June 18, 2018
Chapman Center director delivers talk at Symphony in the Flint Hills
Bonnie Lynn-Sherow, director of the Chapman Center for Rural Studies, was an invited speaker at Symphony in the Flint Hills, June 9, in Rosalia.
Her talk, "The Dam that Got Away — the Corps Meets Pat Sauble," detailed Cedar Point rancher Pat Sauble's fight against a Corps of Engineers flood control project that threatened to inundate his family's ranch and thousands of acres of Kansas farmland.
The saga of Sauble and his community's grassroots opposition to the Cedar Point Reservoir project played into the 2018 Symphony in the Flint Hills theme of celebrating the nature, culture and structure of Flint Hills waterways. Experts, leaders and innovators were invited to give educational presentations related to this year's theme.
For more than a half century, Sauble has been dedicated to protecting water resources in the state of Kansas, receiving the Water Legacy award from the governor in November of 2017. Lynn-Sherow incorporated Sauble's personal account of the fight to save Cedar Creek and Miller Spring into the presentation. His colorful narrative produced chuckles from the audience of more than 100 attendees.
The Chapman Center for Rural Studies team has been working with Sauble and his family for three years, digitizing hundreds of original photos and transcribing Sauble's oral account of his family history for a book scheduled to be published this fall.