Zhou B Art Center; Attucks School

Constructed in 1905 and expanded in 1922, this historic school in Kansas City's 18th and Vine District has been an important institution in the community. The school was named for Crispus Attucks, a formerly-enslaved man who was killed in the Boston Massacre in 1770. According to a 1928 article in the Kansas City Call, the city's original Attucks School was established in 1880 in a building at 18th and Euclid. The school later moved to this stately building which was designed by Charles Smith and built in two stages, with the first section being completed in 1905 and an addition being completed in 1922. The building served as a grade school through the 1960s. The building was repurposed by the school district following plans aimed at integration and access, and it was vacant for many years starting in the early 2000s. In the fall of 2022, new ground was broken at the site to prepare for the building to be renovated into the Zhou B. Art Center of Kansas City, a $20 million dollar project that was completed in 2024 and converted the space into art studios, galleries, and event spaces that have brought new life to a century-old fixture of the area.

According to an article published by the Kansas City Call in 1928, the institution known as the Attucks School was founded by professor P. H. H. Williams in 1880. The school was located in two rooms of a now-demolished building that stood at 18th and Euclid, with "two teachers compris[ing] the faculty of a student body numbering less than one hundred." The school has moved twice over its history, first to a now-demolished building at 2108 E. 18th Street, and again to its current location at 1815 Woodland in 1905. The Woodland location was designed by architect Charles A. Smith, a well-known Kansas City designer, who also designed a two-story expansion that was added in 1922. (African-American Heritage Trail)

The Attucks school served as one of Kansas City's premier elementary schools for African-American students for over one hundred years. A graduation program dated to 1926 lists Principal W.H. Harrison and teachers Judith A. Syms and Mary L. Watrous, presiding over a graduating class of eighty-six students. According to the 1928 Kansas City Call article, "The present Attucks School at 19th and Woodland is known as one of the best and fullest equipped Negro schools in Kansas City. The building consist[sic] of twenty class rooms, six special rooms, two offices, a fully equipped gymnasium, an auditorium seating 600, manual training, branch library, a corrective gymnasium and a cafeteria in which many children, who cannot afford to buy lunches, are served free of charge." The article also states that Attucks School boasted an enrollment of 1,086 students during the Fall '27-Spring '28 school year. At one point, the school also played host to the Attucks News, "edited and published monthly by the fifth and sixth grade pupils of Room 16."

Like many aging school buildings, the Attucks School saw declining funds for maintenance especially after the school moved from this building to 2400 Prospect. That school was later closed by a school board redistricting plan in early 2016. The building sat empty under the care of the city for a while, before being sold to the Zhou brothers in 2018. The brothers, Chinese artists ShanZuo and DaHuang Zhou, first connected with community arts figure Alvin Gray at a Chicago art conference in 2017. Upon visiting Kansas City, the two brothers expressed interest in opening an arts center in the Attucks School building. Ground was broken for construction on October 4th, 2022. This art center opened in 2024 and is the third opened by the Zhou brothers, following the initial center in Chicago's Bridgeport neighborhood, which opened in 2004, and another center in Beijing, China, which opened in 2015.

Brown, Cloyd. The Attucks News. Kansas City, MO, n.d. 

Collison, Kevin. “Historic Attucks School to Become Major Art Center for 18th & Vine.” Flatland, February 4, 2021. https://flatlandkc.org/news-issues/historic-attucks-school-to-become-major-art-center-for-18th-vine/.

Kennedy, Mike. “Kansas City (Mo.) Board Votes to Close 3 Schools.” American School and University Magazine, February 26, 2016. https://www.asumag.com/facilities-management/business-finance/article/20852969/kansas-city-mo-board-votes-to-close-3-schools. 

Unknown. “Attucks School.” African American Heritage Trail of Kansas City. Accessed November 1, 2022. https://aahtkc.org/attucksschool. 

Unknown. “Attucks School.” Kansas City Call, July 27, 1928.