A dozen or so flags flutter in the breeze in this early Kansas City scene, suggesting that the steamboat may have been carrying a Fourth of July holiday crowd. The scene is believed to be at the foot of Main Street. In the background is one of Winner's piers which stood for many years in the Missouri River before the ASB bridge finally was built. The piers had been built for a bridge by William E. Winner, who ran out of money before it could be completed. The card was one of a folder set of 22 cards, picturing Kansas City's boulevard, theaters, office buildings and street scenes. An explanatory legend titled, Kansas City Mo. 1907 reads: What was only a half century ago a rough, wild and unsightly series of hills and hollows, stretching back for miles from the two rivers, the Kansas and Missouri, which have their junction at this point, is now the beautiful location of one of the most wonderful and attractive cities in the world. The confluence of the rivers, the one coming from the north and flowing on in an easterly direction across the state, and the other the Kansas, flowing from the west, made such easy grades and direct courses as to attract the railways, making Kansas City a natural and necessary gateway to the great southwest. Kansas City Times, July 4, 1973.
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