Local History Blog
Once a star of the Kansas City skyline, this 90-foot cow statue now sits alone in park
Readers who have walked the Riverfront Heritage Trail sometimes write in to ask about some of Kansas City’s more obscure public art pieces, such as West Pennway’s miniature Mayan pyramid or the I-670 pedestrian bridge’s iron birds. One piece,…
Factory workers in this part of Kansas City once dressed the nation. What happened?
At its height, Kansas City’s garment industry dominated much of the U.S. clothing market and was the second largest employer in town behind the Stockyards in the West Bottoms. Over the span of 50 years, it grew from a small wholesale district…
Before he hit it big, Walt Disney was just a Kansas City paper boy. Take a look back
From labor strikes to demolition, here’s the history of Kansas City’s Buck O’Neil Bridge
The Missouri Valley Room holds a unique piece of library history
Continuing with the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Kansas City Public Library, this week's blog post highlights the card catalog system, which was adopted in 1887. Before the convenience of computers and online catalogs, there was…
How a 'border ruffian' who supported slavery got a monument honoring him in a KC park
On a recent visit to Penn Valley Park, a reader noticed an oddly placed stone along Penn Drive south of the lake. A plaque embedded into its surface reads: “To the author of Annals of the Great Western Plains,…
Belvidere Hollow: KCQ unearths Kansas City’s Lost Black neighborhood
In the Historic Northeast, east of downtown and just beyond Interstate 29, lies Belvidere Park — what now may appear to be an empty space. But at the turn of the 20th century, the area was a burgeoning Black neighborhood.
A local reader…
A pool? A skate park? The real story behind this KC neighborhood’s unique sculptures
A reader was intrigued by a handful of concrete structures resembling skateboard ramps on a grassy area off The Paseo, near 58th Street and Lydia Avenue — and reached out to What's Your KCQ?…
Railroad tycoon envisioned a grand Belgian settlement in Kansas City. Then came cholera
The Strange Case of Mr. Swope and Dr. Hyde
For more than a century, Kansas City has been haunted by the mysterious death of philanthropist Thomas Swope. Suspect number one is his nephew-in-law, Dr. Bennett Hyde, who stood to inherit a sizable portion of the Swope family fortune. But did…