Give Us Your Disabled, Your Criminal, Your Kodachrome….at least for now

  The End of an Era, again, for Southeast Kansas and the world. Southeast Kansas is no stranger to ‘End of an Era’ stories though. Endings that I’m familiar with? The M-K-T railroad, the Kansas Army Ammunition Plant (KAAP), and that’s just a couple of the larger ones from one town, Parsons. At one point those two comapanies together would have employed around 5,ooo people between them. You would be hard pressed to find people in the area without a connection to one or both industries. Parsons, of course, is not alone. It’s not a good time to be looking for work anywhere.

A couple of remaining area employers (that are always on the Kansas State budget chopping block), are the Parsons State Hospital and Training Center (PSHTC)and the Labette County Community Corrections (LCCC) military style boot camp.

The PSHTC has suffered budget cuts again and again, as well as depending on government grants for research. The LCCC is already slated to close, even though it is cheaper to house these young offenders there. A last ditch effort to teach state legislators basic accounting and common sense is ensuing.

So what’s left here? We still have some area employers doing well in niche’ markets. With today’s announcement from Kodak, one of those niche’ markets is dissapearing also.

“On June 22, 2009, Kodak announced the final manufacturing run of Kodachrome 64, the last remaining Kodachrome film. Dwayne’s Photo plans to continue processing Kodachrome films through the end of December 2010. As long as supplies last, Dwayne’s will continue to offer Kodachrome film for sale. This is a sad occasion for us, as we’re sure it is for many of you. While we understand the business realities driving Kodak’s decision, we are still sorry to see the film go. Kodachrome was truly an icon of the 20th century and has certainly been a very important part of Dwayne’s business for many years. Once it’s gone, nothing will ever capture “those nice bright colors” in quite the same way. We want to say thank you to all the customers who have been loyal to Kodachrome and to us over the years.” –  Dwayne’s Photo

 Dwayne’s Photo, Parsons Kansas is the last certified Kodachrome processor IN THE WORLD.

So for now at least, Parsons still offers an excellent destination for criminals, mentally retarded wards of the state (including sex offenders) and….KODACHROME.

We want all three, lots of it. At least for now.  ~sekanblogger

Those of you who were surfing for Paul Simon music and actually read all this crap anway?…….. – click here