How do you maintain your sense of community when your town no longer exists?

That's the question confronting former residents of Treece in southeast Kansas. After the Environmental Protection Agency declared the town a Superfund site, most residents accepted a government buyout and left the town for good. As Rex Buchanan, of the Kansas Geological Survey, told The New York Times in 2012: "The only thing polluted in Treece is the earth, air, and water."

Treece's rise and fall from a booming lead and zinc mining town to a Superfund site is explored in the new radio documentary, "Treece, Kansas: Ghost Town in the Making" airing on KPR Presents on Kansas Public Radio, Sunday, May 19 at 8:00 PM. The documentary is produced by The Recollective, a multimedia storytelling collaborative, in partnership with Pittsburg State University. The project was supported by a KHC Humanities grant.