Free
Join us at Brooker Central Park in historic Marion, Kansas for the panel talk "Water, Water, Everywhere," featuring Rex Buchanan (Director Emeritus of the Kansas Geological Survey), Jim Hoy (Director Emeritus of the Center for Great Plains Studies and professor emeritus at Emporia State University), Heidi Mehl (Healthy Streams for Kansas Initiative) who will explore the role water plays in Marion County historically, presently, and in our future.
Marion County has more natural springs than any other Kansas County, this is what drew so many settlers to the area in the past. Despite its value, freshwater consumption is not sustainable in many areas around the world, including Kansas. Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," where the speaker at sea laments “water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink," inspired the title of this panel echoing that fact that two-thirds of the earth’s surface is covered with water, yet only three percent of it is comprised of drinking water.
Why is it so difficult to conserve this vital resource? What are some of the stories and legends from the Prairie that involve water? Does Marion County need to conserve for the future? How might water constraints impact this region? How does the role of culture—our values, norms, and beliefs— impact water consumption? How can we be part of the solution? Our guest speakers will investigate these questions and more.
Meet Our Speakers:
Rex Buchanan is the Director Emeritus of the Kansas Geological Survey, based at the University of Kansas. A native of Kansas, he is the co-author of Roadside Kansas: A Guide to its Geology and Landmarks (rev. edition, 2010) and editor of Kansas Geology: An Introduction to Landscapes, Rocks, Minerals, and Fossils (rev. edition, 2010), both published by the University Press of Kansas; and co-author of The Canyon Revisited: A Rephotography of the Grand Canyon, 1923-1991, published by the University of Utah Press (1994). He served as Secretary of the Association of American State Geologists and chaired the Kansas Task Force on Induced Seismicity. In 2008 he was named a fellow of the Geological Society of America and in 2016 received GSA’s Public Service Award.
Heidi Mehl heads the Healthy Streams for Kansas Initiative where she works to recover the state’s streams and improve water quality, as well as directing burgeoning soil health and regenerative agriculture projects in Kansas. She has a strong interdisciplinary background spanning the fields of fluvial geomorphology, hydrology, biogeochemistry, and human-environment interactions. Heidi received her Ph.D from Kansas State University with a dissertation title “A cultural ecology of riparian systems on the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation: understanding stream incision, riparian function, and Indigenous Knowledge to increase best management plan adoption.”
Jim Hoy is director emeritus of the Center for Great Plains Studies and professor emeritus at Emporia State University, where he taught literature and folklore for 45 years. He is a Flint Hills native, reared on a small ranch near Cassoday. His book "Flint Hills Cowboys" (published by the University Press of Kansas in 2006) was named a Kansas Notable Book. His latest, "My Flint Hills," also from UPK, was released in September of 2020. Among his many books are, Plains Folk: A Commonplace of the Great Plains, My Flint Hills: Observations and Reminiscences from America's Last Tallgrass Prairie, and, with Tom Isern, Plains Folk: A Commonplace of the Great Plains.
About:
This panel discussion is part of Flint Hills Counterpoint, a Marion county ecology and arts program sponsored by Humanities Kansas, the Kansas Creative Arts and Industries Commission, Mid-American Arts Alliance, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Creating tours and events throughout the county to foster land stewardship in Marion County.