Kansas
Kansas City equine show shines spotlight on horsemanship, mental health
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) – Dozens gathered in Kansas City’s Hale Arena to shine a spotlight on horsemanship as well as mental health in rural America.
Jeff Winton, the founder of Rural Minds, has spent a lifetime around horses. But moreover, he has spent a lifetime around heartache.
In 2012, Jeff’s 28-year-old nephew, Brooks, died of suicide in rural America.
“When that happened it became very apparent that no one wanted to talk about it because there’s an embarrassment factor,” Jeff said. “We even had the pastor tell us that some of the people in our small town of 500 farming people, that we should make up an excuse for his death – we should have said he died in a farming accident or something.”
Jeff said his mother courageously ignored the advice of those around her.
“My mother said, ‘Now this nonsense is going to stop with my family, we’ve been hiding this for too long, too many young people have been dying’,” Jeff continued.
According to research done by Rural Minds, those who live in rural areas have much higher rates of depression and suicide than those who live in urban areas, a nearly 68% difference, however, they are less likely to access mental healthcare. Meanwhile, farmers are twice as likely to die by suicide than those in any other occupation.
“Believe it or not, 65% of the counties in the United States that are rural, have no psychiatrists,” Jeff noted. “Sixty-five, that’s huge.”
With that in mind, Jeff set out to make a change for the 46 million of us living in America’s heartland. In 2021, he founded Rural Minds to help empower those who live in rural areas with information, resources and training.
However, the story is not one that is unique to mankind as mental illness stretches far and wide in the animal kingdom. A few years after Jeff joined Linden Hill Stables a trailer on the way to another competition contained Jeff’s horse Duke and Jim Modica’s poney Java Joe. While en route, the trailer became detached from the vehicle and slid on its side.
While Java Joe did not make it out of the crash alive, Jeff said Duke is the reason that five other equines were able to escape it. After first responders had arrived, they started to hear a great rumble from inside the trailer, within seconds, Duke emerged, bloody and victorious as he burst through the gate and righted the trailer.
Before the collision, Jeff said Duke had been a nationally renowned champion in Western-style shows. But ever since the crash, something has changed, Duke no longer wins many ribbons.
“You can see he’s got a white scar on his inner left front leg,” Jeff said. “The vet said they tried but it just never went away, but I’m glad he’s got it. It reminds me every day of how strong he is.”
Lisa Hillmer, owner, trainer and instructor at Linden Hill Stables, also chairs the KC Summer Kick-off Horse Show, one of the season’s first shows. Each year she said the event partners with a charity to foster community involvement. In 2024, the show deemed Rural Minds the beneficiary.
“My family started the organization in Nebraska before I decided to move it to Kansas City,” Hillmer said. “It’s something that’s important to me to keep it going.”
The show, which is free and began on Thursday, May 30, runs through the weekend. It is set to feature a full slate of classes for Saddlebreds, Morgans, Hackney Poneys, Road Horses and Equitation riders.
The event kicked off Western and English classes on Thursday. Linden Hill started strong with a third-place ribbon for Jeff and his horse Catherine in the English-style class. In this style, judges search for horses that look more pleasurable to ride. American saddlebred horses were originally bred for plantation riding which required much stamina and an even gate.
Modica, who also rides for Linden Hill, took home one of the team’s first blue ribbons with his Hackney Poney Annie. The pair showed in the speedster cart class in which judges look for both form and speed.
The DJ at the event also takes requests from riders. For $5 they can play a song of their choice while their class is shown, all of which goes back to Rural Minds.
Thursday’s events were drawn together with a dinner and silent auction to benefit the charity.
“It’s so important that families talk openly about depression because there’s nothing to be embarrassed about. But people in rural areas are taught to be very independent, to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, to get over it, because again, it’s not considered an illness. It’s gratifying work – it’s heartbreaking work.” Jeff concluded.
The following are some of the free programs and information provided by Rural Minds:
The horse show ran from Thursday, May 30, through Saturday, June 1, at Hale Arena, 1701 American Royal Ct., in Kansas City, Mo.
Copyright 2024 KCTV. All rights reserved.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) – One creator has written an anthem for Kansas City to reflect the metro’s historic summer for years to come.
An Omaha-based Afrobeat artist, Kusher Snazzy, released a World Cup song, ‘KC to the World,’ celebrating the tournament’s culture and diversity.
The song features soccer players and dancers representing multiple nations that played in the World Cup, including Germany, Brazil, Mexico, the United States and Italy. It was filmed locally in multiple locations, including a metro studio and rooftop.
READ MORE: Kansas City eyes 2031 Women’s World Cup bid after hosting FIFA tournament
Kusher Snazzy’s goal with the song was to depict the once-in-a-lifetime summer. His passion for soccer and the Midwest inspired the lyrics.
“We don’t know when FIFA is going to choose KC again,” said Kusher.
Joseph Termini is the mastermind behind the project. He took a vision and made it come to life. As a Kansas City native, he knew the importance of showcasing his city positively through a music video.
“Kansas City has been under the radar, and I feel like this is the first time we’re being put on a pedestal, and that pedestal is allowing other people to realize that this is more than just a small-town city,” said Termini.
Listeners can find the hit song on YouTube.
ALSO READ: Heart structure may stay in Kansas City after Fan Festival ends
Copyright 2026 KCTV. All rights reserved.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The pilot of a crop duster aircraft appears to have survived without serious injury after a crash on Monday in northeast Kansas.
The Jackson County, Kansas, Sheriff’s Office was called around 12:30 p.m. Monday on a crash involving a crop duster aircraft south of Kansas Highway 9 near Whiting, Kansas, or about 80 miles northwest of Kansas City.
Jackson County Sheriff Tim Morse said that after the crash, the pilot was able to exit the aircraft before it caught fire. The pilot walked to a nearby farmhouse for help.
Several area fire departments responded to the location to extinguish the fire.
The cause of the crash is under investigation.
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If you have any information about a crime, you may contact your local police department directly. But if you want or need to remain anonymous, you should contact the Greater Kansas City Crime Stoppers Tips Hotline by calling 816-474-TIPS (8477), submitting the tip online or through the free mobile app at P3Tips.com. Depending on your tip, Crime Stoppers could offer you a cash reward.
Annual homicide details and data for the Kansas City area are available through the KSHB 41 News Homicide Tracker, which was launched in 2015. Read the KSHB 41 News Mug Shot Policy.
TOPEKA, Kan. — A proposed legal settlement with the U.S. government would require the Keystone Pipeline system’s operator to pay a $26.9 million civil penalty over a major oil spill in Kansas in December 2022 and spend about $40 million more to prevent future accidents.
The agreement would resolve allegations from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Kansas that South Bow, based in Canada, violated U.S. and state clean water laws. The rupture dumped nearly 13,000 barrels of heavy crude oil into a creek running through a rural pasture in Washington County, Kansas, about 150 miles (241 kilometers) northwest of Kansas City.
The accident was the largest onshore crude pipeline spill in the U.S. in nine years and surpassed all 22 previous ones on the same pipeline system combined, according to a 2021 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. The total amount of oil spilled would have nearly filled an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
South Bow also would pay Kansas more than $3 million for environmental restoration projects under a proposed decree filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Kansas. A judge would have to approve the proposal after a 30-day public comment period.
South Bow also would pay Kansas more than $3 million for environmental restoration projects under a proposed decree filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Kansas. A judge would have to approve the proposed decree after a 30-day public comment period.
“The oil spill blanketed land and water, rendering the waterway lifeless and useless and requiring extensive cleanup and remediation,” Jeffrey Hall, the EPA’s assistant administrator for its enforcement office, said in a statement. “The substantial penalty reflects the seriousness of the environmental harm.”
South Bow officials did not respond immediately Sunday to a phone message and email seeking comment, but the company told The Canadian Press that it “proactively” began cleaning up the area before receiving directives from U.S. officials. The cleanup was completed early in 2024.
The company that built the pipeline, TC Energy, spun off South Bow as a separate firm in 2024, after the Kansas cleanup was done.
No pipeline workers or area residents were injured, and officials said public water supplies weren’t affected by the spill. However, a complaint filed Friday by the U.S. government along with the proposed settlement said more than 2,700 animals were harmed or killed. The area is home to an endangered species, the long-eared bat.
In a May 2023 report for the U.S. government, an engineering consulting firm said that a bend in the Keystone system where the spill occurred had been “overstressed” since its installation in December 2010 — likely because construction activity itself altered the land around the pipe. The complaint filed Friday in court said soil under the pipe had been “improperly compacted” and that while the company re-excavated the site in 2013, it did not replace that section of pipe.
The 2,689-mile (4,327-kilometer) Keystone system carries thick, Canadian tar sands oil to refineries in Illinois, Oklahoma and Texas.
In April, President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead for South Bow and another company to build a second pipeline from Canada to Wyoming, a smaller version of a massive $8 billion pipeline project known as Keystone XL blocked by former President Joe Biden’s administration in 2021 over environmental concerns.
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