NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — James Fisher with the Kansas Fairgrounds Foundation is excited for the completion of the House of Capper renovations.
"It will be done, probably by June or July," Fisher said. "We will do the featuring and the ribbon cutting closer to fair time. We've not really set that yet. Bryan Schulz and I need to get together with the folks from the Kansas Cooperative Council to find out what works best for all of the organizations."
The building date of 1913 makes it one of the oldest existing buildings on the fairgrounds.
"The fair has used it for everything from an entertainment stage to at one point, it housed the fine arts. It's been used for a variety of things. You're not going to miss it on the fairgrounds. The renovation and rebuilding of it, it's going to be beautiful."
The Capper Project is a tribute to the work of Arthur Capper in rebuilding the structure to its original state and to develop and build the Capper Cooperative Park to celebrate the Capper-Volstead Act of 1922, which allowed for the creation of cooperatives in the United States.
"We still have a little bit of money to raise for that," Fisher said. "We're working on that, we have some grant opportunities that we're working on to go towards that. Hopefully, by the time we get the Certificate of Occupancy for it, we'll have it fully funded."
The House of Capper has historical significance on the Kansas State Fairgrounds as the place where many local, state and national political figures announced and launched their campaigns. The latest candidate to do so was U.S. Senator Roger Marshall M.D. in 2019, prior to his win in 2020.
The original building was paid for entirely by Arthur Capper and built to his design. The rebuild will pay full respect to the original architectural design of the building, while incorporating all current ADA and building regulations.
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