The city of Hutch's website was pretty helpful. They have several pages encompassing, general info about the town. They have a page on local business, civil activities and events, and a page on the arts.
Several links down on the Google search page I saw a link that caught my eye. The headline read something along the lines of "Hutchinson KS. The 10th most boring town in America". Well I want to know the good with the bad so I clicked on the link.
The article was a blog on a travel site about the 15 most boring towns in America. I don't recall the other towns on the list, but most of them were small towns in the Mid West mainly in Kansas and Oklahoma. The author of piece obliviously had a bias against these sort of towns.
The articles were based on a photo of something inherently boring ( an apartment under renovation, an empty parking lot, empty chairs outside the back door of a business in the alley ) accompanied with a snarky captions like "Nothing to see here." or "This apartment has no one living here." of course no one lives here the apartment is being renovated. If you follow this guys train of thought, I could take pictures of Disney World's back allies and dumpsters and convince you there's nothing fun to do there either.
More amazing to me was the thread of comments left on this post. The post originally went up in 2006. And the comments were still coming in as recently as last month. Nearly 6 years later. Most of them at first were in agreement with the writer. Albeit I'm assuming from the infantile screen names and the complete disregard of spelling and grammar ( which I like to call "Internet Ebonics") , these posters were mainly teenagers to 20 somethings.
Some obliviously more seasoned posters were there also. They made some more valid points. All in all the comments that weren't a hate filled diatribe of expletives, hit the same beats.
It seems to be the consensus that Hutch has a meth problem. I didn't see any evidence of that while I was there, but never the less, I don't see that being an issue for me or my family. I once saw that stuff being made. Muraitic acid, starting fluid, benzedrine inhalers, menthol cigarette filters were just some of the ingredients that went into this concoction. You may as well grind up a hardware store and snort it. No thank you.
Another reoccurring theme was a lackadaisical attitude on behalf of the police and local government. No one sited anything in particular, just that they were lazy and never did anything. If that's the case, then the meth problem can't be that bad.
The third most common complaint was the residents were lazy. That they would rather lay around and collect unemployment or disability than go look for a job. Everyone I know there is either gainfully employed or in school. Even still, if it is true that's just less people to fight over the job I'm applying for.
One frequent poster challenged people to list 10 things uniquely cool about Hutch. Surprisingly to me most had problems doing so.
I decided to try my hand at it. Now keep in mind I've only spent about 3 months in Hutch in my entire life and almost all of that was 29 years ago. So here goes nothing.
1. The Cosmosphere
If you don't know about it or have never been there I highly recommend checking it out. It's an aerospace museum with lots of cool stuff on loan from NASA and The Smithsonian as well as artifacts of their own. They have real space traveled flight suits, return capsules, and a back up lunar rove. Heck they even have Sputnik 2,the back up for Sputnik 1 in case it blew up on the launch pad. I spent a lot of time there back in '82/'83. I had a friend who worked there who would sneak me in to hang out until he got off. Back then they had 1 of 5 true IMAX screens in the country. Amazingly cool.
On my trip back home in July of last year, my awesome Aunt Peggy scored Lisa and I some tickets for The Cosmosphere. They've added even more cool stuff including a SR71 Blackbird ( the worlds fastest spy plane ) hanging from the ceiling in the lobby. Or how about the entryway to the gift shop made from the heat tiles of a space shuttle? And did I mention the 2 full sized rockets they have outside?
2. The salt mine museum.
I've never been there but it sounds really cool. The atmosphere is so cool and dry they use it as a film vault. They even have the master copy of "Gone With The Wind" and others down there.
3. Skaets
Nothing super special about this place. Just good food at decent prices. The cool thing about it is that it's been there forever. If I'm not mistaken my Aunt Peggy went there on her first date. And remember steaks spelled backwards is Skaets!
4. Bogey's
If I counted right, their online menu lists 140 different flavors of shakes. One of their recent online specials was a family dinner,8 cheeseburgers, a pound of curly fries, 4 medium soft drinks, and a half gallon of ice cream for $20. That would feed my family of 7 for $20?!? Unheard of.
5. Danny Boys
6. Location
Hutchinson is within a couple hundred miles of the geographic center of the lower 48 states. Which opens up the opportunities for travel. We could vacation in L.A. , N.Y.C. Seattle or even back here to Sarasota and travel about the same distance. Chicago, Houston, or Las Vegas would be even closer.
7. 3rd Thursdays
A monthly street party with live bands and dinner and drink specials all up and down Main St. We have something similar here in Sarasota called 1st Fridays or The Gallery Stroll. All the art galleries stay open late. Although most don't have live music and the event is often ruined by being over run by Sarasota's snooty elitist class.
8. Emancipation Days
A yearly local celebration featuring a parade and street festival. I recently took my Granddaughter Kaylynn to our local Christmas parade and we had the time of our lives. I'm looking forward to taking her to the Emancipation Day parade.
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| Grandpa and GoGo at the Xmas parade. |
9. The State Fair
Come on, it's the state fair. I can sum it up in two words. "Corn Dogs". 'Nuff said.
10. The Fox Theater
The Fox Theater is a historic venue that plays first run movies and classic films. It also features live concerts. It brings a touch of culture to this small town.
I am looking forward seeing Arlo Guthrie there in April. It will most likely be Lisa and I's first date night when we get there.
BONUS POINT # 11
11. Zombie Apocalypse/Red Dawn Scenario.
Small towns are more favorable places to be in a zombie outbreak. The virus will take longer to reach there and spread more slowly once it is there.
Plus Hutch is probably fairly low on the list of targets for nuclear strikes.
In either case I'm heading for the hills of Montana (see # 6).
WOLVERINES!!!
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