WICHITA, Kan. (AP) _ He may have terrorized Mr. Wilson for four decades, but officials of Wichita are glad to have Dennis Mitchell, a.k.a. the Menace, as a neighbor.

″I had no idea he lived here, but he sure is welcome,″ Mayor Bob Knight said.

Cartoonist Hank Ketcham reveals in his illustrated autobiography ″The Merchant of Dennis the Menace,″ that the strip’s characters - including pal Joey, dog Ruff and nasty ol’ Margaret - have been hiding in Wichita since the strip began in the 1950s.

″I’ve no idea why Wichita,″ said Deborah Sloan, publicity director for Abbeville Press in New York, which published the 250-page book. ″Maybe he’s been to Wichita.″

Ketcham writes in the book that the Mitchells live in a ″two-story, three- bedroom fixer upper on the outskirts of Wichita.″

Before the book was released in September, readers of the comic strip, which is published in more than 1,000 newspapers, had been left to assume Dennis terrorized Anytown, USA.

Gene Dickinson, spokesman for the Wichita Area Chamber of Commerce, said Dennis and his gang won’t boost the city’s Census numbers, but they’ll be a boon to the city’s image.

″Dennis’ celebrity status is pretty rarefied air,″ Dickinson said Monday. ″He’s an institution. And I mean, he’s here living, breathing and sleeping - so to speak - in Wichita.″