For more than two centuries some perched high atop barns, silos, homes and sheds throughout much of rural America during the 19th and 20th centuries. These silent sentinels guarded buildings from lightning that attacked from the heavens.

Even going back to the ‘30s, ‘40s and early ‘50s just about every house or barn sported one or more of these gadgets on the roofs.

Lightning rods, invented by Benjamin Franklin in 1749, were iron rods sharpened to a point and designed to draw the electrical fire silently out of a cloud before it could come near enough to strike. Typically, the rods measured a half-inch in diameter, and were connected to a metal cable hidden within the structure, or sometimes attached to the outside of a building.

The size of the rods varied depending on the height of the building and the type of metal. Regardless of the size, the cables crawled their way down to Earth where they were anchored. Grounded, the lightning rod directs the lightning strike’s energy harmlessly into the ground, thus sparing the building.

During the 19th Century, the lightning rod became a decorative motif. Lightning rods were embellished with ornamental glass balls (now prized by collectors). The ornamental appeal of these glass balls were also used in weather vanes.

The main purpose of these balls, however, was to provide evidence of a lightning strike by shattering or falling off. If after a storm a ball is discovered missing or broken, the property owner should then check the building, rod and grounding wire for damage.

Today, one can drive all over the countryside and never spot a lightning rod on a house. Occasionally, I spot one still sticking up on top of an old barn somewhere in rural Kansas.

While few people rely on lightning rods today, many select surge protection for telecommunications and cable. Twenty years ago, most people used a land-line telephone, a television and an electrical line.

Now most use high-end electronics and other technology that remains highly susceptible to any kind of electrical surge. A lightning rod system protects against a direct strike. Surge protection guards against an indirect strike.

With the new technology most of the old lightning rods wound up in the dump or continue to rust in the weather on old abandoned barns – the few remaining upright. Still, because they were once so prominent across the rural United States, people have begun collecting them. Others are being used for decoration.

Some of the more sought-after designs were once made from copper with a starburst tip, other vintage lightning rods consisted of ornate, hammered aluminum with a cobalt-blue ball. But beware, some are now replicas and made of plastic.

Any more, most folks don’t see the need to spend money on these relics from the past. Today’s modern technology has also resulted in the end of the notorious lightning rod salesmen of yesteryear.

You know those flim-flam men who used to travel the countryside, looking for houses without lightning rods. Once they spotted such a house, they’d swoop down and unleash a hard-pressure sales pitch concerning the grave dangers of lightning strikes and burning down of unprotected homes and buildings.

Following the collection of a tidy sum of money, they’d install a cheap rod on top of the house, and often not even bother to attach a ground wire. The whole business, of course, was totally useless.

Lest we forget, the world remains filled with shyster salesmen of various sorts. As far as I know however, selling lightning rods is not one of their current scams.

John Schlageck is a leading commentator on agriculture and rural Kansas.

By RON WILSON
Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development

Two worlds. When a person from one country comes into a different country, it can feel to them like they have entered another world. That feeling caused one woman to create a bilingual newspaper so as to help others through such transitions. She has gone on to provide outstanding leadership for the Hispanic community in the Kansas City region.

Clara Reyes is the founder and owner of Dos Mundos, which literally translated means Two Worlds. Dos Mundos is the Spanish and English language newspaper in Kansas City.

Clara grew up in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. She wanted to pursue a career as a dentist and graduated from the University of Guadalajara. In 1964, she traveled to Kansas City to explore pursuing her education in dentistry. While there, she met Manuel Reyes and a romance ensued.

After a brief courtship, he followed her to Guadalajara where they were married. Then they moved to his home area in Overland Park.

“When I came from Mexico, I didn’t know any English,” Clara said. She quickly found that tasks which came easy to a U.S. citizen, such as opening a checking account or paying a telephone bill, were monumental challenges for someone unfamiliar with the language or the culture. She wished she had a bicultural, Spanish-language aid to help her adapt to her new country.

Clara spent several years as a student, homemaker, mother of two and then a real estate agent in Kansas City. “I saw people from Mexico who wanted to buy a house but didn’t know how to get loans or sign up for utilities,” Clara said.

She set out to find assistance for them. “I went to the gas company and they said, `Yes, we want to help and we have bilingual information, but we don’t know how to disseminate it,’” Clara said. The Chamber of Commerce indicated something similar. “They said, `We need some way to communicate with the Hispanic community.’”

In 1981, with support of her husband and children, Clara began a bilingual newspaper which could help inform the Hispanic community. “We started with a typesetter in our basement,” Clara said. The newspaper was called Dos Mundos, meaning two worlds. The company logo shows two globes connecting with each other.

Rather than producing the paper only in Spanish, she chose to use both Spanish and English. “We did it in bilingual form because we wanted others to read and know our needs also,” Clara said.

Dos Mundos was the first bilingual newspaper in Kansas City. It has now grown to become the largest and most read Hispanic paper in the area. The company’s market profile shows that the circulation region extends beyond Kansas City to rural communities such as Oskaloosa, Ottawa and Mound City, population 694 people. Now, that’s rural.

Clara Reyes’ company also operates three Spanish music and language radio stations in Kansas City. She is extremely active in community affairs.

Clara has served as president of the Coalition of Hispanic Women against Cancer, was a co-founder of the Southwest Boulevard Business Association, and has been a board member for the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Greater Kansas City, the National Federation of Hispanic Owned Publications, the Salvation Army, and many more. She has also received the international Ohtli Award from the Mexican consulate in Kansas City.

“Clara Reyes was our Huck Boyd Lecture speaker several years ago, and it was so interesting to learn how she started Dos Mundos with the help of her husband and children,” said Gloria Freeland, director of the Huck Boyd National Center for Community Media in K-State’s A.Q. Miller School of Journalism and Mass Communications. “For more than 35 years, her publication has filled a real need in her community and beyond. Her work demonstrates that communication can be used to unite people and strengthen communities.”

For more information, see www.dosmundos.com.

Two worlds. Just as the Dos Mundos newspaper has helped to connect the Hispanic world with the English one, Clara Reyes has been a leader in connecting people in Kansas City. In doing so, she has made a world of difference.

You gotta’ love it when an idea is good enough to take off and become more than just an idea, and especially when that idea gets more people out into the Kansas outdoors. Such is the case with an all new program launched by the Kansas Dept of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism (KDWPT) named Adaptive Sportsmen of Kansas, (ASK.)

Accessibility to outdoor activities has always been a barrier to people with mobility disabilities; the ASK program seeks to help remove those barriers by providing electric all-terrain track chairs for disabled sportsmen and women to use. Eight Action ST22 Trackchairs have been purchased and are available for free use on a first-come, first-serve basis at hunts and other pre-approved outdoor events put on by the KDWPT and ASK program sponsors including Bushnell Optics and the National Wild Turkey federation.

Each chair is joystick controlled and has a four-point harness to hold the rider safely in the chair on rough terrain. They also have front stabilizer wheels, padded armrests, an LED headlight, gun holder, fishing rod holder, head and foot rest and a storage box. ASK Program Administrator Jessica Rice told me they have also purchased remote controls so a second party can control the chair remotely in situations where the rider needs both hands to control a gun or fishing rod. Jessica, who goes by Jess, says anyone with a mobility disability is welcome to use the chairs. Additional funds for the chairs came from money we sportsmen pay for license fees, etc through the Pittman-Robertson Act.

Rice told me they recently took a disabled veteran from Arizona who was sponsored by the Pay-It-Forward Foundation on a guided deer hunt near Topeka. The weather forecast was for nasty, snowy weather and they weren’t sure how the new chairs would perform in the snow. She said the Trackchair performed flawlessly in several inches of snow and allowed the veteran to harvest both a buck and a doe from the chair.

Jess says the national Wild Turkey Federation and Bushnell Optics have both become valued sponsors of the ASK program, and backing from additional corporate partners is being pursued. More events are being planned where the chairs can be utilized, and Bushnell has also committed to donating optics for use at applicable events. For more information on the ASK program or to request use of one of the new Trackchairs, call Jess Rice at 913-278-2362, or email her at [email protected] ; yet another great way for people with mobility disabilities to Explore Kansas Outdoors.

Steve Gilliland, Inman, can be contacted by email at [email protected].

Monday, January 14, 2019, the gavel fell and we began the 2019 session. Even though it was not an election year for the Senate we had five Senators sworn in, four are new Senators and one replaced a Senator last year and he was reelected in November.

This year I will serve on the same committees as I have served the prior two years. If anyone is interested in attending any of these meeting they are as follows: Agriculture and Natural Resources 8:30-9:30 a.m., Financial Institutions, Insurance, Pensions and Benefits of which I am Vice Chairman 9:30-10:30 a.m. From 10:30-12:00 I serve as Vice Chairman of Senate Ways & Means. On the Ways & Means committee I serve on five budget sub committees. I will still be a member of the Buildings and Construction Committee. The Chairman of this committee is alternated from the House to the Senate each year, so I will no longer be the Chairman of this committee. The other committees I serve on are: 911 Commission, The Disabilities Concerns Commission and the office of Technology Commission. We have several rural group caucuses, which I participate in along with serving on the Transportation Task Force, which will recommend a new ten-year highway improvement plan.

On Wednesday, Governor Laura Kelly, delivered her first State of the State address. Some of her main agenda items include, more money to public education, increased funding to hire more social workers for DCF, and Medicaid expansion. Governor Kelly launched her agenda of increased spending in numerous areas, but vowed to keep her campaign promise not to increase taxes. Governor Kelly explained she would be proposing a one-year budget with a separate proposal for a two-year education plan. Kelly recommended a $92 million inflation adjustment to state aid for K-12 public schools. This would be a phase in of $364 million over four years. With this increase, the state’s education funding would increase 5.5% during the next budget year, to nearly $4.4 billion. The budget proposed a 14% increase in spending on foster care programs. Kelly’s agenda includes hiring 55 additional social workers, which would increase the department’s budget 8.7%, to $727 million. The budget includes $14 million to initiate Medicaid expansion in Kansas. The budget provided $22 million for a 2.5% salary increase for state employees, excluding the judicial system and legislative branch. An additional $3 million was earmarked to increase wages for officers of the Kansas Department of Corrections. The budget proposal would complete restoration of a 4%, or $30 million, cut in 2017 from the Board of Regents. Most of the money was previously restored to universities, but Kelly offered the final $8.9 million to be recovered. This restoration does not include previous cuts from 2008. Governor Kelly’s budget was built around the re-amortization of the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System which essentially refinances the remaining $8.9 billion debt over 30 years. This is meant to provide $160 million in “short-term savings” but will extend the system’s debt until the year 2049. Larry Campbell, Governor Kelly’s budget director, said the debt would become an additional cost of approximately $7 billion. Senate leadership issued the following in response: “Governor Kelly’s budget is simply taking a different path that inevitably spends us right back into the red. She is willing to fund her irresponsible spending agenda at the expense of our Kansas retirees while placing an additional $7 billion burden on our future generations.” The budget will continue to draw $200 million annually from KDOT to finance basic government.

Thursday the Senate voted to confirm seventeen governor nominated appointments and two attorney general nominated appointments.

HARD FACTS: According to the Kansas Department of Commerce, in 2018 Kansas added over 11,000 new jobs and $1.7 billion in capital investment. GEICO announced a new service center in Lenexa, adding 500 new jobs. Spirit Aerosystems announced another major expansion with plans to add over 1,400 new jobs in the Wichita area. Since December 2017, Kansas gained 20,100 seasonally adjusted total nonfarm jobs and 17,200 private sector jobs.

I am honored and grateful to represent the 40th Senate District in Kansas. Please do not hesitate to contact or call me with your questions and concerns, my office number is 785 296-7399 or my cell is 785 899-4700. If you are in Topeka stop by my office at 236-E.