Scores of schoolchildren, judges and bishops visited this Southmoreland home

This house that once stood at the northeast corner of Warwick and 40th Street hosted some famous parties celebrating its well-known and well-loved resident in the 1930s. Schoolchildren with ties to him, lawyers, judges and bishops visited “gentleman ...

A Westport wine garden at 39th and Roanoke

Esslinger’s Wine Garden at 39th and Roanoke, seen here as it looked in the 1880s, offered small tables scattered on a shade lawn where pleasure-seekers could find food, beer and wine made from grapes grown on the site. One of several wine ...

Special Exhibit on historic fashion in Westport

Map Shows Fairground Racetrack That Became Curve of Valentine Road

It has long been told – with little hard documentation – that the curve of Valentine Road follows the curve of a race track that once stood there. This map, with the racetrack and other fairground buildings overlaid on top of a current ...

North Hyde Park block was home to early Kansas City police officer

  In 1920, Irish-born immigrant Dennis Malloy, who had worked as a bobby in London and then served in the Confederate army, lived with his family in this North Hyde Park home at 3335 Charlotte. He was credited as being the last survivor of ...

Corner drugstore at 39th and Genessee served the neighborhood

Small corner stores with living quarters above are a feature of many neighborhood corners in Midtown, including the southeast corner of 39th and Bell in the Volker neighborhood. This corner shop housed several different drug stores in the early ...

On Southmoreland’s Oak Street, grocers, railroad men, salesmen raised their families

Families moved into homes on the 4100 block of Oak beginning in the late 1800s and the area blossomed in the early 1900s. A 1909-1950 Sanborn map of the block. Note that Oak and McGee run north to south so the map is flipped on its side. A well-known ...

Middle class families settled in Southmoreland on Hyde Park Avenue (McGee Street)

The corner of E. 43rd and McGee Streets in 1940. Middle-class families filled in the rows of homes along McGee from 41st to 43rd beginning in the early 1900s. Family members worked as railroad workers, chemists and real estate dealers, among ...

Valentine’s Waverly Way has disappeared

A 1905 newspaper ad touts the choice homes on Waverly Way, just made ready for occupancy. This row of residences stood on the north side of the street (now known as West 34th Terrace), between Pennsylvania and Washington Streets. All of Waverly ...

North Hyde Park block drew early prominent families

The home at 3310 Harrison was known as “the Old Barton Home” in the early years of Midtown development. This photo dates from around 1900, when William Barton, president of the Barton Hat Company, lived here. The home became a sanitarium ...