conceived by Granite Bay High School in 2018 and debuted just weeks after the College Admission Scandal took the nation by storm.

“‘Ranked’ offers students the opportunity to shed light on the pressure placed on them to perform to the point of perfection, despite the inequities they may face in society,” Theatre Director Angie Bin said. “This musical has given the students significant buy-in as a way to share the stressors that many of them face.”

The production is also directed by Music Director Whitley Chesney, Choreographer and Assistant Music Director Mary Jo Harper, and Technical Director Alex Chesney.

“This is my first time as a music director for a musical. It’s wonderful to learn with these students. I enjoy working with students that aren’t in choir, as I never see them outside of rehearsal,” said Whitley Chesney. “‘Ranked’ has been a great show for students to experience real world issues. We have been able to have several conversations about how things in the show can relate to our lives. It has been cool to see how the students take their own experiences and incorporate them into their acting choices.”

Lily is portrayed by junior Courtney Shelton. Other lead actors include juniors Ella McElroy and Israel Carreno, senior Ashlynn Bagnall, and sophomores Casey Gomez and Lexi Hill.

Tickets are $8 for adults and $6 for those under 18 and are available at fortscotthighschool.ludus.com or at the door. Parental guidance is suggested and seating is limited. Doors open 30 minutes prior to showtime.

Obituary

Obituary of Lois Swope

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Lois LaVerne Swope

Lois LaVerne Swope, age 92, a former resident of Frontenac, Kansas and more recently of Ft. Scott, Kansas, passed away early Tuesday, October 19, 2021, at the home of her daughter in Ft. Scott. She was born May 26, 1929, in Detroit, Michigan, the daughter of Cledies Dray and Ellen Cummings Dray. Lois graduated from the Pittsburg High School with the Class of 1947. She married Eddie L. Swope on June 12, 1949, at Pittsburg. Lois had worked for seventeen years at the Parsons Ammunition Plant. She was a life-long Methodist. She was a past member of the American Legion Auxiliary of Frontenac. She loved to play bingo.

Survivors include her son, Kevin K. Swope and wife, Trish, of Thomasville, Georgia and her daughter, Landia Antonetti and husband, Paul, of Ft. Scott; four grandchildren, Laurie Antonetti of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, Alison Nelson (Jason), of St. Louis, Missouri, Samantha Peterson (Matt), of Thomasville, Georgia and Andrew Swope, of Tallahassee, Florida and six great-grandchildren, Conner Antonetti, Sophia and Seraph Nelson and Isaac, Ivy and Isla Swope. Also surviving are two sisters, Louise and Nancy.

Lois was preceded in death by her husband, Eddie, on July 22, 1996. She was also preceded in death by her sister, Ruby Chubb.

Private burial will take place in the U. S. National Cemetery in Ft. Scott, Kansas. Memorials are suggested to Care to Share and may be left in care of the Cheney Witt Chapel, 201 S. Main, P.O. Box 347, Ft. Scott, KS 66701. Words of remembrance may be submitted to the online guestbook at cheneywitt.com.

Bourbon County, Business, Fort Scott

New Healthy Bourbon County Action Team Employee: Rachel Carpenter

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Rachel Carpenter, 23, started yesterday as the new program coordinator for the Healthy Bourbon County Action Team.

Carpenter earned an associate degree from Fort Scott Community College and is pursuing a bachelor’s degree from Fort Hays State University in sociology. She has a certification in community development, program evaluation, and grant writing from FHSU and will graduate in the fall of 2022.

“I’ve been working in Honduras (in Central America) and decided to study sociology and am learning how to make data-driven decisions in how to help,” she said.

She interned with Jody Hoener, CEO of HBAT, and then applied for the full-time position when it became available.

“Rachel met all the minimum qualifications for the… position and brought additional skill sets to move our mission forward,” Hoener said. “She is passionate about our work and helping people, that’s the kind of culture we aim to nurture at the Healthy Bourbon County Action Team. With everyone seeking employees right now, we consider ourselves considerably blessed to have an amazing skilled induvial as a part of our team.”

Carpenter’s salary comes from a $560,000 grant which will also provide grants for farmers and ranchers and start-up businesses, she said.

The grant will also help with development funding for the east side of Fort Scott and the historic downtown Fort Scott, Carpenter said.

The grant was from the Patterson Family Foundation, a family-led foundation extending the legacy of Neal and Jeanne Patterson which strives to help lift rural communities through health care, education, economic opportunity, and beyond, according to its website How We Help | Patterson Family Foundation.

Carpenter is married to Jon, a Fort Scott Policeman, and is a nursery volunteer at Faith Church, Fort Scott. She is also the founder of the Carpenter’s Hands, a ministry to Honduras. Her hometown is Wichita, but she has lived in Bourbon County for five years.

The Healthy Bourbon County Action Team is located at 104 N. National Avenue, north of Luther’s BBQ Restaurant. Submitted photo.

The Healthy Bourbon County Action Team has a vision of a community where we feel safe, earn a living wage, find healthy food, have access to sidewalks, ride safe bike routes, have opportunities for recreation, and more according to its Facebook page

The HBAT is currently seeking community input to better fund development projects.

Bourbon County’s Health and Wellness Survey is open at

The Healthy Bourbon County Action Team Board consists of a cross-sector of community organizations, businesses, and governmental entities:

Jody Hoener, President, and CEO, Ex Officio

Craig Campbell, (Chair) Community leader and volunteer, Fort Scott Good Neighbor Action Team Chair

Lindsay Madison (Treasurer), President and CEO Fort Scott Area Chamber of Commerce

Joy Miller, (Secretary) Kansas State University Extension Office

Sally Johnson, City of Uniontown Clerk, USD 235 Board

Alysia Johnston, President Fort Scott Community College

Chelsea Yount, Fort Scott Community College

Josh Jones, Mayor City of Fort Scott

Kayla Stewart, RN Coordinator Via Christi

Mayra Montanez, Downtown Business Owner, and Entrepreneur