by RICK DANLEY // February 1, 2019 There was a day in the middle 1950s when Spencer Ambler betrayed his instinct and agreed to join his friends at the Silver Grill Restaurant in Chanute. “All the kids said, ‘Let’s go to the Silver Grill,’” remembered Ambler. “I said, ‘No, I don’t want to go.’” But … Continue reading A Spirit of Love
by RICK DANLEY // March 10, 2018 You’re in the cockpit of a B-1 bomber. It’s the middle of the night. You’re somewhere over northern New Mexico, slicing through the black sky at about 600 knots. There are four of you in the plane. The copilot to your right, his face made ghoulish by the green … Continue reading The View from Above
by RICK DANLEY // July 14, 2018 In place of the usual hello, Mike Hook, the veteran pawnbroker and manager of DM Past and Present, has a phrase prerecorded on his mobile phone, which he plays when a customer first enters his small Iola shop. The audio is of a woman’s voice, tinny, robotic — … Continue reading The Value of Things
by RICK DANLEY // April 24, 2018 There was a moment sometime after the close of the 2014 election when independent candidate Greg Orman, having just conceded a high-profile, tightly fought U.S. Senate race to longtime Republican Sen. Pat Roberts, fell into conversation with another of Kansas’ political veterans, Bob Dole. Orman recalled the exchange. “You … Continue reading Orman for Gov.
by RICK DANLEY // December 23, 2017 At least according to the 1959 tome “Swedish Christmas” — now, sadly, out of print — Christmas wasn’t Christmas without the yuletide pig: “It was not easy to slaughter the Christmas pig in the correct manner. It must be done in the first light of early dawn. One … Continue reading Swedish Christmas: Little Hus on the Prairie
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