Walk past the small courtyard at the corner of Wornall Road and Ward Parkway, and you can’t miss them. The bronze likenesses of Winston Churchill and his beloved wife Clementine have shared a seat there for more than 36 years.
Platted and developed during a citywide building boom at the turn of the 20th century, Kansas City’s Hyde Park neighborhood boasts not just one, not two or three, but four areas added to the National Register of Historic Places between 1980 and 2007.
The Kansas City Public Library and Missouri Valley Special Collections are proud to announce the addition of 34 newly scanned maps to KCHistory.org.
The bold, bright Western Auto sign is an iconic piece of Kansas City’s downtown skyline and central to a recent What’s Your KC Q inquiry: How did the Western Auto company get its start here, and how was it tied to the distinctive, 12-story building that still bears its name?
In a tragic twist of fate, the recreational roadway that was one of Mahoney’s proudest achievements would also cost him his life and have a profound impact on his family for generations.
The man who first assumed the title of Barbecue King of Kansas City way born on March 16, 1874, in Shelby County, Tennessee. By the age of 15, Henry Perry had started learning his trade working in steamboat kitchens traveling up and down the Mississippi River.
Thanks to the 2018 film "Green Book," many know of "The Negro Motorist Green Book," published annually for 30 years beginning in 1936. The guidebooks provided Black travelers a list of businesses, restaurants and lodgings that would welcome them while traveling. For those interested in learning more, the New York Public Library has made 23 editions of the "Green Book" digitally accessible here.
Bowling first appeared in the metro area in the late 19th century. Advertisements for bowling alleys in the city proper and in Wyandotte (what is now Kansas City, Kansas) were printed in The Kansas City Star and Times as early as 1884, though only a few details about them are available today.
We're putting the spotlight on some of our favorite special collections in a new video series from the Missouri Valley Special Collections. First up? The Mrs. Sam Ray Postcard Collection (SC58). Watch and learn how a septuagenarian became Kansas City's most prolific public historian.
Reader Mike McGrew wrote to KCQ and asked, "Has there ever been a velodrome constructed in Kansas City? I understand there was a nationwide wave of competitive cycling races in the late 19th and early 20th century." Here’s what we found.
