Kansas Profile – Now That’s Rural: Dave Mueller, Tampa Trail Stop
May 31, 2023
By Ron Wilson, director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at Kansas State University
“Success builds success.”
“One thing leads to another.”
Those observations describe the positive momentum that is happening in a rural community in central Kansas.
Dave Mueller has played a leading role in the resurgence of the town of Tampa in Marion County. Mueller grew up on a farm near Tampa. After attending K-State, he worked for a national feed company before coming back to join his father on the farm. Mueller raises crops and runs a cow-calf operation on the family farm today.
Above: Tampa highway sign | Download this photo
Tampa is a historic community. It was a frequent stop for wagon trains traveling along the Santa Fe Trail. Over time, it experienced the typical struggles of smaller rural Kansas communities, such as declining population and outmigration. By the late 2000s, most of the businesses in downtown Tampa had closed.
“My aunt and uncle, Butch and Phyllis, had operated Butch’s Café (in Tampa) since 1980,” Mueller said. By 2009, Butch had passed and Phyllis was wanting to retire. “I bought the building so that the café could continue to operate.”
Next door to the café was an abandoned building. Mueller approached that building’s owner about purchasing it, but the owner was unwilling to sell. One day while Mueller’s crew was replacing the roof on the café building, the roof on the abandoned building next door collapsed.
“At that point, the owner decided that selling it might be a good idea,” Mueller said. He bought the building, gutted it, and rebuilt using some of the same bricks.
The café then moved into the new, larger building and operates as the Santa Fe Trail Café today, operated by two local people -- Pat Dalke and her daughter Ashley Thornhill.
“They run it in the same style as Butch and Phyllis,” Mueller said. It is open every day for lunch except Saturday. “There’s a chicken fried steak special every Sunday.”
He adds: “This has been a real staple of the community. The farmers really support it.”
In keeping with the name and location, the Santa Fe Trail Association provides placemats in the café.
Another large building downtown housed the post office. That building was owned by an out-of-state owner who chose not to put funds into the maintenance of it. Eventually the building deteriorated to the point that the post office closed.
This building was purchased and renovated also. Ultimately it came to house a volunteer grocery store. “We sold 180 shares at $100 a share,” Mueller said. Additional fundraising was done to fund store equipment and inventory.
Today, the Tampa Trail Stop store operates as a not-for-profit, volunteer-led grocery store. “The nearest grocery store is 30 miles away, so we wanted to save our older people an hour round-trip,” Mueller said. “We’re open limited hours, 4 to 7 p.m. on Monday through Friday and 10 to 1 on Friday and Saturday.”
The store carries such staples as milk, bread and canned goods as part of some 3,500 items in inventory. The store also strives to market locally grown products such as honey, fresh produce,and items such as Krehbiels Specialty Meats in McPherson and Wiebe cheese which comes from the nearby rural community of Durham, population 89 people. Now, that’s rural.
Tampa Trail Stop works with Dales’ Grocery in Hillsboro to source grocery supplies. “People tell us what they need and we carry it,” Mueller said.
The store operates in one-quarter of the building downtown. Also located in the building is a hair salon, community building and fitness center.
For more information, search for Tampa Trail Stop and Santa Fe Trail Café on Facebook.
Success builds success. One thing leads to another. For Dave Mueller, purchasing the café building in Tampa led to purchasing another building, which led to creating more business opportunities and revitalizing the community.
We commend Dave Mueller and all the entrepreneurs and volunteers who are making a difference by investing in Tampa.
And there’s more. Unlike most of rural Kansas, the average age in Tampa is moving younger, not older. We’ll learn about that next week.
Audio and text files of Kansas Profiles are available at http://www.kansasprofile.com. For more information about the Huck Boyd Institute, interested persons can visit http://www.huckboydinstitute.org.
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