Local History Blog

Interest in Kansas City’s Swope Park continues to percolate as the weather warms and in the wake of a recent What’s Your KCQ? look at the history of the 1,805-acre expanse of green space. It was 126 years ago that real estate tycoon Thomas H. Swope donated the land to the city. A follow-up KCQ questioner wonders: What inspired his generosity? The answer is a little complicated and may surprise you.

Home movies are treasured time capsules documenting birthdays, weddings and other cherished memories. Reader Barbara Walsh acknowledges her fortune in having a collection of 8mm films of her family from the 1930s through the 1950s. One particular film in her collection sparked her curiosity — a one minute and eight second clip titled:CEMETERY DAY ST. MARY’S OCT. 8 / 38. The footage shows a long procession of clergy making its way past onlookers dressed in church attire. After a cut-away, the camera pans across the cemetery to show a crowd of people standing among ornate headstones and monuments watching the proceedings from afar. Ancestors on both sides of Walsh’s family tree are buried at Mount St. Mary’s. Visiting the cemetery and placing wreaths on the gravesites of loved ones was an annual tradition of her maternal grandparents, Arthur and Marguerite Nester, and their children. It was her grandfather, an avid photographer, who filmed the 1938 Cemetery Day event.

Spring has arrived, and winter-weary Kansas Citians have once again turned their attention to the great outdoors. The What’s Your KCQ? team, a collaboration between the Kansas City Public Library and The Kansas City Star, have been inundated with questions about the crown jewel of the KC Parks system: Swope Park. To keep readers satisfied, we’re taking on five inquiries for this week’s rapid response edition.

Following a recent viewing of “The Day After,” the 1983 film depicting the destruction of Kansas City by nuclear attack, a reader wondered if the city was really considered a Soviet target during the Cold War years. In the movie, survivors of the attack witness the breakdown of society in rural Kansas and Missouri. The individual put the question to What’s Your KCQ?, a collaboration between the Kansas City Public Library and The Kansas City Star, also asking if the city did anything to address the threat.

Missouri Valley Special Collections staff have been hard at work adding new content to KCHistory. Below, you will find a list of newly digitized objects added to the site during the month of February.

A reader recalling her mother’s experience as a nurse during the integration of Kansas City’s hospital system in the 1950s, asked “What’s Your KCQ?” — a partnership between the Kansas City Public Library and The Kansas City Star — to investigate how equal treatment and desegregation came to the city’s Black hospital.

We are pleased to announce a new addition to our archives! The Folly Theater Collection (SC223), which contains over 300 boxes full of vintage burlesque and performing arts history, is now available to researchers in the Missouri Valley Room. As Kansas City’s oldest theater in operation, the Folly has assumed various names and identities throughout its 120+ year lifespan—from a vaudeville, burlesque, and Shakespearean playhouse, to an X-rated movie theater, potential parking lot, and finally, a restored performing arts venue worthy of the National Register of Historic Places. Let’s explore the complex history of the “Grand Old Lady of 12th Street” and the countless performers who have graced her stage.

A reader recently came across a Twitter post showing the evolution of Kansas City’s municipal seal over time. Two of the three emblems seemed self-explanatory, but one, a red and blue geometric design didn’t seem to have much to do with Kansas City at all. The reader recalled encountering the design on old city documents, and on bits of infrastructure around town. The reader asked What’s Your KCQ?, a collaboration between The Star and the Kansas City Public Library, to investigate the evolution of Kansas City’s seal.

With the holidays in full swing, a What’s Your KCQ? reader recently wondered: “What happened to the Christmas decorations that used to be displayed downtown, particularly the crowns strung across the streets?” Since City Hall lacks an attic, we couldn’t start our search in the most logical place. In the years before World War I, the downtown Christmas shopping season was a modest affair. The economic boom of the 1920s changed things, and beginning in 1924, the Downtown Merchants Association pooled its resources and festooned the streets with garland and other decorations. In 1925, the association added a parade to kick off the holiday season.

During a recent visit to Cliff Drive in Kessler Park, a reader said, he noticed a turnoff near the west entrance to the scenic byway. He followed the road up a hill and was treated to a spectacular view stretching across the Missouri River into Clay County. Continuing up, he noticed a line of trees at the top of the hill and decided to investigate. He found something peculiar – what seemed to be an abandoned and graffiti-covered, concrete swimming pool surrounded by an iron fence. The reader asked What’s Your KCQ?, a collaboration between The Star and the Kansas City Public Library, “What is the concrete pit atop the hill, and why is it there?”

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