Streetcar expansion spurred development of this Squier Park block
An 1891 map of the block shows it has been subdivided into the Troost Park subdivision, but only a handful of homes have been constructed. Source: A Complete Set of Surveys and Plats of Properties in Kansas City, Mo. 1891.
Many parts of ...
NE Corner of 39th Street and Summit Once Housed Local Shops, Apartments
This long building at a busy streetcar stop at 39th and Summit (now Southwest Trafficway) once housed apartments, grocery stores, drug stores, and a beloved neighborhood shoemaker’s shop. Today, traffic whizzes by this corner, where local ...
Roanoke property owners took a stand against apartments in 1920s
Charles and Rose Burkey, who owned the Summit Theater, lived in this Roanoke home at 827 Valentine for almost two decades. The block, between Summit Street (now Southwest Trafficway) and Madison, is a mix of single-family homes and apartments ...
Corner of 39th and Pennsylvania was home to Westport pioneer family
The home of William and Susan Bernard stood near the corner of Pennsylvania and W. 39th Street in this photo from about 1920.
Among the earliest homes in what is now Midtown were the those of wealthy Westport settlers built in the mid-1800s. ...
1932 arson destroyed fine old Broadway residential hotel
This early drawing of the McGee home, later the Rochambeau Hotel, is one of the few publicly-available images of the important mansion that stood at 37th and Broadway, near the site of the current Uptown Theater. Built by Kansas City pioneer ...
Plaza homes replaced by “modern” apartments as Plaza developed
While families came and went and homes were replaced with apartment buildings, the Charles McCallum family lived on this Plaza Westport block from at least the 1920s to the 1940s. McCallum was a Scottish-born carpenter and his widowed son, also ...
Swedish families settled and stayed for decades on this Volker block
Many Swedish immigrants and the children of Swedish immigrants were among the first residents of this Volker block. Several families stayed in their homes for decades, something that was fairly unusual in Midtown during the early 1900s.
It is ...
Westport’s oldest settlers fiddled and danced at Little’s Hall
If you look closely at the leaded glass on the old Broadway Hardware building on Westport Road, you can make out the name “Little’s Hall.” The location was a popular spot in the early 1900s, hosting political events, dances and club meetings. ...
Valentine Road history: mansions, churches – and a plus-sized dress shop
As Midtown was developing, there was tension along Valentine Road east of Summit between developers and those who wanted the area to remain single-family.
Valentine Road between Broadway and Southwest Trafficway has been home to Kansas City ...
This Volker block was home to hard-working laborers
A couple sits on a front porch at 4012 Holly Street in 1940. The neighborhood had been home to railroad and stockyard workers as well as others during the previous three decades.
Laborers, most of them immigrants or the children of immigrants, ...
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