Central Library

Kansas City-born author and photographer Bruce Mathews tends to write about and photograph the city in its best light. Here, the sun has just set on Union Station and the warm hues of the sky and street lights complement the Station alit in purple. Mathews has written several books about Kansas City, including the most...

This poster presents the United States Capitol Building dome at sunset bathing the building in warm light that causes it to glow. An architectural cutaway superimposes half of the original photograph of the building, revealing its interior design and structural elements. A third layer of the graphic lines a row of six...

Clarence E. Shepard was born in Cortland, New York and grew up in Clay Center, Kansas. He began his study of architecture at the University of Berkeley in the 1890s and then moved to Chicago to work in the studio of Frank Lloyd Wright. After the birth of his daughter, Shepard moved his family to Kansas City where he pr...

This 19th century pedestal table is a beautiful combination of dark stained wood and glass and is accompanied by four chairs. The pedestal refers to the one "leg" in the center which holds the glass tabletop. The pedestal is comprised of a simple geometric base with a squarish form. As the eye moves up toward the cente...

This lectum was designed to empower the speaker before the audience. Rectangular in shape, the top of the piece provides ample space for the speaker to rest their hands on either side of the angled book platform. The platform is upholstered in a red velvet material in order to keep the speaker's materials from sliding...

This unique clock is thought to have been built in the 1950s by the Power & Light Building’s engineering staff in appreciation of the iconic Kansas City landmark located at 14th and Baltimore. The building, completed in 1931, is a 36-story structure and is considered one of the greatest examples of Art Deco architect...

Based in Kansas City, Irma Starr is a world-renowned potter who creates collectible works of art that are modeled after the 17th-century slipware style of pottery. This plate commemorates the Kansas City Public Library's 9th and Locust Street Location in correlation to Native American collections in Kansas City. The c...

This depiction of an early railroad worker, then-called "gandy dancers", was created by the artist to honor Irish immigrant laborers who contributed so greatly to the western expansion of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869. The figure shown balances on two railroad ties while holding a segment of track. The st...

This photograph appears to pronounce the institutions of knowledge, art, and architecture in featuring an antique bookcase, marble bust, and doric column as its subjects. Filled with rich brown, leather-bound books and comprising nearly half of the photograph, the bookcase suggests knowledge as the prominent value of t...

In this August 1900 cover for Puck Magazine, a man blown up to the size and shape of a hot air balloon floats along with "Kansas City" and "Convention" ribbons framing his head. The man is Richard Croker, the then-president of New York City's Tammany Hall, a Democratic political organization. Just as the tip of Croker'...