Working-class families from Sweden, Missouri, and Kansas lived on this West Plaza block in 1940. Residents had a variety of jobs: salesman, flour mill hand, marble cutter, machinist in a canning factory, upholsterer, piano tuner, landscaper, bookkeeper, radio serviceman, railroad freight clerk, and barber.
As part of our Uncovering History Project, the Midtown KC Post is examining each block in Midtown. A set of 1940 tax assessment photos is available for many blocks.
The area developed around 1907 when newspaper ads hawked lots in the Holly Garden subdivision. For $5 a month, they claimed, a family could buy land “in the most sightly addition overlooking the beautiful Westport district.”
Proximity to the streetcar line, just two blocks away, was a selling point, and in fact, the land office for the real estate company offering the lots was conveniently located at the end of the streetcar route.
The quiet block of small bungalows and other compact homes looks much the same today (in this recent Google Maps view) as in the 1940 slideshow below. Its residents were young families, many with several children and often with mothers, sisters, and other relatives living together. Most of the residents were born in Kansas and Missouri, although they also came from Austria, Italy, and Brazil. Like many other folks in this part of town during that time, several families had come to Kansas City from Sweden.
The photos below show the rest of the homes on the block as they looked in 1940.
Historic photos courtesy Kansas City Public Library/Missouri Valley Special Collections.
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