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 ...

Why was there a huge steel tank at 33rd and Harrison in the 1920s?

This vintage postcard gives no details about “the tank,” which was sitting in the yard of 3310 Harrison in North Hyde Park in the 1920s. But a little research turned up numerous news articles from the day about its purpose, and highlighted ...

A block dominated by churches in Old Westport

Two churches, Our Lady of Good Counsel and Westport Methodist, dominate this block of the Valentine neighborhood just north of Westport. Many churches moved to Midtown in the early 1900s as their congregations moved south. This photo is from ...

Do you know the history of the Center City neighborhood?

Homes in the Center City neighborhood around 1900. originally published April 6, 2015 In the early 1900s, developers such as the Cowherd Brothers were building “modern” middle class homes across what is now Midtown. One area where development ...

Westwood Park homes offered fireplaces, garages, and rec rooms

Small but modern homes close to the Country Club Plaza made for modern living in the early 1930s, as this block of Westwood Park filled in. This photo was taken in 1940. Many of the homes on this Westwood Park block, between Liberty and Terrace ...

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 ...

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. ...