TOPEKA — Former Manhattan Mayor and Federal Judge Richard Rogers has died. Rogers was a decorated war veteran who served in both chambers of the Kansas Legislature before spending 40 years as a federal judge. He was 94.
Rogers died Friday evening at a Topeka care center. Stewart Funeral Home in Wamego confirmed he died of natural causes.
Rogers was born Dec. 29, 1921, at Oberlin in northwest Kansas and moved with his family to Wamego when he was in the first grade.
He graduated from Wamego High School in 1939 and from Kansas State University in 1943.
Rogers was a World War II bombardier before leaving the military in 1945 and graduating from law school in 1947. He served 12 years in the Legislature before being appointed as a federal judge in 1975.
