Zombies occupy Statehouse steps, raise funds to fight poverty

Call them zombies with a cause.

Clad in their best sartorial tributes to the living dead, hundreds of people walked the streets of Topeka on Saturday evening as part of a fundraiser to fight hunger and poverty.

With rotting faces and severed limbs, blood-drenched wedding dresses and nooses around their necks, the gathering drew looks from passing motorists, who slowed to take in the scene.

Accompanied by members of the Capital City Reapers Zombie Response Team, who donned black uniforms and combat gear, the group of undead impersonators marched north from the corner of S.W. 8th and S.W. Jackson, winding their way along S.W. 7th, Topeka Boulevard and back toward the Capitol, where they soon lay strewn across the Statehouse steps, posing as victims of the vigilant zombie fighters.

The goal of the annual event is to provide some old-fashioned, horror-inspired family fun — and it attracted zombie hunters as young as age 5 — but also to benefit Let’s Help, a community nonprofit that seeks to break the cycle of poverty. Participants were asked to make a $5 donation to Let’s Help or bring canned goods.

“It’s a way to give,” said zombie walk organizer Louie Creek, who helps run the horror and science fiction group Kansas Karnage.

Zombies have enjoyed a popular comeback in recent years, he noted, and after groups in Kansas City and Lawrence launched zombie walks there, Creek said it was clear Topeka should have its own version.

“People really get into it,” he said.

Topeka High sophomore Reina Gonzalez and her friends Madeline Currah and Hannah Rocha were among those in attendance Saturday.

Asked why they had chosen to dress up as the undead, Gonzalez quipped: “Emotionally we’re dead inside.”

Gonzalez said she had spent the afternoon perfecting her zombie makeup and offered her recipe for fake blood — corn syrup with blue and red food dye.