Ranch rodeo week
STRONG CITY — It’s time for another rodeo in Chase County — the Flint Hills Ranch Rodeo.
The rodeo is an annual event in Chase County and features events that are patterned after tasks performed every day by ranchers.
“Competitors at ranch rodeos are the folks who not only talk the talk, they walk the walk,” a press release stated.
The rodeo will include co-ed competition and youth teams. Among the events are team sorting, tie-down, stray gathering, team doctoring and team roping — skills that ranchers need every day to complete daily tasks.
The rodeo will begin at 10 a.m. Saturday and will last all day and well into the evening hours. Spectator admission is $8 for adults; $3 for children 3-10 years old. Admission is good for the entire day.
— Brandy Nance
Would-be rescuer dies
ARGONIA — A 47-year-old Argonia man died Saturday night while trying to save eight people from a rain-swollen river in southern Kansas.
Five people on a raft got into trouble on the Chikaskia River in Sumner County and three firefighters became trapped trying to rescue them. Dennis Rhodes, a former emergency worker from Argonia who lived nearby, went into the raging water to help.
Authorities said Rhodes was knocked off his feet by the current and carried downstream. He was pulled from the water and rushed to Via Christi Regional Medical Center where he died.
The eight people in the river were rescued by a Sedgwick County crew.
Chat with manager
Questions are still being accepted for Tuesday’s online chat with Emporia City Manager Matt Zimmerman.
Questions for the chat, which will begin at 1:15 p.m. and last about half an hour, may be submitted in advance at www.emporiagazette.com.