The College Hill Commoner, Sept. 2009

4 Changes coming

to the College Hill Neighborhood Association. A new leader is sought.

14 Jay Laessig:

The man behind the chair at College Hill’s longest running barber shop.

10 The blues man

in our own backyard.

Critically acclaimed blues singer lives in Crown Heights.

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER Vol. 2 No. 10

COLLEGE HILL

• CROWN HEIGHTS • UPTOWN • SLEEPY HOLLOW

BOOM! THE 1880s REAL ESTATE BOOM THAT SHOOK COLLEGE HILL PAGE 12

SEPTEMBER 2009

LETTERS

2 SINGLE TRASH SERVICE WOULD SAVE US MONEY TO THE EDITOR:

I have a friend and long-time colleague who lives in a neighborhood not very far northeast of College Hill who says that he pays less than $40 for three-month contracted trash collection with Waste Connections.

They have had that contract for many years. In College Hill, some of us pay more than $68 for the same service by Waste Connections. We who live in College Hill do not have a neighborhood contract with a single trash collector. Perhaps we should organize ourselves to our mutual advantage. A budding politician could endear himself with his College Hill neighbors by initiating such an effort, don’t you think?

SAMUEL C. WEBB

SOMEONE MOVED THE BIG BUN TO THE EDITOR:

In the caption to the story “Sketchy Past” [August issue] you write that The Big Bun was at Central and Hillside. You moved it a mile— it was on the northwest corner of Central and Oliver, where the QuikTrip is nowadays. After The Big Bun was torn down a tire store was built on the site, and then the QuikTrip. All that in 40 years.

JOHN M. DAVIS EDITOR’S NOTE: Right you are, John. Thanks for pointing that out for us and our readers.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

The College Hill Commoner publishes neighhborhood anniversaries, births, birthday wishes, bar and bat mitzahs, congratulations, graduations, milestones, memorials, obituaries and more. Call to inquire about rates and deadlines: 689-8474, or jessica@collegehillcommoner.com.

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

NEIGHBORHOOD & PAPER OFFER OLD AMERICANA

REVEILLE A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

TO THE EDITOR:

Ever sense I started reading The College Hill Commoner, I’ve wanted to express my thoughts regarding our community and your paper. My wife, daughter and I have lived in College Hill since July 2006. We relocated to Wichita from Southern California due to a job opportunity, for me, that allowed my wife to not work outside the home, and my daughter to attend Blessed Sacrament Catholic School (where the tuition is covered in ones monthly tithing of eight percent). The icing on the cake is that we get to move into a really cool old home, in a neighborhood with brick streets, an abundance of old growth trees, a flowing park, a unique community pool with a vintage pool house, and most importantly a neighborhood with a sense of community and an overall improved standard of living for us.

Our first year here was very difficult. We don’t have family nearby, didn’t know anyone and the weather, landscape and culture were foreign. Many times, over the years, we seriously considered just packing up and returning to So Cal. As much as College Hill is Norman Rockewellesque from the outside, it is also a tight-knit community from the inside where many current residents grew up as well as their parents. I still don’t feel as connected as I would like, however, I do recognize that depends on me being pro-active in the community. But reading the Commoner has helped me in this area.

Ever since The College Hill Commoner showed up at my doorstep…. I feel much more connected to the community. I love the stories behind the local people and the people behind the stories. I look forward to reading about the upcoming events. I look to see which businesses advertise and how they lay out their advertisement. (I particularly like the retro style).

Being on the wrong side of 40, (knocking on 50’s door) with an eight year old daughter, I love the way College Hill and The Commoner offer a piece of old “Americana” for my family. It reminds me of my young childhood of a simpler time, where I lived in Savannah, Georgia until I was eight.

The Commoner helps me to recognize the uniqueness of our community and it helps me appreciate my neighborhood much more than if I didn’t have it to read. I recently bought subscriptions of The Commoner to be delivered out of state to my in-laws and my mom who love knowing what’s going on in our neighborhood.

Thank you very much. And ever so grateful.

TIM SHIPPEN

W

hen you get out of the Navy you tell yourself that you will never again work for an outfit where the boss can walk into your sleeping quarters, shake you out of the rack and tell you to get on deck. Mostly, you hold to that. But then you have kids.

“Wake up,” they say, “and get us some juice.”

You want to swear because you’re salty and it’s early, but you know better. You roll out, mutter and fumble your way down to the galley and pour the little urchins some juice. Things are grim for awhile until the coffee is brewed and it is best to avoid a lot of chit chat until the Old Man has his second cup. By then, the chipper First Mate has put out a little cereal, cut the crust of the picky one’s bread, found the backpack and the homework, checked the forecast, gathered the foul weather gear and fished the car keys out of the couch. The little one is diving into the bucket of Legos.

The bigger one is out the door in time to beat the bell. The dog has even been for a walk. And there you sit, foggy, uncertain and unfit for duty for at least another hour or two.

And so it goes here at the Commoner, where the Old Man keeps the night watch and pays for it dearly every morning. Perhaps you’re a parent. Maybe you’ve been in the Navy. You know the lure of the night and its dangers. On a good night, when all is calm, you can steam ahead full and make up for lost time. On a bad night, there are icebergs and the distracting clink of the ice maker and nothing gets done but damage. It’s only just past midnight as I write this, far too early to know what the night will yield. But already, I’m picking up a distant signal.

“W-A-R-N-I-N-G, it flashes. “M-O-R-N-I-N-G A-H-E-A-D. T-U-R-N B-A-C-K. T-U-R-N B-A-C-K N-O-W-!”

BARRY OWENS EDITOR

WRITE THE EDITOR:

We welcome your letters. No subject is out of bounds, so long as it is local. Letters should not exceed 300 words and may be edited for clarity and length.

E-MAIL US: editor@collegehillcommoner.com WRITE US: 337 N. Holyoke, Wichita, KS, 67208 CALL US: 689-8474 ADVERTISE: jessica@collegehillcommoner.com, or 689-8474 THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER VOLUME 2 ISSUE 10 SEPTEMBER 2009

PUBLISHER

J ESSICA F REY O WENS

EDITOR

B ARRY

OWENS

CONTRIBUTORS

K ATIE G ORDON , D AVE K NADLER , J OE S TUMPE

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER

Published monthly by The College Hill Commoner 337 N. Holyoke Wichita, K.S. 67208 316-689-8474 editor@collegehillcommoner.com www.collegehillcommoner.com

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

OP-ED

3

No Campus for Old Men

T

ime flies. One minute you’re sitting in a college classroom with your whole life in front of you. The next minute … well, you’re still sitting there, because only one minute has elapsed. But fast forward a few decades – I’ll just step out for a couple of beers while you do that – and, presto!

Still in the classroom. Only this time you’re older than the professor and there’s hair growing out of your ears.

Where does the time go?

DAVE KNADLER That’s a rhetorical question; I know where it went. In my case, about 70,000 hours went into a newspaper career that lasted a few years less than I expected.

Interspersed here and there were a few too many vacations, one stockmarket crash, any number of dubious choices. Thus do gray-haired men don moldering backpacks and mount bicycles for a daily ride up to Wichita State University. As they say, it’s a long, strange trip.

It gets stranger when you’re on your bike and realize that WSU is

living soul. Take a side street, miss not, technically, reachable by bicycle. I’m still not sure why city plan- a turn, and somehow you’re back at the Elks Lodge. That’s when you ners didn’t just go ahead and put a realize you’ve been riding for hours moat around it, maybe a few tank and the campus isn’t any closer. traps. They did pretty much everySomething about the Elks Lodge has thing else to fortify the campus evidently wrinkled the against non-motorspace-time continuum. ized traffic. You’ve Let’s just say this is It’s eerie. got 14,000 students not a real bike The other option is and I’ve seen maybe friendly town. Try to to ride directly up two bike racks.

Which, I guess, is ride any arterial in Hillside or Oliver. My enough. Bikes are so Wichita and you can philosophy on this is that I’m not crippled rare you feel conhear the minivans now and I prefer to spicuous peddling accelerating a remain that way. The around, like a guy quarter-mile away, grim reaper comes on a unicycle jughoping to get soon enough; why gling chickens. Who a piece of you. tempt him? Statistics is this older man and show that most bicyhis strange contrapclists attempting tion? Does he not Hillside will be sent own a car? Did he cartwheeling into the misplace his parking high weeds before they tag in the same way get to Popeye’s; on Oliver you he misplaced his Shocker Card? might make it as far as the post But you can understand why office. Let’s just say this is not a bikes aren’t common at WSU. So real bike-friendly town. Try to ride few of them get there. Try to ride any arterial in Wichita and you can north from Crown Heights, for example, and all roads bend strange- hear the minivans accelerating a quarter-mile away, hoping to get a ly uphill toward this post-apocalyppiece of you. And if they think tic Elks Lodge on 13th Street. You you’re a college student, well, all pedal by and hear somebody in bets are off. there coughing, but you never see a

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But the urge to retake beginning algebra is strong. At WSU they call us returning adults, as though we’re salmon coming back to spawn.

We’re impelled by some force higher than logic. That force is often called unemployment. Personal convenience is not a factor. If cheating death on a bicycle means saving some precious money, and saving some precious hours in search of that mythical parking space on campus, by God we’re going to do it.

We do sort of hope that the young and attractive students we pass, the ones with all the phones and the friends, will mistake us for charismatic faculty members and allow us our dignity. But we’re also happy if they don’t notice us at all.

We’re musk oxen among the gazelles, after all; the salmon metaphor only goes so far. But unlike the capricious gazelles, we’re here primarily to prove we’re not as dumb as we look. We’re here seeking a career at the same time most other people are seeking retirement.

Quixotic, I know. I suppose it fits that some of us are riding bikes.

Writer Dave Knadler lives in Crown Heights.

4

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

Gorlich to Step Down as C.H.N.A. President New leaders, new ideas sought for College Hill Neighborhood Assoc.

Elections this month.

BY BARRY OWENS For the first time in a nearly a decade, College Hill will have a new leader. Celia Gorlich, the longtime president of the College Hill Neighborhood Association, is stepping down this month.

“The time has come,” said Gorlich, who has been president for the past nine years. “ I think I can safely say that due to big changes in my personal life and a way increased work load at my work, I’ve got to quit because I don’t believe that I’ve been doing the best job for the last two years, at least. It’s been too much for me.”

The neighborhood association will hold elections this month during its general meeting Sept. 29, 7 p.m., at East Heights United Methodist Church, 4407 E. Douglas. The meeting is open to all College Hill residents.

Aside from Gorlich’s position as president, the board is seeking candidates for vice president, secretary and treasurer.

“We have tried many, many times to get people to step forward to be in office. People have come up to be on the board to be treasurer and secretary. But very few people want to take over the whole enchilada,” Gorlich said. By stepping down, Gorlich is forcing a shake up at the top.

John Belt, who is chair of the nominating committee for the association, said he received some nominations for Gorlich’s and other positions last month, “but not as many as we’d like.”

The association is accepting nominations this month.

“We need new people,” Gorlich said. “We need new ideas.”

Gorlich has been heavily involved

Celia Gorlich, longtime president of the College Hill Neighborhood Association, will step down this month. She says it is time for “new people” and “new ideas” to steer the association.

BARRY OWENS

with the neighborhood association since its inception in the 1990s. She started on the crime committee, launched the newsletter, then it was on to the vice presidency, and finally the presidency. She is only the third president in the association’s history.

During her tenure Gorlich helped to stop the butchering of College Hill trees by utility companies, mediate disputes between neighbors, organize events, represent the neighborhood at outside events, and oversee the business of the association, which is a 501c3 non-profit organization. Most recently, she and the association worked with the city to extend the College Hill swimming pool hours.

But it was vocal opposition a few years ago to the construction of a Walmart Supercenter just outside the neighborhood that got the most press.

“We did great grass roots organizing in the neighborhood and I don’t want anybody to think that it wasn’t what we did. It was,” Gorlich said of stopping the retail giant. “City hall never ignores College Hill.”

But Gorlich said she is most proud of building up the membership of the association by increasing the

“I haven’t been out there as cheerleader.

That’s what I feel bad about.

I just can’t do it anymore.” newsletter mailing to all residents, including renters, and going door to door when necessary to spread the word.

“I believe that I did a good job in reaching out to different people in the neighborhood who hadn’t been involved before. I reached out to renters. I believe that is important. I would hate for people who rent in this neighborhood to feel that they are not invested in the neighborhood, because they are,” Gorlich said.

But in recent years, membership has plateaued, association meetings have been limited to once a year, and Gorlich found that she wasn’t knocking on as many doors as she used to.

“I haven’t been out there as cheerleader,” she said. “That’s what I feel bad about. I just can’t do it anymore.”

Beth King, who is currently vice president of the association, called Gorlich a “truly solid leader” who had “grown weary.”

She praised Gorlich’s dedication to leading and listening to the entire neighborhood, which is more economically diverse than a drive through the toniest blocks would suggest.

“It is easy in a neighborhood group to surround yourself with people who think like you do,” King said. “I don’t think that is good leadership. To reach out to other people is important, and to be open to others people’s ideas I think is equally important.”

Gorlich said she is open to the idea of just living quietly in College Hill for awhile. But not too quietly.

“When I go to the park and I see people not picking up their dog poop, now I can yell at them,” she said, laughing. “That’s sort of my hobby. I didn’t feel like I should do that as president.”

More seriously, she said she is eager for someone else to take on the fight for awhile.

“I’ve never minded people calling me and asking me what to do and who to call, and I still wouldn’t mind,” she said. “But it will be nice not to be the point person. It’s been a lot of years.”

The College Hill Neighborhood Association is accepting nominations for the following offices: president, vice president, secretary and treasurer. Anyone interested in running should contact John Belt at 687-9453 or via email at john.belt@wichita.edu. Candidates should plan to provide information about themselves and be prepared to share that information at the meeting Sept. 29.

5

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

Merchants and City Pitching Design District Plan Public has first chance to see Douglas Avenue plans this month.

BY BARRY OWENS A 10-year plan at cost of $10 million to beautify and unify Douglas Avenue from Downtown to College Hill was welcomed, though not yet approved, by the city last month.

The Douglas Design District, a merchant’s association set on upgrading the avenue with better lighting, street scaping, signage, bike lanes and other features, presented its plan to a city council workshop in August.

This month, city planners and district members will begin presenting the plan to the public during an open house Sept. 28, 5-7p.m., at the Red Cross building, 1900 E. Douglas.

“We have the plan and now we have to go out and pitch it,” said Monica Smits, a Design District member and owner of Aspen Boutique in College Hill. “The cost is overwhelming, but we have a plan for that, too.”

The ambitious plan calls for private funds to pay for half of the cost of implementation, with the hope that the city can find a way to pick up the rest.

City leaders praised the concept last month, but it’s a long way from

Rendering of a proposed bus stop design planned as part of the Douglas Design District, which would run from Washington to Glendale streets along Douglas Avenue.

RENDERING: THE DOUGLAS DESIGN DISTRICT

approval. After the plan is rolled out to the public, it will go before the neighborhood advisory boards in October and is not likely to make it to the full council until next year.

The plan, which started as a proposal to unify the design and furnishing stores near Downtown two years ago, has since grown into a more ambitious project to make the avenue more pedestrian friendly and commercially appealing. The District would

span from Washington to Glendale streets.

“We are just a small group of business owners, but we want to see a future on Douglas Avenue,” Smits said. “We are so excited that the city has embraced it. Everybody that has seen it has embraced it. Everybody loves Douglas Avenue. It is the heart of our city.”

District wide the plan, as presented last month, calls for:

• Reducing the speed limit from 35 to 30 mph.

•Installing historic lighting and burying the current above ground utility lines.

• Retaining on street parallel parking.

•Installing bike lanes.

•Installing benches, public art, historical markers and other street features.

Other sections of the avenue, near Downtown, would see landscaped medians and upgraded pedestrian crossings.

Near East High School and in College Hill, the plan calls for reducing the lanes of traffic from four to three to make way for on-street bike lanes. Additionally, the plan seeks street landscaping in locations between Hillside and Rutan.

While the plan was born out of business interests, Smits said it has evolved to include to neighborhood and residential interests. Each of the neighborhoods along the route have been involved in the planning through representatives from their neighborhood associations.

“It is for the people,” Smits said.

“Without the people, we don’t have the businesses. Without the businesses, you don’t have the street.”

6

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

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THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

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8

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

COMMUNITY CALENDAR Neighborhood Meeting Set

Art Show at the Crown

The College Hill Neighborhood Association will hold a general meeting on Sept. 29, 7 p.m., at East Heights United Methodist Church, 4407 E. Douglas.

The meeting will include an update and discussion with Robert Layton, Wichita City Manager, and a presentation from the Douglas Design District.

The meeting will also include election of officers, including president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer.

The meeting is open to all College Hill residents.

The cast and crew at the Crown Uptown Theatre will host an open house and art show this month.

The open house is Sept. 6, 123pm. The art sale will include original jewelry by Craig Green and original art by Monte Wheeler.

Karen Robu will be selling autographed CDs. The theatres’s artistic director, Tom Frye, will be selling copies of his plays.

There is no charge for admission.

“We’re trying to open up the Crown and let people see what it is all about,” Frye said.

DDD Information Meeting City planners, along with members of the Douglas Design District, will present their plans to upgrade and beautify Douglas Avenue during an open house Sept. 28, 5-7p.m., at the Red Cross building, 1900 E. Douglas.

The public is invited to attend to learn more and to ask questions.

Church Hosts Open House College Hill United Methodist Church, 2930 E. 1st St, will host an open house Sept. 13, 4-6pm, at the church.

All are welcome. Hot dogs will be served and there will be a petting zoo and bounce house for the kids.

Film Fest Seeks Volunteers The 2009 Tallgrass Film Festival, Oct. 23-25, is looking for volunteers to help with this year’s events. Volunteers are needed for all shifts. Help is also sought for daytime hours the week before the festival.

For a list of potential positions, go to tallgrassfilmfest.com and click on the volunteer link on the main page.

For more information, Gay Quisenberry at gay@tallgrassfilmfest.com or at 409-3376.

Waxing

9

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

OCT. 5

Don't miss an evening of food, dancing, auction and good fun!

Join Wichita Habitat for Humanity for the first Tool Box Bash event.

Saturday, October 10 from 7-10 p.m. at the Broadview Hotel in downtown Wichita.

TICKETS $35 EACH AND TABLES FOR 10 AVAILABLE FOR $350.

Tickets & info: 269-0775 or www.wichitahabitat.org

All proceeds benefit Wichita Habitat for Humanity’s affordable homeownership program.

Event sponsored by NorthStar Comfort Services and many other generous sponsors.

10

ARTS

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

BACKYARD BLUES MAN Crown Heights mechanic (and Texas Blues figure) to headline Blues Crawl

BY JOE STUMPE ewis Cowdrey straps on a beat-up acoustic guitar and grins.

“Here’s another reason I like Wichita,” Cowdrey says before launching into an old blues number. “I got this at a garage sale for not quite $5. It doesn’t play great, but neither do I.” Many would beg to differ.

Cowdrey, who will headline the Sept.

27 Fall Blues Crawl Afterparty in Old Town, was one of the founders of the famed Austin, Texas blues scene that produced Stevie Ray Vaughn, the Fabulous Thunderbirds and more.

Accounts of that fertile period in music history routinely reference Cowdrey alongside both Stevie and Jimmy Vaughn, W.C. Clark, Lou Ann Barton and others who went on to greater popularity.

Today, Cowdrey lives in Crown Heights with his wife, Karin, who works for Spirit (and who plays in the Boeing jazz band). He works on old Volkswagons to help make ends meet (his personal collection includes two Bugs, a Fastback and VW bus). He thinks he played about four gigs last year for a total of $125.

“That’s not a profession, that’s a hobby,” Cowdrey says.

Wichita Blues Society president

L

Lewis Cowdrey, a blues musician and Crown Heights resident, is a singer and songwriter, guitarist and harmonica player. He will headline this month’s Fall Blues Crawl Afterparty in Old Town on Sept. 27.

PHOTOS: BARRY OWENS

Patti Parker calls him “a hidden treasure in Wichita.”

What happened?

Hell if Cowdrey knows.

One decade he’s touring Europe on the heels of a CD that’s drawing rave reviews and the next he’s...not.

Not that Cowdrey is complaining.

He’s mostly always considered it a privilege to play for an audience.

“I got to be something without being anything,” he said. “I got to be the blues singer.”

BORN BEATNIK Full-time occupation or not, the 63year-old Cowdrey still looks like a musician with his earring and gray stubble.

He’s a story-teller, though not in the linear sense of first this happened, then this

happened. Instead, a story about riding the Greyhound bus will veer into an account of a female murderess he met on one trip and then swerve into an aside on the similar tales that make up the best blues songs. But here’s the linear part of his story: Cowdrey grew up in the west Texas town of Lubbock. Buddy Holly had put Lubbock on the map musically (“I’d say Buddy Holly was the most important white guy since Bob Wills,” Cowdrey says), but the bespectacled rocker had plenty of company: Waylon Jennings was a disc jockey on the local radio station, session sax legend Bobby Keys was in the high school band at the same times as Cowdrey, and future Austin fixtures Joe Ely and Jimmy Gillmore were also around.

“There were musicians everywhere, and everything was changing,” Cowdrey said.

Cowdrey took his first piano lesson at six, got his first harmonica at the age of eight and a saxophone a few years later. He thinks his father would have made a great musician, but he was tied to a job with the railroad, the family trade.

Cowdrey saw a different future for himself.

“When I was nine or 10, I was pretCONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

ARTS

11

BACKYARD BLUES MAN

“I know a lot of famous guys just a little bit,” Cowdrey said. “The unfamous guys are just as impressive, which is why I like Wichita.”

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

ty sure I was a beatnik,” he said. He joined a band at 18 and never looked back, although his chosen profession would rarely pay the bills on its own over the decades to come. He raced motorcycles and attended college, but music usually came first, especially jazz and blues.

AUSTIN CALLING Cowdrey moved to Austin in the 1970s and played in various bands, including Lewis and the Legends, Sunnyland, the Fabulous Rockets (started with Angela Strehil) and the Storm (started with Jimmy Vaughn). “That (the Storm) was me and everybody who became famous in Austin,” Cowdrey said.

Like other members of the Texas capitol’s blues scene, he hung out at Antone’s and jammed with the established African-American bluesmen who came through town to perform there.

Eventually he got to play with just about everybody he idolized—Jimmy Reed, Albert Collins, Lightning Hopkins and Otis Rush.

Cowdrey hosted an open mic night at Antone’s. He toured Europe and Israel.

In 1994 he released a CD, “It’s Lewis,” on Antone’s label, backed by players like Clark and drummer Freddy “Pharoah” Walden. Wrote one reviewer: “Quite simply, ‘It’s Lewis’ is, we feel, the best

Texas Blues CD of the last 20 years.”

The CD sold about 10,000 copies worldwide, but Cowdrey said he never made any money off of it. And the gigs —at least those worth playing—dried up.

By the time he moved to Kansas in the 1990s, Cowdrey said, “I thought I would never play again.”

But of course he did, and still does occasionally. In Wichita he’s performed with Barry Harris, Jesse Anderson, George Graybill, Tim Johnson, Cliff and Jessie Major, David Graham and others.

PUB SHOW Cowdrey plays guitar and harmonica, sings and writes songs. Above all he considers himself an entertainer, someone who can gear his show to the crowd whether they want covers of other people’s famous songs or his own originals.

Performers who moonlight as prima donnas are “ludicrous,” he said. “I’m like, hey dude, the show must go on.”

For his Afterparty show at America’s Pub, “I intend to do a bunch of songs that mean a lot to me, and I intend to respond to people’s requests.”

He plans a folky acoustic set, another focused on the harp and a third featuring perhaps his best weapon—a voice just high and piercing enough to cut through any Texas roadhouse.

After all these years of playing, he doesn’t mind admitting that he’s still excited by the opportunity.

“Every time you pick up a guitar there’s a certain level you want to reach—and not get run out of town on a rail.”

Playing the blues has been a lot of things to Cowdrey — a dream, a job, a hobby. “But mostly it’s something I wouldn’t want to do without,” he said.

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BOOM HISTORY

12

BY JEFF A. ROTH

M

uch has been written about the 1880s “Boom Period” of Wichita, a time when local real estate values reached irrational and unsustainable heights, only to be followed by a market crash that wiped out many early Wichita fortunes. During this time the word “boom” was locally used more as a verb than a noun or adjective, as in to promote or boost the young town. For the broader story read Wichita: The Magic City, by H. Craig Miner (Wichita-Sedgwick County Historical Museum, 1988). As Miner documents, Wichita reported more real estate transactions in 1887 than any other American city except New York and Kansas City.

The promoters of the day swept many novice and seasoned investors alike into the “buy low, sell high” speculation game. The boom in the valley reverberated up to College Hill.

During the 1880s the farmsteads of College Hill were becoming less important to their owners for subsistence and more valuable as real estate subdivisions.

Stables, barns and chicken coops were being displaced by avenues, alleys, even a trolley track. A look at the transformation of the farms into prospective housing additions reveals the optimism (and competition) of the early landowners of College Hill. Their activities provide a microcosm of the larger Wichita boom of the 1880s.

M.R. Moser, College Hill farmer and implement dealer in town (whose advertised slogan was “The Old Reliable”), was undoubtedly aware of the rising prices for commercial lots and home lots, both in town and in the country. In 1884 he had his College Hill farm surveyed with a view to future streets and homes.

Moser joined with his neighbors to the south to plat the College Hill Addition in October of 1884. This addition featured a “park” in its center (roughly today’s Clifton Square together with the large homes on the south side of Douglas). The park was intended to be the grounds of a hoped-for college. The wisdom of the time suggested that if a college were built in an area it would have a buoyant effect on surrounding real estate values.

Promoters sought investors and faith denominations to raise capital and build these citadels of higher learning in a number of Wichita locations. This one was proposed to be called Central University (centrally located between Fairmount College to the north and Wichita University to the south), all gracing the rise being called “College Hill.”

In 1886 Mr. Moser platted the north part of his farm on the hill as the Brooklyn Heights Addition to Wichita, evoking eastern connections similar to the commercial establishments in town, such as the New York Store, the Boston Store, and the Philadelphia Store. The immediate acreage around his farmhouse he platted as Moser’s Addition. Also that year Merriman Park Place Addition was

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

1880S REAL ESTATE BOOM ECHOED IN COLLEGE HILL

MAP: COURTESY OF JEFF ROTH

For the land owners of College Hill, the booming business of 1880s real estate sales was viewed as easier pickings than 1870s farming. A map from 1887 shows newly formed subdivisions, including Prospect Hill, Frisco Heights, Brooklyn Heights, Capital Hill, Moser’s, Merriman Park and Grandview.

platted by George O. Merriman, a progressive thinker from Michigan who had a desire for an urban plan that would be more intriguing than the conventional grid layouts in town. He achieved this with a design that incorporated meandering and curved streets around the land he reserved as a park.

Fanciful, even humorous names were given to the new residential additions. James and La Quincy Phillips, in a pun on the city of Rome’s famed Capitoline Hill, named their addition Capital Hill (as in wealth is made here).

Their contribution was a rectangle from today’s Central to Second Street, Broadview (formerly Capital Avenue) to Crestway (formerly East Street). Capital Hill was described favorably by the press at the time as “a little bijou of an addition.”

Other subdivision names exploited the perceived desirability of the hilltop terrain such as Grandview Addition and Highland Park. Farther to the south, on the other side of Lincoln, Magic Hill was platted (where real estate fortunes could be made, as if by magic). For the land owners of College Hill, the booming business of 1880s real estate sales was viewed as easier pickings than 1870s farming.

North of Augusta Road (Central), on Cemetery Road (Hillside), lived another prominent hillside farmer, Andrew “A. J.” Cook. He was the original settler of the quarter section that stretched from today’s Wesley Medical Center to Bluff Street and north by half a mile. In 1885 he platted the north half of his farm into the Frisco Heights Addition, so named for the St. Louis & San Francisco railroad tracks (now since removed) that clipped the northwest corner of his farm.

He platted the south half of his farm, originally known as Cook’s Hill, as Prospect Hill Addition, a name evoking the booming prospects for one wise enough to buy lots from him and build a home there. Prospect Hill additionally featured a country school house built by Cook, located on the northwest corner of Bluff and Central.

As a pioneer settler, Cook was a contemporary of the early College Hill preemptors and land speculators E.F. Staley, J.M. Thomas and James Humphrey.

Cook, however, did not pull up stakes as his first neighbors had done. He stayed on and became something of an entrepreneur, describing his occupation to the census takers over the years as nurseryman, arborist, farmer and implement dealer. He was also an inventor, focused on bringing commercial freight and passenger boat travel to Wichita.

Since settlement of the Arkansas Valley in the 1870s there had persisted local dreams of navigating the Arkansas River by steamboat for travel from Wichita to the Mississippi River, the Gulf of Mexico, and the world beyond.

Additionally, river freighting of local products was predicted to enhance the CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

HISTORY

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BOOM: 1880’S REAL ESTATE BOOM ECHOED IN COLLEGE HILL In the spring of 1879, early College Hill neighbors A.J. Cook and M.R. Moser traded barbs on the letters page of one of the local dailies. Below is an excerpt.

PHOTOS: JEFF ROTH

Sketched rendering of the A.J. Cook’s patented steam powered dredge boat that would, in theory, create channels large enough for the steamers to bypass the sand bars of the Arkansas River. History does not record if his invention was ever built.

JEFF ROTH

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

valley’s prospects of becoming a commercial giant of the Southwest. A few boats in fact made it up to Wichita, including the sternwheeler the Tom Ryan, whose captain was figuratively given the keys to the city by Mayor William Greiffenstein, who promised the captain all the lager and pretzels he desired during his stay in April of 1880.

Other steamers were less fortunate in plying the Arkansas, like the one launched later that year in front of a large crowd gathered at the old iron wagon bridge at Douglas Avenue. Launching with fanfare, it slid to a halt on a sand bar a mere 140 feet from its departure point.

The embarrassed passengers were forced to abandon ship and wade to shore, as Miner notes in Wichita, The Early Years 1865-80.

Cook was convinced, however, of the navigability of “The Big Sandy” as it was sometimes called, enough so that he patented a steam powered dredge boat that would, in theory, create channels large enough for the steamers to bypass the sand bars. History does not record if his invention was ever built.

Either due to jealousy or simply a fierce competitive spirit, he got into a spell of catcalling with his neighbor to the south, M.R. Moser, about the origins and desirability of their respective tracts on College Hill. The intensity of their exchange suggests the fervor with which they valued their land. It all started when the Wichita Beacon featured a glowing article about Mr. Moser’s fine brick residence, large orchard and fresh water spring, entitling the article “Moser’s Hill.” The heated exchange was played out in the paper for all to read. [See sidebar on next page.]

The spirited development of the College Hill farms into potential home sites progressed through the 1880s, primarily on its western slope facing town.

Newspapermen, mindful of supportive ad revenue, wrote enthusiastically of the growing district and sales activity on the hill.

From the Beacon, Oct. 13, 1886: “N.F. Neiderlander has sold two of the

finest lots in Merriman Park Addition…College Hill continues to boom.” A month later, during a tour of the area by horse and buggy, a Beacon reporter recorded his guide’s comments, “This lot belongs to H. Imboden, this to A.W. Bitting, this to Judge Mitchell, that to Captain White of the Beacon, that on the left to Bird, the architect, that on the right to his partner, Proudfoot…”

The following year architects Willis Proudfoot and George Bird did in fact build their country cottage homes adjacent to Merriman Park: Proudfoot’s “Hillside Cottage” at 303 Circle Drive and Bird’s “Aviary,” at 330 Circle Drive.

It is commonly held that the architects built these residences as model homes to serve as examples for others to follow in College Hill and elsewhere. As if seeding the town’s other suburbs, two customized copies of Bird’s Aviary were built in the waning months of 1887: “Fairmount Cottage” at 1717 N. Fairmount, and “Riverside Cottage” at 901 Spaulding Avenue. A fifth surviving 1887 home designed by Proudfoot and Bird stands at 133 S. Charles, which at the time was part of a suburban development being promoted around Garfield University, now Friends University.

The Beacon reporter in the buggy continued the hyperbole regarding the boom on the town’s eastern heights: “We are drawing in the fresh air, and gazing on the scene stretching away below us on the west, where lies the city, wreathed in a cloud of smoke, rising from manufactories, mills, residences and business houses. There, too, lies the river, its course marked by the trees on its banks and further on stretch miles upon miles of farms, dotted everywhere with houses and groves…’I had no idea you had such a beautiful site for residences within such easy reach of the city,’ were the first words uttered by the writer, and then we started to drive round the circling roads that have been laid out with such care, with a view to making the park as picturesque as possible…”

The “easy reach” of the suburb was a reference to the extension eastward of the recently established mule car line. The

“Hillside Cottage” at 303 Circle Drive, above, and “Aviary,” at 330 Circle Drive, below.

Architects Proudfoot and Bird built the homes on the park in hopes of attracting more builders and buyers to College Hill.

Cook: “My attention has been called to a mis-name (sic) in your issue of the 12th calling the hill east of town, Moser’s Hill. The first entry of three fourths of a section was made by the writer…The hill was therefore called Cook’s Hill.

When the Sabbath School was organized at our school house, it was called by the appropriate name of Prospect Hill. (Beacon, March 26, 1879) Moser: “It appears that Mr. Cook is a little ‘off’ in his card regarding Moser’s Hill…I have no objection to Mr. Cook calling his place ‘Cook’s Hill’ or ‘Prospect Hill’ or any other name he chooses, but my place is known and recognized …as Moser’s Hill.” (Beacon, April 2, 1879)

addition of trolley service was a boon to any outlying real estate development and so it was enthusiastically reported in the Beacon, “Major Powell informs us also that he will transfer his graders and track layers to Douglas avenue, and will, as rapidly as possible build the line out east from Hydraulic avenue, the present terminus of the line, to the north west corner of Merriman Park Place…This is sure to be one of the best lines of the system, as the heights on our eastern limits are rapidly being bought up and settled upon for permanent residences.”

The glowing accolades for Merriman Park, College Hill, Prospect Heights and Frisco Heights would soon be silenced.

The unabated, escalating and unrealistic prices being paid for city lots had reached unsustainable heights. Civic leaders, notably Eagle editor Marcellus Murdock, called for a halt to the speculative madness. The runaway train of local, eastern and foreign real estate investors began losing steam in late 1887 and ground to a halt by mid-1888. The bubble burst, the boom went bust.

The building of homes on College Hill likewise came to a dead stop. In some cases partially built homes were abandoned, leaving nothing but stone foundations. The prospect for a college uphill from Douglas and Park Avenue (Rutan) drifted away. The nearby college to the north, Fairmount, fell short of opening its doors because of the boom collapse, and the neighboring school to the south, Wichita University, closed its doors in just a few short years.

The Hillside Cottage and the Aviary attracted no other copies. They were destined to stand without neighbors for the next 20 years, lonely sentinels over the park.

Cook: “The citizens of Prospect Hill have no objection to Mr. Moser calling his own farm by any name he wishes so long as he doesn’t endeavor to carry it beyond his legal possession.” (Mr. Cook goes on a long property ownership rant about the original land preemptor getting claimed jumped, but the offending interloper died, and the administrator of his estate sold the land without the original squatter having a chance to contest the sale and save his claim). (Beacon, April 16, 1879) Moser: “I have some time to waste on the idiotic ravings of A.J. Cook….A.J. must be full of truth, for none of it ever comes out of him, particularly when he asserts that I have ever given a name to my place. He knows, if he is capable of knowing anything, that I never called my place ‘Moser’s Hill’ …except in reply to some of his spleen. The name was given by the editors of the Beacon, and the editors of other newspapers, who had visited the place and admired its beauties. These notices seem to have galled the sensitive Cook to such an extent that, like the buzzard, he desires to empty his filth upon me or any other person who can’t see ‘Cook’s Hill.’ I believe that is all I have to say in reply to A.J. Cook, and with these few kind remarks will drop the subject of “A.J. Cook v. Moser’s Hill.” (Beacon, April 23, 1879)

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THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

Village Barber & Style, in Lincoln Heights Village, is the longest running barber shop in College Hill. Above: Owner Jay Laessig gives customer Ron Brown a trim.

PHOTOS: KATIE GORDON

The Barber Will See You Now (And In 2 Weeks)

BY BARRY OWENS t is another Wednesday afternoon at the neighborhood barber shop.

Light rock plays on the radio, the daily newspaper is well thumbed, and the row of retail talcs and musk after shaves look freshly dusted. Owner Jay Laessig lounges in his chair and waits for his two o’clock. A regular.

They’re all regulars here at Village Barber & Style, which is College Hill’s longest running barber shop. The shop has been in Lincoln Heights Village since the shopping center first opened in 1949. Laessig, who bought the shop from Bill Skidmore in 1988, is only the third owner.

“I’ve got customers that started coming here in the early 1950s,” said Laessig.

In walks Ron Brown, the two o’clock, a physician. He’s been getting his hair cut here for 30 years.

Laessig drapes him with a smock and gets straight to work. The job takes about seven minutes. Brown reaches for his wallet, Laessig reaches for his calendar.

“Two weeks?” the barber says.

“See you in two weeks,” Brown says.

And it so it goes at this shop, where the haircuts are both ritual and rite of passage.

I

To be sure, there are any number of places to get your hair cut in the neighborhood and Laessig’s shop doesn’t hold the patent on tradition, familiarity and comfort. But it does seem to hold a sentimental place in the hearts of generations of College Hill men and boys (girls and women, too).

“People will fly in to get their kid’s first hair cut here, because this is just

where you go to get your first hair cut,” said barber Jeana Davis, one of Laessig’s three employees.

“We’ve got one customer who comes in from Oklahoma,” Laessig says.

“We’ve got guys that come in from Lyons, Haysville, Derby, Mulvane, the west side, the south side. Cheney. All around.”

Laessig has no answer as to why.

“It just becomes like a family deal,” he says.

Though his wife, Peggy, retired last year (she was a beautician) Laessig said he has no plans to retire soon. He would miss the customers.

“They become my friends,” he says.

“I don’t even know my neighbors.”

Laessig has been a barber all of his adult life (“I started barber school the day I turned 21”) and while many might attest to his skill with the shears, it is likely only part of the reason they keep coming back.

“He’s like the mayor of the village,” says Amy Herd, owner of the neighboring shop, Artifacts. “He brings chocolates to everyone every day. He asks how they are doing. He keeps an eye on things. It’s nice.”

Between customers on this afternoon, Laessig visited the shoe store and

the cafe and the flower shop. Everyone got a piece of chocolate.

“When they’re not in, I just leave it on their desk,” he says.

By mid-afternoon, though, things had picked up at the shop and there was a line waiting to sit in Laessig’s chair.

“How have you been? Didn’t you just go somewhere?,” Laessig asks one of the customers.

“Just got back from Table Rock Lake,” he says.

“That’s a clear lake,” Laessig offers.

“Cold, too,” the customer counters.

And then they are off into a winding conversation about feeder streams and the number of locks on the Mississippi river and what Franklin Delano Roosevelt had to do with it.

When they hit a snag, Laessig produces an atlas to look up a few answers.

“Some people don’t want to be bothered, others want to talk,” Laessig says, shrugging off his skill at drawing people out. “But there are some things you don’t talk about: Politics, somebody’s wife, somebody’s car, their hunting dog. There’s one other thing, but I can’t think of it right now.”

No time, anyway.

The next customer is waiting.

THE COLLEGE HILL COMMONER ❚ SEPTEMBER 2009

Come on, boy Photos by BARRY OWENS

Summer ain’t over around here until the dogs get a dip in the College Hill pool. That day came last month during the Dog Days of Summer, an annual fundraiser for the Kansas Humane Society. Some dogs were easier to get into the water than others.

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“We love it..

WaterWalk is

a great place to call home. It’s exciting to live in the middle of all the activities in the heart of the city —Music Theatre; Wichita Symphony; the Orpheum; all of the Old Town Development, and a short walk to Intrust Bank Arena. We believe a strong community core is essential to a healthy progressive city and WaterWalk is part of it.

”

GUS & MARY CAMPUZANO WATERWALK PLACE RESIDENCE OWNERS