WICHITA MATTERS: Growth, Sustainability and the City Elections

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In a recent column
in The Wichita Eagle, I talked about
how, much more than any particular candidate being elected to the city council
or as mayor in next week’s election, my fondest hopes are tied to whether or
not any of those candidates might read a book, and take seriously the message
inside it. The book is Charles Marohn’s Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity. Why this book? Let me explain. First, the big picture.

Feature Stories

Portrait of an Artist, Portrait of a Fighter

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Juanta Wolfe paces back and forth
in the octagon, staring
down his opponent. His lips pull up toward his nose, accentuating the 28-year-old’s
thinnish mustache. It produces an expression somewhere between derision and
intimidation. At 6’2 and 153 lbs. he is wiry but muscular; not the most
intimidating figure in mixed martial arts, but not the least.

Columns

A Study in SimianScope

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About 10 years ago, I went to a local Blockbuster to rent
the film King Kung Fu. Cinemassacre, a popular YouTube channel
that reviews retro movies and video games in a humorous manner, recommends you
check out the movie. It is a very goofy G-rated parody that fits into the “so
bad it’s good” category. But just as importantly, the movie is a snapshot of
what Wichita looked like in the 70’s. King Kung Fu is a 1976 comedy that tells the story of
a gorilla trained in the martial arts that gets loose in Wichita, falling into
in series of mishaps while beating people up using its Kung Fu skills.

WICHITA MATTERS: 20 Years in the Parks

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The city elections are only a
month away, but at this moment, my mind is looking back to summer, rather than
forward to November. Each year, ever since our family moved to Wichita in 2006,
mid-June and early-September have offered my wife and I–and, as the years went
by, often our children too–a fine treat: a free, all-volunteer, invariably
creative and nearly-always successful outdoor play, courtesy of the Wichita
Shakespeare Company. This past summer was their 20th continuous
season of operation, so I think a few words of congratulations, explanation
and, more importantly, appreciation are in order. We’re a bookish family, and a
theatrical one, and civic one–which means public performances of Shakespeare plays
in Wichita (and usually including a performance in parks around Park City,
Derby and Andover as well) are triply appealing to us. We’re not alone of
course.

Feature Stories

Time Waits for No Man

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Allen Ames sits in his well-worn chair at his well-worn work
bench while working with his well-worn tools on a customer’s watch. Semi-retired
from watchmaking, the 74-year-old still plugs away in his basement, stopping by
a Wichita jewelry store each week to pick up the broken watches that customers
have dropped off. All these watches share a common problem: they do not
accurately measure time. That is something they have in common with human beings. Even Allen Ames. “You think, ‘My God, I can’t believe a year has gone by so
fast,’” Ames said.