Missouri Valley Sundays

As Kansas City grew in the 19th century, so did the business of sin. Noting the pervasiveness of vice and debauchery, a visitor in 1888 described it as “the best town this side of Hell.” In a discussion of her new book Storied & Scandalous Kansas City, author Karla Deel...

Censorship was an inescapable aspect of the American effort in World War I, applied not only to soldiers’ mail but also reports from war correspondents—including The Kansas City Star’s Otto P. Higgins. Higgins sent 218 dispatches during his coverage of the Great War in 1918 and 1919, including first-hand a...

Starting in 1918, at the urging of his son Harry, John Benton Hart began telling stories of a colorful three-year period of his youth. The native Kansan, a member of the 11th Kansas Cavalry, had clashed with Confederate Gen. Sterling Price’s army in the Battle of Westport and elsewhere in Missouri. He’d crossed the...

One of the earliest, and best, accounts of travel along the Santa Fe Trail came from a young physician, Rowland Willard, who trained in St. Charles, Missouri, and set off for the Southwest in 1825. His journals and subsequent autobiography chart a journey that took him to Chihuahua, Mexico, providing a rich account...

In a discussion of her book Pioneer Mother Monuments: Constructing Cultural Identity, University of North Dakota historian Cynthia Prescott walks through the proliferation, wane, and rediscovery of memorials to sainted pioneer women – in the Kansas City region and across th...

No artist captured the people and landscape of early 20th-century Missouri more than native son Thomas Hart Benton. As a child growing up in southwest Missouri, and later as an adult, he hiked the Ozarks’ hills and valleys and floated its rivers. Benton’s travels throughout the region are reflected in many of his paint...

Founded as a port at the confluence of two great rivers, Kansas City has the waters of the Missouri running through its bloodstream—threading expressways, delivering drinking water, carrying traffic and sewage, and emerging most visibly in the city’s celebrated fountains. Considering the Mighty Mo’s historic connect...

Mexican immigrants who settled in Kansas City’s westside community in the early 1900s faced discrimination, poverty, and a lack of social services. In response in 1919, the Guadalupe Center became one of the nation’s first social service agencies for Latinos. A century later, Guadalupe Centers, Inc., continues i...

In many ways, Kansas City’s early history is that of a stereotypical frontier town. Native Americans, pioneers, and cowboys are indelibly linked to the settlement of the area and the city’s heritage. Cattle and other livestock are crucial. But contrary to popular mythology, the Kansas City Stockyards did not fit the...

Commemorating Women’s History Month, University of Missouri-Kansas City social historian Sandra Enríquez identifies and examines some of the female immigrants – past and more contemporary – who were instrumental in shaping Kansas City’s politics, culture, and society.