Thanksgiving is, for the fortunate, a time to give thanks for blessings and plenty.

That was true in Jackson County 100 years ago - again, for the fortunate.

For those not so fortunate, there were places like Kansas City’s City Union Mission, a relief agency which recently observed its 100th anniversary.

This story, in slightly different form, previously appeared on FlatlandKC (flatlandkc.org), the nonprofit digital newsroom operated by Kansas City PBS. The Jackson County Historical Society appreciates the opportunity to re-post it here.

Read More

Historical society members cheer launch of the 1870s one-room structure’s preservation project; completion of mission’s first phase expected in November.

The Howard Schoolhouse is owned and operated by the Jackson County Historical Society; for more information, go to jchs.org. To learn more about how to donate to the historic structure’s restoration, go to jchs.org/save-our-schoolhouse.

Read More

It was one of the prominent Jackson County weddings of 1919 and, accordingly, it received front page coverage.

The bride wore a gown of white lightweight Georgette fabric, part of which consisted of braille, a decorative cloth known for its raised, dotted texture.

The groom’s apparel went unrecorded.

Still, the wedding of Harry Truman and Bess Wallace was one of “unusual beauty and interest” according to The Examiner of Independence, the newspaper that has covered Independence and eastern Jackson County since 1898.

The very specific details regarding the June wedding and what the bride wore have been available to researchers, historians and genealogists - as long as they’ve had the patience and determination to find a library holding microfilm of the archival Examiner - and then go there, thread the microfilm into a microfilm reader, and then roll the film to the June 28, 1919 edition.

But, since this summer, researchers have received a more convenient and efficient way to access the archival Examiner.

By Brian Burnes

Read More

When President Harry Truman announced the unconditional surrender of Japan on August 14, 1945, it was time to celebrate.

Jackson County residents reacted in a fashion similar to what was seen in communities large and small across the country. The scenes of huge crowds in New York’s Time Square were repeated, on a smaller scale, in Kansas City and Independence,

One difference in Jackson County, of course, is that President Truman and his family happened to live in Independence. Many local residents knew individual Truman family members as a friend, or neighbor, or the occasional customer at the Maple Avenue and Union Street gas station. As described here, in this month’s E-Journal, Independence Examiner journalist Sue Gentry, a friend of Bess Truman, witnessed the president’s White House announcement and quickly transmitted her story back to Independence.

But other than that, the Jackson County celebrations - just like many across the country - included impromptu parades, the throwing of pillow feathers from high windows, and the indiscriminate hugging of strangers. 

To Jackson County residents of 2025, the scenes recall the recent Union Station victory celebrations following Super Bowl and World Series victories.

But to compare the end of World War II to professional sports championships trivializes what was being celebrated in 1945 - the vast and palpable relief that the war was over and the soldiers and sailors soon would be returning home.

Eighty years ago, nobody knew of an atomic bomb. 

They just knew - beginning on May 8, when Truman had declared Victory in Europe - that a traditional invasion of the Japanese home islands was being planned, with the projected number of casualties too terrible to contemplate.

Accordingly, the widespread feeling in Jackson County, as Brad Pace writes, had been one of “dread.

Read More

On Friday, March 15, 2024, residents of several communities in Platte County, Missouri, just northwest of Jackson County felt - in a most subtle way - the earth move beneath their feet. 

They felt compelled to report the experience to the U.S. Geological Survey. Accordingly, the agency soon confirmed an approximately 3.5 magnitude earthquake had been recorded at a shallow depth of about six miles below the surface just northeast of Kansas City International Airport. 

The quake, according to the Kansas City Star, had struck at approximately 1:45 p.m. Residents reported light shaking, while airport workers described a slight tremor. KCI representatives soon reported on social media that no damage had been discovered.

Meanwhile, if any Jackson County residents had felt anything, they didn’t notify the authorities.

So - it was no big deal.

That hadn’t been the case more than two centuries before at Fort Osage, some 27 miles northeast of the Truman Sports Complex. What happened at the recently constructed federal outpost not long after midnight was sufficiently unnerving that details of the event made news as far east as Philadelphia, with witnesses struggling to explain it.

This month’s E-Journal, in slightly different form, first appeared on FlatlandKC, (flatlandkc.org) the nonprofit newsroom operated by Kansas City PBS. The Jackson County Historical Society appreciates the permission to reprint this article.

By Brian Burnes

Read More

Affordable housing remains a continuing issue in 2025 Kansas City.

So it was some 100 years ago, when a vibrant post-World War I economy and a migration of rural Americans seeking work and prosperity in emerging economic hubs like Kansas City created a need for properties that could be called home by those earning moderate to lower incomes.

In this “extra edition” E-Journal Ethan Starr, a Kansas City native who is the executive director of Historic Kansas City - the nonprofit organization that long has worked to protect and preserve local historic structures and landmarks - looks with fresh eyes at the residential homes and apartment units built by Kansas City developers eager to meeting that growing demand.

Read More

A “clarion call” is like a spiritual bringing forth. It is the ushering in of the gifts embedded into a person, drawing them to fulfill a divine purpose already predestined for them. It is a sound measured by one’s restlessness of the harsh realities of life and drawn in by the cries of inequality on the basis of one’s human rights. 

Lucile Harris Bluford heard “the call” and decided to act. In doing so, she carried the plight of African Americans with the power of the pen, even stepping into the headline to become the story. She had effectively done what the black press often encouraged. She fulfilled the prophetic activism of African American women in general, and, in particular, her mentor, Ida B. Wells-Barnett.

By Dr. Delia C. Gillis and Keana Jarvis

Read More

President Harry Truman’s decision to issue de facto recognition to the infant state of Israel 75 years ago was one of the most consequential moments in 20th Century world politics.

The international ramifications of that decision were profoundly significant in 1948, and remain so today.

The account of how Truman reached that decision included a remarkable Jackson County story.

That involves the president’s longtime Army friend and later haberdashery business partner, Eddie Jacobson. 

The story is told here by Shirley Christian, a Kansas City area journalist and historian.

Christian worked as a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, the Associated Press, and the Miami Herald,

In 1980 she joined the Herald’s Latin America Bureau, where she covered the wars then being fought in Central America. 

She received a 1981 Pulitzer  Prize for international reporting.

Her first book, “Nicaragua: Revolution in the Family,” appeared in 1985.

She also is the author of “Before Lewis and Clark: The Story of the Chouteaus, the French Dynasty That Ruled America’s Frontier,” published in 2004.

This article first appeared in two parts in 2014 in the Jackson County Historical Society Journal. 

The Society is pleased to reprint this article, and it thanks the author for her permission to do so.

Read More

In this month’s E-Journal, Scott Cauger, former Jackson County Historical Society board member, details the history of his family’s film production business which operated for years in the Englewood district of Independence.

Scott’s father, the late Theadore “Ted” Cauger, Sr., who for a decade served as the historical society’s treasurer, operated the business begun by his father, Arthur Vern “A.V.” Cauger, whose career in the film industry began when he operated a nickelodeon in downtown Kansas City in the early 1900s.

Jackson County can boast of a rich film industry legacy, which includes the “Film Row” district of Kansas City, where Hollywood film studios coordinated the distribution of motion pictures throughout the Midwest. Yet the story of the Cauger family film business is unique in the range of services it offered, which included the production of commercials for small business clients, to the eastern Jackson County distribution of feature films produced by the Hollywood film industry.

Read More

A newly-formed Missouri nonprofit group, Friends of Englewood Theater, is in the process of acquiring the former theater at 10917 E. Winner Road in Independence.

The group is led by Brent Schondelmeyer, a former president of the Jackson County Historical Society and author of this month’s E-Journal.

The movie theater operated for decades, and in more recent years served as a country-western music venue. But it has been closed for almost 20 years. The nonprofit is also purchasing the former Ben Franklin store that stands adjacent to the theater.

Both properties are being acquired from the estate of Wade Williams III, who passed away in 2023.

Williams owned several Kansas City area movie theaters and was well known in the film industry for owning the rights to an extensive collection of vintage sci-fi films.

The pending acquisition is the latest development in the Englewood Arts District, where community residents are today supporting an array of shops, galleries and restaurants located about two miles southwest of Independence Square. In his article, Schondelmeyer details how Independence annexed the Englewood neighborhood in the late 1940s and how community opinion was divided about that idea at the time.

To learn more about the nonprofit, its plan to acquire the buildings and how to donate to its redevelopment efforts, go to englewoodtheater.org.

BY BRENT SCHONDELMEYER

Read More

Kansas City area writer and photographer Bruce Mathews, with collaborators, has published several books documenting the beauty of local cemeteries and the diversity of those families whose loved ones chose to be interred there. 

In “Mount Washington Cemetery: In Search of Lost Time,” Mathews details the grand chapel built by the family of Kansas City Star co-founder William Rockhill Nelson, as well as the vision of George Kessler, the landscape architect who designed the cemetery.

Mathews reminds us that, many years ago, cemeteries were not exclusively a site of sorrow but a place of refreshment and contemplation.

Further, the book details not only the resting places of many prominent and accomplished Kansas City area residents, but also the varied and fascinating lives they lived before their passing.

On Memorial Day, May 26, the Mount Washington Cemetery Historical Society will be hosting an open house at the Nelson Memorial Chapel between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m.The cemetery is at 614 S. Brookside Avenue, in independence. Copies of Mathews’ book will be available, with proceeds benefitting the Mount Washington Cemetery Historical Society, for the preservation of the Nelson Chapel.

For more information, go to mwchs.org, or call the cemetery office at 816-252-4141.  

BY BRUCE MATHEWS

Read More

It’s February and students across Jackson County are in their classrooms, immersed in their spring semesters.

But one Independence school building remains closed. 

That’s the Howard Schoolhouse, the one-room 19th century building that had been open to visitors at the 1859 Jail Museum since 1960.

The 12-by-16 foot schoolhouse, which stands adjacent to the jail at 217 N. Main St., was placed on its current foundation in 1960. Concerns have arisen about the stability of the foundation and the Jackson County Historical Society, which owns both the jail and the schoolhouse, restricted visitor access out of an abundance of caution last autumn.

Beyond the possible foundation problem, the schoolhouse’s windows need to be repaired or replaced, as does its front door and transom. The building’s exterior walls need to be scraped of its peeling paint and re-painted; the schoolhouse’s interior walls need new paint, as well.

Still other issues include the restoration of the interior wood flooring and wainscoting.

Society board members hope to one day to re-open the schoolhouse to visitors if it can secure the needed funds.
“The Society intends to be a proper steward of the historic structures that have been entrusted to it,” said Gloria Smith, Society president. 

“Just as the Society recently received generous financial assistance to complete needed repairs to the 1859 Jail Museum, it now respectfully asks supporters to consider assisting in the restoration of the Howard Schoolhouse,” Smith added.

The society received the building as a donation in 1959.

Both it, and one-room schoolhouses across the country, have a long legacy.

BY BRIAN BURNES

To learn about how to donate to the restoration of the Howard Schoolhouse, go to jchs.org/save-our-schoolhouse

Read More

The 1859 Jail and Marshal’s Home on the Independence Square has a long and storied history. It held countless felons, petty thieves, and even a few outlaws. Meanwhile, just a few feet away from the cell block, generations of jailers and their families lived in comfortable domestic quarters in the adjoining home built for their use.

Of all that has played out at the jail over the past century and one half, one of the most dramatic and tragic events was the murder of Sheriff Henry Bugler on the evening of June 13, 1866. The shooting of one of the area’s most prominent law enforcement officers sent a shock wave through the county, which was still struggling to heal deep wounds from the just-ended Civil War. With controversial Reconstruction policies being implemented across the South and the border states, the murder carried political overtones and was covered by newspapers nationwide.

Despite the attention it received, no one was ever charged or convicted of the crime. To this day, mystery surrounds the events of that violent night. All the witnesses and participants have long since passed away. We will never know for sure who fired the fatal shot. What we can do is review the known facts and consider who had the motive and the means.

By: BRAD PACE

Read More

He was the leader of the free world and he would be home for Christmas.

That’s what Harry Truman, alone in Washington, decided. In the earliest days of presidential air travel, he authorized a dicey flight through winter storms to Kansas City on December 25, 1945.

A photograph of Truman taken the following day just outside his family’s Independence home - cradling an armful of presents with a wide smile - presented the personification of the bountiful life put on hold during the world war that had ended only months before.

Behind the home’s front door, however, the mood was way more bah humbug. Upon returning from Washington the president had found a scornful spouse, not impressed with his efforts to bring in the holiday right.

“So you’ve finally arrived,” Bess Truman told her husband. “I guess you couldn’t think of any more reasons to stay away.

“As far as I’m concerned, you might as well have stayed in Washington.”

From the perspective of 2024, Truman’s 1945 holiday looks like the white Christmas that no one was dreaming of - an icy post-World War II case of contemporary holiday stress.

Perhaps it started with unrealistic expectations of yuletide bliss bumping up against the pressures of presidential imperatives, leading to a marital spat, complicated by concerns over health and workaholic fatigue.

Read More

As the Kansas City Public Library continues to celebrate its 150th year of service to the community, supporters have taken special note of its history and especially its first full-time director and so-called “Mother of the Library,” Carrie Westlake Whitney. In a remarkable career of nearly 30 years, she defied the patriarchal expectations of her time to leave an enduring mark on the library and the city. 

Whitney, who became the library’s first full-time Head Librarian in 1881, built the library from a modest collection of 2,000 books into Kansas City’s most indispensable civic institution with nearly 100,000 books.

Read More

Introductory note by co-author, Bruce Mathews: In 2020, Judith King and I, along with 30 “contributing authors” had just completed the book “Mount Washington Cemetery: In Search of Lost Time.” It was the sixth in a series of eight books, each taking a unique look at the shaping of Kansas City. 

Shortly after that book was completed, I was chatting with Steve Mitchell, one of the contributing authors. We were sitting on his front porch at #2 Janssen Place. He asked, “What’s next?” I said, “How about a book about your neighborhood?” I could tell immediately he had been thinking about it for a long time. He and his wife, Barbara love the street they live on, and they especially love their 1905 Victorian home they purchased, and began restoring, in 1985. They are now the longest tenured homeowners in Janssen Place, having lived there for 40 years. They have raised their four wonderful children in the home.  

With Steve’s motivation and personal interest, we have now completed the seventh book in the series which pays tribute to many of those who have helped make Kansas City a better place in which to live.  This one is titled “Janssen Place: Still on Parade After 125 Years.” 

What follows are summaries of a few of the stories that come to life in much greater detail in the book. The book itself is a 368-page history of the neighborhood. The narrative below offers a glimpse, drawing attention to the developer, first homeowners, architects, builders, the architectural styles, subsequent owners and challenges that have been overcome along the way.  

The book can be purchased, ($40) online at www.jchs.org or in person at the 1859 Jail Museum. It can also be found online at www.mwchs.org or in person at the Mount Washington Cemetery Office, The Nelson-Atkins Museum, The Truman Library, the Kansas City Museum, Made in Kansas City stores, Forest Hill Cemetery office and Union Cemetery office.

By Bruce Mathews

Read More

There have been many Hell’s Half Acres.

There were the sections of Labette County, Kansas terrorized by the murderous Bender Family in the 1870s.

There was the Fort Worth, Texas red-light district, also in the 1870s.

Kansas City had a Hell’s Half Acre, too - from the 1870s through there 1890s.

In this month’s E-Journal Pat O’Neill - retired Kansas City marketing and public relations professional, as well as long-time historian of the area’s Irish community - serves as our guide through the district that earned that name in Kansas City’s West Bottoms.

O’Neill - who co-founded the annual Kansas City Irish Fest and is a former president of the Kansas City Irish Center - also is the author of several books. Those include “From the Bottom Up: The Story of the Irish in Kansas City,” published in 2000, and an updated version of the same title in 2015. 

In 2017 O’Neill published “Dearest Mother: Letters from a Lonesome Sammy, 1915-1919,” which compiled letters from George Wigert, an Army artillery sergeant during World War I - and a grandfather of the author.

In 2021 O’Neill, with co-author Tom Coffman, published “Ted Sullivan: Barnacle of Baseball.”

And in 2023 O’Neill co-wrote, with Pat and Kyle Kelly, “Kelly’s Westport Inn:
The Poorman’s Playground.”

O’Neill, a JCHS member, is also a former board member of the historical society.

The article below has been adapted from a lecture O’Neill delivered earlier this year at the Kansas City Public Library.

Read More

The Truman Sports Complex opened more than 50 years ago.

But right now - as the Kansas City Chiefs prepare for their regular season home opener on September 5 - its future is unclear.

Jackson County voters in April soundly defeated a sales tax extension ballot measure that would have helped fund a new downtown Kansas City baseball stadium as well as upgrades at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.

In June the Kansas legislature approved a plan that would expand a state incentive program in an effort to lure both the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals from Jackson County.

In July, during a Kansas City visit, Missouri Gov. Mike Parson said he expected the state to present a plan to keep both teams in Missouri by the end of the year.

So - in the words of Missouri native Yogi Berra - it’s ain’t over ‘till it’s over.

And, if it’s any consolation, during the mid-1960s, the eventual construction of the Truman Sports Complex seemed anything but inevitable.

This story previously appeared, in slightly different form, on FlatlandKC, a digital news initiative operated by Kansas City PBS. 

Read More

The 1905 Rock Island Railroad Bridge spanning the Kansas River in Kansas City’s West Bottoms was built to last. It dominates the area immediately west of the Hy-Vee Arena (formerly known as Kemper Arena).

Its weathered and lanky form is studded by countless large protruding rivets, binding together over 2,000 tons of “Carnegie” branded steel. More than 100 years ago skilled workers inserted each rivet glowing red hot into precisely-drilled holes and then hammered down the unformed end to close the joint. As the steel cooled it would contract to squeeze the joint tightly together. A strong build was needed to handle the heavy steam locomotives used at the time, along with their loaded freight cars.

The bridge ultimately outlasted the big livestock operations it was built to serve, and even the Rock Island Railroad itself, which filed for bankruptcy in 1975 and was liquidated five years later. But the men who built it so long ago would surely be amazed to see it today beginning a new phase of use as America’s first trailhead and entertainment district over a river.

What follows is the story of this remarkable transformation.

By Brad Pace

Read More

The latest phase of the continuing architectural conservation of the 1859 Jail Museum in Independence has begun.

In May, representatives of a local historic preservation firm started their six-month project, working to further restore the pre-Civil War landmark and stabilize its northwest corner.

The building, which opened for its annual visitors season in April, will remain accessible throughout the process.

The project, budgeted at $300,000, is paramount to officers of Jackson County Historical Society, which owns and operates the structure just northeast of Independence Square at 217 N. Main St.

“The society takes seriously its responsibility to provide appropriate stewardship of the 1859 Jail Museum,” said Gloria Smith, JCHS president. 

“It is important to preserve this unique and historic structure not only for today’s visitors but for those in the future.”

The work, arguably, has enhanced the visitor experience. 

While guests will not be able to enter the marshal’s office, located in the northwest corner of the building’s first floor, they will be able to look into the room from two separate doorways and monitor the project’s progress.

“If anyone wants to peek in there, absolutely, please do,” said Corey Thomas, a vice president of Pishny Restoration Services of Lenexa, which is conducting the project.

“We only ask that no one step into that space.”

Visitors are enjoying the rare opportunity to examine the 19th century building from a 21st century perspective, added Kaija Laney, the society’s visitor services coordinator.

“People are loving being able to see all the different aspects of the building.”

Guests, she added, “think it’s really cool that the jail is remaining open while the work is going on. This project has been planned for a long time and it’s exciting for them to actually see it come to fruition.”

There were also a few surprises after initial excavation work began in early June - ones that prompted, out of an abundance of caution - a call to the Independence Police Department.

Spoiler: the officer found nothing that concerned him.

Read More