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Dedicated in 1930 by J.C. Nichols' real estate company, this Ward Parkway fountain demonstrates the growth of Kansas City's southern suburbs in the 1920s. One of several simple pedestal fountains that can be found in this part of War Parkway, this Ward Parkway fountain represents the continued influence of urban planners on the shape of the community. By the early 1900s, the city's fountains were designed for aesthetics while previous fountains in more urban areas were designed to provide drinking water for horses and humans.

Sixty-Ninth Street Fountain

This Kansas City driving tour mostly follows the route of Ward Parkway, the crown jewel of Kansas City’s 135-mile boulevard and parkway system that was planned by architect George Kessler in the early 20th century. The parkway is named in honor of frontier trail outfitter turned Kansas City real estate investor Seth Ward. Heirs of Ward worked with real estate developer J.C. Nichols, donating the original ninety acres that would become Ward Parkway in 1908 to become part of the city's parks and boulevard system and increase the value of adjacent neighborhoods. 

The parkway soon attracted some of the wealthiest families in the city, with public and private investment creating the parklike atmosphere that continues to make this boulevard a source of civic pride for many Kansas Citians. At the same time, the neighborhoods along the parkway included restrictive covenants in real estate deeds that accelerated patterns of residential segregation.  

This tour includes a handful of historic homes near Ward Parkway, taking a slight detour along Sunset Drive before returning to Ward Parkway for the last few stops and concluding at the historic Raphael Hotel. The tour can be experienced from any location. For those who are driving along Ward Parkway, users can choose to start at Gregory Boulevard (71st Street) and drive north to Country Club Plaza, or they can start at the Plaza and move south (hit the reverse order to change the starting place and order). Be sure to also explore the numerous Clio tours in the area for Country Club Plaza, Loose Park, and the UMKC campus. 

Ward Parkway Driving Tour

Ward Parkway was constructed in 1913 as one of the first major thoroughfares designed by George Kessler as part of the Parks and Boulevards System. These routes were constructed following the natural, stony terrain of the city, and landscaping and statuary were a significant part of the movement. In 1923, the land surrounding Ward Parkway from 67th to 71st Street was acquired by the J.C. Nichols Company for planned residential development. It remained vacant for some time but was developed in the following decade into the Romanelli Gardens neighborhood, with the subdivisions known today as Armour Fields (to the east) and Romanelli West (to the west). Located in the median of Ward Parkway, the sunken garden was constructed of shallow stone walls to both the north and south of a central pool. The original design featured lion figures placed at the north end and antique stone baskets imported from Budapest at the south, with steps on each side leading down to a courtyard surrounding the pool. Though the walls are still visible, trees and shrubbery have since been planted, concealing them into the landscape. In the center of the 16-foot by 36-foot rectangular, stone pool, the original water feature installed in 1930 was a fluted pedestal fountain containing two saucers and a slender figure of a girl playing a double flute. Due to vandalism, that fountain was later replaced with a single, scalloped bowl being lifted up and supported by a child, with a single jet spraying from its center. Sometime in the late 1900s it was replaced again with the present, two-tiered pedestal fountain with the cherub-faced basin. The Romany Road Fountain is one of the few remaining Kansas City fountains that are non-recirculating, draining directly into the sewer. Because of this primitive draining system, in early 2022 the city elected to turn off this fountain, and others alike, in an effort to conserve water.

Installed in 1930, this shallow pool and fountain were the centerpiece of a sunken garden constructed to enhance the newly built neighborhoods surrounding Ward Parkway. While the stone pool exists in its original form, the fountain has been replaced multiple times due to vandalism. The present is a two-tiered pedestal fountain. A single jet spouts from the summit of the upper bowl while the perimeter of the lower bowl contains the faces of four cherubs in which water streams from their mouths. To the north and the south of the pool, the shallow stone walls of the sunken garden are still visible, though much of them are concealed by trees and shrubbery.

Romany Road Fountain

In the early 1920s, during a trip to Italy, real estate developer J.C. Nichols purchased the Carrara marble sea horse sculpture that now adorns this traffic circle fountain. Prior to its move to Kansas City, it had been located in Venice for three centuries. The acquisition reflects the ambition of Nichols for the suburban neighborhoods along Ward Parkway, as well as the continued emphasis on developing parkways throughout Kansas City during this era.Kansas City’s Parks and Boulevards System was built through the early 1900s. As the city limits expanded south. Nichols was buying land and developing suburban neighborhoods. He proposed extending Ward Parkway, and once the thoroughfare was completed to Meyer Boulevard, Nichols donated the sculpture and hired the prominent architect Edward Buehler Delk to incorporate it into the traffic circle's fountain.Delk designed the iconic fountain featuring the mythological sea horses. Commonly referred to as hippocampus in Greek mythology, these sea horses feature the head of a horse (‘hippos’), the tail of a serpent (‘kampos’ meaning ‘sea monster’), the body of a fish, webbed feet, and a set of wings, which are thought to have made them swim faster. Hippocampi were often ridden by other sea creatures and associated with the Greek god of the sea, Poseidon, as they pulled his chariot. The grand sea horse sculpture is centered in the middle of an 80-foot, circular limestone pool, resting on a triangular stone pyramid. The fountain features two fluted saucers with carved lion heads and three cherubs that hold up the smaller saucer, which is topped by another cherub holding a fish. Water spouts out of the mouth of each sea horse and lion. Due to vandalism in the early 1960s, the Park Board had to replace the top figure, originally a child riding a dolphin. By 1991, the marble fountain had deteriorated, so it was removed and replaced with a sandstone replica the following year. The lighting was also improved at that time, including the addition of fiber optics. The fountain became inoperable in 2015 after flooding in the electrical vault, in which the electrical system, pump room, and the vault itself needed to be replaced. Funding from the City of Fountains Foundation and a successful $600,000 bi-state fundraising effort led by retired businessman David Fowler made the restoration possible. The remaining funds from the effort created an endowment for the fountain for future maintenance and repairs. After sitting dry for two years, the fountain was re-dedicated on October 25, 2017. The namesake of Meyer Boulevard, August Meyer (1851-1905) was the president of Kansas City’s first board of parks commissioners. He was born in St. Louis, Missouri but at the age of 14 was sent by his German parents to study abroad. He studied mining engineering in Zurich, Switzerland, graduated from the School of Mines in Freiburg, Germany in 1872, and later studied further in Berlin, Germany. By 1874 he moved back to the states. He landed in Colorado working at a government assaying post before becoming senior partner at A. R. Meyer and Company. He operated an ore-crushing mill and founded a smelting company, becoming president of the Meyer Mining Company. In 1881 as Kansas City became a major rail hub and industry was booming, Meyer moved his headquarters and purchased a small smelting plant which was later reincorporated as the United States Zinc and Chemical Company. When Kansas City’s first Park Board was established in 1892, Meyer was appointed President due to his experience in engineering and travels in Europe. Under Meyer’s leadership, the Parks and Boulevards System was created, and many of the main features of that system continue to shape the city today. Ward Parkway was designed by premier landscape architect George Kessler in 1913 as part of the Parks and Boulevard System. Kansas City built numerous parks and landscapes in the late 19th and early 20th century, an effort that reflected the City Beautiful Movement, where leading American cities invested in public parks, civic buildings, and landscapes along their major thoroughfares. Ward Parkway follows the natural path of the terrain, starting at the east end of the Country Club Plaza shopping district, then curving west-southwest and traveling south to around 92nd Street before making a final curve and ending at Wornall Road. The 12-mile stretch of parkway features a wide median full of landscaped green space, fountains, and statuary lined with historic properties. In 2012, the American Planning Association designated Ward Parkway as one of ten ‘Great Streets’ for exemplifying exceptional character.The parkway is named in honor of Seth Ward (1820-1903), who made his initial fortune as a merchant along the frontier trails of the America West before investing in real estate. In 1871, he purchased 212 acres of property near the Kansas-Missouri border just south of Westport. Years later, he purchased another 180 acres. As the Parks and Boulevard System was being built, real estate developer J.C. Nichols purchased Ward's property and other parcels to the south and developed residential neighborhoods, including the Country Club District. The Nichols Investment Company and Hugh Ward, son of Seth Ward, proposed the extension of the parkway as the city’s southern boundary reached 79th Street. They also acquired additional land and donated it to the city for the expansion. Named in Seth Ward’s honor for his contributions to the city's economy, Ward Parkway was one of the first major parkways in the system and connected to other major thoroughfares.Today, the neighborhoods surrounding the fountain are known for their beauty, but also the restrictive covenants Nichols included in deeds that prevented African American and Jewish families from purchasing or renting property. Banks followed suit with similar lending practices that limited the diversity of suburban Kansas City in ways that mirrored residential segregation in hundreds of other communities. Following the 1948 Supreme Court case Shelley v. Kraemer, restrictive covenants have been legally unenforceable, yet the demographic patterns of these and many other suburban neighborhoods remain similar to the early 20th century.

Dedicated in 1925, the Meyer Circle Sea Horse Fountain is one of Kansas City’s most iconic landmarks. Architect Edward Buehler Delk designed the fountain, which originally featured a 17th-century sea horse sculpture from Venice that was purchased by real estate developer J.C. Nichols during one of his trips to Europe. Nichols donated the statuary to the city to adorn the large traffic circle as the construction of Ward Parkway moved south alongside some of the residential neighborhoods his company was building in that era. The 30-foot marble fountain piece was later replaced with a sandstone replica in 1992. The fountain was deemed inoperable in 2015, area residents donated hundreds of thousands of dollars for needed repairs and the fountain was rededicated in October 2017.

Meyer Circle Sea Horse Fountain

Ward Parkway was designed by premier landscape architect George Kessler in 1913 as part of the Kansas City Parks and Boulevard System. It follows the natural path of the landscape, starting at Mill Creek Parkway in the Country Club Plaza shopping district, then curving west-southwest and travels south to around 92nd Street before making a final curve and ending at Wornall Road. The 12-mile stretch of parkway features a wide median full of landscaped green space, fountains, and statuary, and is lined with historic properties. In 2012, Ward Parkway was designated as one of ten ‘Great Streets’ by the American Planning Association for exemplifying exceptional character. A plaque at the north end of the pool commemorates the designation. The City Beautiful Movement was a major aspect in the implementation of the Parks and Boulevards System as it transformed the landscape along the major thoroughfares. The first water feature to be installed along Ward Parkway was a reflection pool designed by notable architect Edward Buehler Delk. Taking up nearly an entire block in the median between W 61st Terrace and W 62nd Street, this pool was occasionally used for ice skating and miniature boat races. In 1965 the pool was renovated, including the addition of three water spray rings. The rings were placed centrally within the pool, giving symmetry to the large fountain. George Kessler (1862-1923) was born in Germany and moved to the United States with his family in 1978. He returned to Europe to study landscape architecture and civil engineering before coming back to the states in 1882. He was first hired by the Fort Scott and Gulf Railway Company to design and supervise the construction of Merriam Park in Kansas. He then opened an office across the state line, in Kansas City, Missouri, and sought out other work. In 1887, he was commissioned for the development of Hyde Park, located in the largest planned single-family home development at the time. He transformed the rugged, overgrown limestone hollow into a beautiful park. In the years to come, Kessler began advocating for city improvements and in 1892, the Kansas City Parks Board was created. The following year Kessler performed an assessment on the city’s topography and with board president August Meyer, developed the Parks and Boulevard System - the most notable accomplishment of his career. His work can also be seen in Saint Louis, Dallas, Denver, Memphis, and Indianapolis. Kessler was also the landscape architect chosen for the Liberty Memorial, but passed away before it was completed.  Edward Buehler Delk (1885-1956) first came to Kansas City in 1920 when J.C. Nichols commissioned him as a consulting architect for the Country Club Plaza, the first shopping center in the country designed for the automobile. He designed many of the first buildings in the shopping center, including the Sudyam Building (now Mill Creek Building) and the Tower Building. Throughout his career he designed commercial buildings, churches, and private residences primarily in Missouri and Oklahoma. Some of his notable work includes the Starlight Theatre (Kansas City, 1951), LaQuinta mansion (Bartlesville, OK, 1932), and Community Christian Church (Kansas City, MO, 1950) which he took over from Frank Lloyd Wright. In addition, he designed Villa Phillbrook, the residence of co-founder of Phillips Petroleum Waite Phillips, (now the Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK, 1927) and the Philtower Building (Tulsa, OK, 1928) which have been accepted to the National Register of Historic Places.

Designed in 1924 by architect Edward Buehler Delk, this fountain was originally created as a reflection pool and was the first water feature along Ward Parkway. The three water rings were installed in 1965. The nearly one block long pool is located in the median of Ward Parkway, one of the first major thoroughfares created in Kansas City as part of the Parks and Boulevards System. The parkway was created in correlation with the development of J.C. Nichols’ Country Club Plaza district and other neighborhoods in plans to expand the suburbs southward. It features an array of beautiful landscaping and ornate statuary that landed it as one of ten “Great Streets” in 2012 by the American Planning Association.

Ward Parkway Mirror Pool Fountain

Brothers Michael and Isaac Katz, sons of Polish immigrants, spent their early childhood in Minnesota. Isaac left Minnesota to work on odd jobs along the railroad, later moving to Kansas City in the early 1900s, where he opened a fruit stand. When Michael turned 16, he joined Isaac in business, opening a cigar shop and confectionary in the lobby of the Adams Hotel across from the old Union Station.Michael Katz enjoyed a talent for merchandising and business. For instance, the government levied a sales tax on cigarettes at the start of World War I. Most tobacconists in the area increased their prices, sometimes raising prices as much as five cents a pack to increase their profits. In contrast, Michael continued to sell packs at the regular ten-cent price, while advertising that Katz would "pay the tax." In three days, the Katz brothers sold more cigarettes than they sold the entire month. The brothers used their success to open a second store but ran into trouble when a syndicate gang seeking to fix cigarette prices contacted them. Thus, Michael and Isaac decided to diversify and expand their product line to offset their tobacco sales.When the city passed an ordinance that allowed for drug stores to remain open past 6 p.m., the brothers hired druggists and transitioned their stores into drug stores, which included selling everything from patented medicine and housewares to "Katz Beer" and pet monkeys. As they had always done, they advertised, successfully marketed, and kept prices low (they relied on volume sales). By the 1930s the brothers expanded beyond the Kansas City area with a store in St. Paul, Minnesota, where the two brothers had been born. By 1933, with the nation in the grips of the Great Depression, the brothers had expanded to eight stores generating several million dollars in sales.The continued success of Michael Katz's drugstores allowed Katz to build a home among Kansas City's elite on Ward Parkway in the late 1920s. Plans for the renowned parkway, sometimes referred to as the "Gold Coast" arose during the first decade of the twentieth century. The neighborhood featured spectacular landscaping and lavish homes built by some of the city's most acclaimed architects. The luxurious Michael H. and Rose Katz residence, designed in the Tudor Style, is exemplary of the homes built for wealthy business people in the years before to the Great Depression, and the home reflects the couple's wealth and prominence.On March 18, 1930, roughly the same time that an article appeared in The Kansas City Star announcing the completion of Michael Katz's new Ward Parkway home, Michael was kidnapped and held for thirty-four hours until his brother Isaac paid a $100,000 ransom. No arrest was made regarding the crime, although many suspected it had ties to syndicate gangs.The Katz store remained in business until 1970. At its peak, the Katz drugstore chain grew to sixty-five stores in five states. While economically successful, the business found itself in the middle of the growing civil rights protests after World War II, namely because the stores did not serve Black customers at the soda fountain counters. Sit-ins and protests, sometimes lengthy, took place at Katz stores during the 1940s and 1950s in Iowa and Oklahoma. In fact, after three days of the student sit-ins in Oklahoma City, the Katz Drug Store managers agreed to serve the Black students;it became an integrated lunch counter.By 1970, the Katz drugstore had been sold. But, the home stands as a reminder of how two Polish immigrants used clever marketing to sell cigarettes and drug store goods, which allowed them to amass a fortune. The mansion sits among many elaborate homes, most of them coming in the prosperous years before the Great Depression. Echoes of the Katz store can be found throughout Kansas City, including the Art Deco clock tower at Main and Westport that was preserved as part of the terms of that former store's conversion to the Katz on Main luxury apartment complex.

The Michael H. and Rose Katz Residence, built in 1928, was the home of drug store mogul Michael H. Katz and his wife, Rose. The imposing Tudor-style home sits along Kansas City's illustrious Ward Parkway, where numerous prominent local citizens purchased property and developed stately homes during the 1920s. Together with his brother Isaac Katz, Michael operated drugstores in Kansas City at the start of World War I, and the chain grew rapidly in the 1920s. At its peak, there were over sixty Katz stores from Oklahoma to the upper Midwest and consumers appreciated the opportunity to shop for housewares and other items while they awaited a prescription. Katz became a household name for Midwestern families, and many Kansas City residents recall seeing the ubiquitous Katz logo on products like their house brand beer and their store marquees. Michael and Isaac Katz supported numerous charitable causes, including Menorah Hospital and other Jewish institutions. UMKC's Katz Hall, now home to the departments of Architecture and Urban Planning, was completed in 1965 and was home to the School of Pharmacy prior to its move to the Health Sciences Building at the university's Hospital Hill campus.

Michael H. and Rose Katz House

Real estate developer J. C. Nichols developed a plan in the first decade of the twentieth century to connect this part of the city to the system of boulevards, bridges, and private parks that the parks department was planning under the leadership of architect George Kessler. Inspired by the nationwide City Beautiful Movement, upper-class and upper-middle-class residents of Kansas City pushed their elected officials to invest heavily in constructing a network of parks connected by wide boulevards that included monuments, fountains, and landscaping. With investments from the heirs of Seth Ward's vast landholdings, Ward Parkway became the city's most prestigious street by 1920. Placing restrictions in deeds that prevented Black and Jewish families from moving to the neighborhoods Nichols and others developed along the parkway accelerated patterns of residential segregation. The grand parkway, with its elaborate landscaping and luxurious architecture, was a source of civic pride for many, but only the city's wealthiest white families could call this area home. At the time of the construction of this home, George E. Nicholson was one of Kansas City's wealthiest residents. Although born in New York in 1861, Nicholson spent most of his life in Missouri and Kansas. At age fourteen, he began an apprenticeship with his father, a building contractor, who handled the construction of a building on the campus of the University of Missouri. From 1880 to 1887, George Nicholson worked as a lead smelter for his father before opening his own zinc plant in Nevada, Missouri. By the turn of the twentieth century, Nicholson had established a large zinc plant in the natural gas fields in Iola, Kansas, owned and managed a chain of cement plants, owned businesses that manufactured bricks, and invested in natural gas operations; he became the first producer of natural gas to try to run a line out of Oklahoma.Around 1910, at the age of 49, he married for a second time and established residence and headquarters offices for his Portland Iola Cement Company in Kansas City. In 1919, two years after building his now-historic grand estate on Ward Parkway, Nicholson headed a group of investors in purchasing the Kansas City Gas Company and the Wyandotte County Gas Company and served as president. The companies later merged to become Cities Service Company.Despite not having a college education, George Nicholson was well-educated and maintained what was generally regarded as one of the best private libraries in the area within this mansion. In addition to his business activities, Nicholson established Methodist missionary schools in Baroda, India, and Manila, Philippine Islands. He also served as a trustee and endowed a chair of Philosophy and Bible at Baker University in Baldwin City, Kansas. In 1937, at age seventy-six, Nicholson died at his second home in Atlanta, Georgia.

This Neo-Classical Revival mansion was constructed from 1917 to 1918 for wealthy entrepreneur George Edward Nicholson along Kansas City's Ward Parkway. Nicholson earned a fortune operating cement plants, brick kilns, zinc mines, and gas companies throughout the Great Plains, Midwest, and South. By 1909, Nicholson's worth exceeded $4 million (equal to more than $120 million in 2024 dollars). At the end of World War I, Nicholson led a group of investors in purchasing the Kansas City Gas Company and the Wyandotte County Gas Company. Nicholson's decision to build his home beside Ward Parkway reflects the growth of the Country Club District, which attracted many of the wealthiest families from other parts of the city. In 1908, Real estate investor J.C. Nichols worked with the estate of the Ward Family, donating the land that would become Ward Parkway so that it would become part of the city's parks and boulevard system. The creation of Ward Parkway greatly enhanced the value of the Ward family's adjacent landholdings, and Sunset Hills and other neighborhoods adjacent to the parkway grew rapidly in the 1920s.

George E. Nicholson House

Pendergast's mansion speaks to his power and wealth, as well as the broader trend in powerful political machines present in U.S. cities during the first half of the twentieth century. In addition to the Pendergast machine, famous political machines include  William M. Tweed in New York, James M. Curley in Boston, and Richard J. Daley in Chicago. Although urban political machines occasionally produced beneficial results, they routinely came at the expense of corruption, exacerbated racial and ethnic tensions, and deficient civic services (because jobs went to individuals as political rewards rather than those qualified to perform the work). One can credit the genesis of the Pendergrast machine to Thomas' brother, James, who built a political network with revenue from saloons, gambling, and brothels. James moved to Kansas City in 1876 at roughly twenty years old and took work as a laborer, working ten to twelve-hour shifts six days a week. Still, James managed to save enough of his earnings (and gambling winnings) to purchase the American House in 1881, a saloon, boarding house, and hotel located in Kansas City's West Bottoms neighborhood, known for its rampant drinking, gambling, and prostitution; the American House helped foster that vice lifestyle. James opened a second saloon and entered the political scene a few years later. He began as a ward delegate and then eventually alderman. In fact, James spent nearly two decades in the city council, serving nine terms as an alderman until he died in 1911. Early in his political life, James learned how to turn favors into political influence, giving birth to the machine that sustained his career and one his brother would ultimately expand significantly. Thomas served as an alderman briefly before becoming chairman of the Jackson County Democratic Party and effectively its "machine boss." As the party chief, he exerted immense influence to win elections for hand-picked candidates, including padding voting ballots by using the names of the headstones of dead democrats, known as the "ghost vote." Thomas Pendergast also hired numerous influential block, precinct, and ward captains, amounting to one captain for every five voters. By 1918, the Pendergast machine staffed polling places with election officials dedicated to Pendergast and guarded by thugs and ruffians. In one instance, Pendergast's machine-controlled police refused to intervene when a voter was beaten unconscious and bloodied because he supported the wrong candidate.  Pendergast's businesses (and those he supported) also benefited from his machine-controlled political system. He threatened to hand out code violations to any First Ward saloon that declined to purchase liquor from his newly created T. J. Pendergast Wholesale Liquor Company. Boss Tom also arranged for the Ross Construction Company, owned by one of his ward captains, Michael Ross, to acquire lucrative city and county road paving contracts. Pendergast also operated as a silent partner in the city's garbage disposal company. Furthermore, he benefited by contributing to Kansas City's Ten-Year Plan in 1930, which involved building downtown skyscrapers and several miles of city and county roads, mainly with Pendergast Ready-Mix concrete. Also, Pendergast worked with his puppet city manager, Henry McElroy, to take federal funds obtained via the Works Progress Administration and use them to award financially rewarding contracts to and hire loyal city employees, who provided kickbacks to Pendergast's bookkeeper.Although he benefited financially enough to build a mansion, he managed to sustain support from the working class. As chairman, he procured millions of federal dollars for Kansas City during the Great Depression. His patronage and leverage over the police allowed illegal gambling, prostitution, and liquor sales to thrive during Prohibition. Finally, Pendergast routinely met with the unemployed, even providing them financial aid and money for medical bills because, as he noted, "They vote for the fellow who gives it to them…We never ask them about their politics. We know pretty well how they will vote after we help them."Still, despite all the perceived good he did for the "lower classes," his machine-controlled police, and having his leverage reach as far as state and federal governments, his mob-like operation, under-the-table support of gambling and prostitution, and rampant fraudulence eventually led to his demise. Activists, political enemies, journalists, women's groups, and clergy members spoke out about Pendergast's corruption. But, Pendergast's biggest mistake came when he actively supported James A. Reed instead of the eventual president, Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR). Roosevelt retaliated by appointing Maurice Milligan, a Pendergast adversary, to the position of U.S. District Attorney for Western Missouri. Pendergast also backed Lloyd C. Stark in the 1936 Missouri gubernatorial race, who won the governorship, turned his back on Pendergast, and began working to dismantle Pendergast's political network and influence. Stark and FDR ate away at Pendergast's machine and worked with the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Treasury, which led to an indictment of Pendergast and a sentence of fifteen months in federal prison (Leavenworth Penitentiary). While the mansion stands as a monument to Boss Tom's power and wealth, he effectively went to prison broke. He developed a gambling addiction that included losses of nearly $6 million. By the late 1930s, his debt to bookies and gamblers gave those he owed virtual control of Pendergast business.

The mansion, completed in 1927, served as the extravagant home of Kansas City's Democratic Party boss, Thomas J. Pendergast. "Boss Tom" Pendergast wielded his power as the area's infamous political machine between the mid-1920s and mid-1930s, expanding the control built by his brother. Pendergast had enormous influence over almost every aspect of Kansas City's political, economic, and cultural life. Moreover, Boss Tom chose candidates for office who voted in line with his wishes, which secured prized city contracts for Pendergast's businesses, providing him with immense wealth that allowed him to build and reside in the historic mansion. However, the political corruption he orchestrated led to a federal indictment and time in prison, and millions of dollars in gambling debts left him broke.

Tom Pendergast House

Hunter L. Gary was born in 1884 in Macon, Missouri. His father, Theodore, began his career as a lightning rod salesman before purchasing his first small telephone system in Macon, Missouri, in 1897. Theodore Gary &amp; Company enjoyed expansive growth in its first decade, pushing Theodore to move its headquarters to Kansas City in 1907. Hunter began working for his father in 1912 and became the company's first vice president and treasurer by the 1920s. In 1922, Hunter Gary sought to build his home in a neighborhood befitting his wealth and social status, and chose to build his new, grand estate in the Country Club District. Famed urban planner, J.C. Nichols designed the community. City planners throughout the U.S. copied his ideas for neighborhood planning in Kansas City while also putting into place restrictive covenants in property deeds, a practice used by other developers in Kansas City and around the nation. Several of Nichols' residential developments were located south of the city's downtown region, following the movement of wealthy residents in a southerly direction. In 1907, the Nichols Investment Company purchased approximately 1,000 acres of land beyond the city limits that became the Country Club District, named for the nearby Kansas City Country Club.In the Country Club District, Nichols built suburban infrastructure, including roads that followed the terrain, cul-de-sacs, buried water and sewer lines, and abundant green space, fountains, and other landscaping features. The District also included plenty of strategies, rules, and deed restrictions that prevented (or expressly forbade) people of color from living in the communities. The historic home's Neoclassical style, with its classic Green and Roman features, was popular in residential, commercial, and civic architecture from around 1895 to 1950. The style, which usually incorporates other class-inspired influences such as the Georgian Revival and Greek Revival, grew exceptionally popular after the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. Millions of visitors viewed the fair's "White City," a host of grand Neoclassical white buildings, giving birth to the architectural trend. Banks and government buildings emerged as the first to embrace the Neoclassic look. Still, the movement became prevalent among wealthy citizens who likewise desired their homes to express their success, influence, and importance. The design for Hunter Gary's home drew influence from George Washington's Mount Vernon estate. Like Mount Vernon, the Gary House is a rectangular mass capped by a hip roof with symmetrical pairs of interior chimneys. The porch traversing the front of the Gary House has a flagstone floor and eight square columns supporting a shallow roof. In 1928, Gary hired another architect to update the kitchen and add a breakfast room and sunroom. The Gary House originally had a balustrade across the porch that echoed the Mount Vernon roof line, although occupants removed this feature sometime in the 1950s. Gary lived in the home until he died in 1937, and his wife lived there a few more years before selling the property to Harry and Bessie Cook Abernathy in 1941. Harry T. Abernathy's father garnered wealth as one of Kansas' first furniture manufacturers. After Abernathy earned a law degree in New York in 1887, he returned to Kansas to work for the family company. Within five years, Abernathy became company treasurer. Meanwhile, in 1886, his father entered into a partnership to open the First National Bank in the heart of Kansas City's business district, which survived the national economic "panic" of 1893 and is now home to the Central Branch of the Kansas City Public Library. Abernathy, who never loved the furniture business, again took a job with his father, working at the bank as a teller assistant. And, just as he had done in the furniture business, Abernathy climbed the corporate ladder, becoming a cashier in 1900, bank vice-president in 1908, president of First National Bank in 1928, and finally Chairman of the Board in 1941, the year he purchased the historic mansion.Harry T. Abernathy died in 1948 at age 83; his wife, Bessie Cook Abernathy, moved out of the house the following year. Henry Cate, president of Flour Mills of America, Inc. purchased the home with his wife Gladys in 1949 and the couple lived there until 1953. Clothing manufacturers Grace and John Van Brunt, Jr. lived in the historic home until they died in 1973 and 1974, respectively; John Van Brunt, Jr. was the son of architect John Van Brunt, who designed the house for Hunter Gary. The house has had several owners since the Brunt's died, but it survives as a reminder of early-twentieth-century culture and economics. Like Hunter Gary, many families that enjoyed Gilded Age success passed on wealth and job opportunities to their children. Meanwhile, as older neighborhoods closer to the city center saw outmigration and decline, wealthy families people moved away from downtown regions to neighborhoods like the Country Club District. The grand home's Neoclassic style represents an architectural trend for civic, commercial, and residential buildings that spoke to the status and influence of its occupants.

The Neoclassical-style mansion was constructed in 1922 for the family of entrepreneur Hunter Gary, who followed his father's footsteps and expanded the family's growing fortune in the telephone business and other investments that shaped early Kansas City. The estate was designed by acclaimed Kansas City architect John Van Brunt, Sr., and represents the high-end residential architecture constructed in Kansas City's most exclusive subdivisions in the early 20th century. The house is near Ward Parkway in the Country Club District, part of the city's parks and boulevard system that connected the city to the neighboring residential area, which was developed by J.C. Nichols around 1906. Today, Nichols is known both for innovative urban planning and for including restrictions that prevented Jewish and African American residents from purchasing property. Brunt drew inspiration from George Washington's eighteenth-century stately Mount Vernon residence in designing the estate for Hunter Gary. Like Mount Vernon, the Gary House is a rectangular mass capped by a hip roof with symmetrical pairs of interior chimneys. The home was sold to furniture maker Harry Abernathy in 1941 and was later home to the owner of a flour mill empire and a leading clothing manufacturer.

Hunter Gary House

Charles S. Keith was born in Kansas City, Missouri on January 28, 1873. His father, Richard Keith, had recently returned to his home state of Missouri in 1871, as he had spent the previous seven years living in California after escaping prison for his role as a Confederate soldier in the American Civil War. As Kansas became the second leading coal producer, Richard Keith started The Central Coal &amp; Coke Company. It became the largest mining and distributing coal company in the West. In 1907, Richard Keith's successor, W.C. Perry, died, and Charles Keith succeeded him as president of the business.After seeing financial success, Keith designed and built his iconic Westport mansion in 1913. Designed by the local Kansas City architectural firm of Shepard, Farrar, and Wiser, the home was completed the following year. Costing around $75,000 (adjusted for inflation is over $2.2 million today), the Georgian Revival-style house featured 22 rooms and six bathrooms, first-floor walls finished in ornate mahogany, walnut, and quartered oak, and a grand, Elizabethan-style library. The extensively landscaped grounds were designed by the local landscape architecture firm of Hare and Hare, with large terraces, a formal garden containing unique specimens, and a lily pond that has since been replaced by a swimming pool. Keith only lived in the home for a few years as he never felt comfortable with its opulence; it became the home of Kansas City real estate and Country Club Plaza developer J.C. Nichols in 1920.Shepard, Farrar, and Wiser had their greatest period of success in the years between 1887 and 1931, and was responsible for the design of over 600 residential buildings in Hyde Park and Mission Hills areas of Kansas City. Hare and Hare completed several significant projects in Kansas City, including the original landscaping work on the grounds of the Nelson-Atkins Art Museum and, perhaps most notably, the design of the Kansas City Parks and Boulevard System and the master plan of the Country Club Plaza. Keith held many positions of power in the city's business community, including serving as the Director of the Kansas City Power and Light Company.During much of Charles Keith's life, the political realm of Kansas City was almost entirely controlled by the extensive Pendergast political machine. Through a network of bribes, fraud, and organized crime, Tom Pendergast served as a power broker for anyone who wanted to get ahead in the local political landscape. This all eventually came crashing down when Tom Pendergast was arrested for evading taxes on bribery payments in 1939. This left Bryce B. Smith, who had been placed in office by the Pendergast political machine, as mayor. For a time, Smith tried to work with the city council, but by 1940, it became clear that to move past Pendergast, the city needed a new mayor. Smith resigned on January 5, 1940.The city council chose Charles Keith to finish the last two months of Smith's term as mayor until they could organize an election. Keith remained busy with his coal and lumber companies, so after two months as interim mayor, he opted not to run for re-election and retire from politics. As a result, his term as mayor was the second-shortest in the city, with 1855's John Johnson recording 35 days in office. Charles S. Keith died in St. Luke's Hospital in 1945 at the age of 72. As a businessman, Keith participated in and led numerous organizations and public events in Kansas City.

Completed in 1914, this mansion was the residence of coal baron and former Kansas City Mayor Charles S. Keith. Designed by the local architectural firm of Shepard, Farrar, and Wiser, the mansion was built in the Georgian Revival architectural style and featured 22 rooms, six bathrooms, and a beautifully landscaped lawn. In 1920, prominent real estate and Country Club Plaza developer J.C. Nichols purchased the home and lived here until his death in 1950.

Charles S. Keith House

Corrigan earned millions and became an imposing figure in Kansas City, dominating the city's construction industry, streetcar system, and city government. Corrigan was known for many public fights with Kansas City Star publisher William Rockhill Nelson concerning Kansas City's street railway. Corrigan, one of twelve Irish Canadian brothers and sisters, was born in 1847 and left his Quebec home for Kansas City in 1868. Corrigan and a few of his brothers seized on the construction boom that followed the Civil War. The Corrigans built streets and purchased seven of Kansas City's eight horse-drawn streetcar lines.With Corrigan serving as a police commissioner, the brothers hired their railway and construction veterans to work in the police department. They also attempted to use their political influence to protect their streetcar monopoly. Nelson responded by writing numerous editorials that helped rally the public against the "Shameless Eight," city council members we accused on attempteding to grant Corrigan a thirty-year city railway franchise. In the years that followed, Corrigan and his family embarked on numerous construction and railway projects that ultimately benefited the city while bringing immense wealth to the owners. The city appointed Corrigan as the Metropolitan Street Railway president in 1902. With the mayor's and city council's support, he attempted to turn the job into an ostensibly lifetime position, but voters decided against it in a December 1909 referendum.Although Corrigan did not live long enough to enjoy the completion of this home, he commissioned this lavish Prairie School estate that would be home to numerous wealthy Kansas City residents. In 1914, one year after her husband died and this home was completed, his widow sold the house to Patrick White, who sold it three years later (1917) to Joseph J. Heim. Originally from St. Louis, where he worked for his father and uncle's successful brewing business, Heim moved to Kansas City in 1884 and established the Heim Brewing Co., producing 12,000 barrels of beer annually. By 1901, the Heim family owned and operated Kansas City's largest brewery, producing more than 140,000 barrels annually, and operated Electric Park, a popular amusement park near the brewery (opened in 1899). Heim added to his wealth by investing in real estate, banking, street railways, and the telephone industry, which proved a wise investment after prohibition compelled the Heim family to sell their brewery complex in 1920.After Heim's wife died in 1923, he sold the estate to Robert Sutherland, a wealthy lumber magnate. Unlike his predecessors, Sutherland remained in the estate for a lengthy period, staying in the home until his death in 1941, while his widow continued to live there after he passed away. Sutherland made his fortune by meeting the needs of oil derricks, first offering wood to those digging for oil in Oklahoma and other midwestern communities and then transitioning to steel. He later invested his fortune back into lumber, this time focusing on the needs of consumers and small businesses with "cash-and-carry" lumberyards. The home, regarded as the masterpiece of highly acclaimed architect Louis S. Curtis, combines Prairie and Art Nouveau architectural styles accentuated with traditional Japanese motifs. Its size and extravagance speak to Corrigan's power and wealth, and its presence alongside numerous other mansions in the Country Club District and along Ward Parkway speaks to the trend of wealthy entrepreneurs moving southward away from the city center to exclusive, racially restricted, suburban-style communities.J.C. Nichols, a nationally renowned urban planner, designed the Country Club District community. Several of Nichols' residential developments were located south of the city's downtown region, following the movement of wealthy residents in a southerly direction. In 1907, the Nichols Investment Company purchased approximately 1,000 acres of land beyond the city limits that became the Country Club District, named for the nearby Kansas City Country Club. Nichols built suburban infrastructure in the Country Club District, including roads that followed the terrain, cul-de-sacs, buried water and sewer lines, abundant green space, fountains, and other landscaping features. The District also included plenty of strategies, rules, and deed restrictions that prevented (or expressly forbade) people of color from living in the communities.

This mansion was built for Bernard Corrigan from 1912 to 1913 and designed by renowned architect Louis S. Curtiss. Corrigan was born in Quebec in 1847 and moved to Kansas City in 1858, where he amassed a fortune as a contractor, street railway tycoon, and real estate speculator. Corrigan also served as the city's police commissioner, with ties to the early days of the city's growing political machine the predated the infamous consolidation of power by Tom Pendergast. The Prairie School estate represents the luxurious residential architecture constructed in one of Kansas City's most exclusive subdivisions. Corrigan died two months before construction finished on the home, and his wife sold the property to Patrick J. White for more than $100,000 (equivalent to more than $3 million in the 2020s). In 1917, White sold the property to brewery mogul and amusement park owner Joseph J. Heim. Shortly after the federal government approved the 18th Amendment prohibiting alcohol, Heim sold the property to lumber magnate Robert Sutherland, who imported and planted 10,000 tulips each year until his death in 1941.

Bernard Corrigan House

The United Daughters of the Confederacy dedicated the monument at an entrance to the Country Club Plaza in 1934 to honor women who supported the Confederacy during the Civil War. The monument featured two benches on either side of a large headstone with the inscription, “In Loving Memory of the Loyal Women of the Old South.” Above the inscription was a Confederate Battle flag and a wreath with the name of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The monument stood at 46th Street and Mill Creek Parkway (later changed to J.C. Nichols Parkway and then back to Mill Creek Parkway) from 1934 to 1958, when it was moved to Ward Parkway and 55th Street.Founded in 1894, the United Daughters of the Confederacy was established by white Southern women who wished to shape the historical memory of the Civil War in a manner that lauded those who took up arms against the United States. Members sought to vindicate the ideology of the “Lost Cause,” an idealogy that minimizes the evils of slavery and suggests that Confederate soldiers were defenders of the Constitution. One of the UDC's strategies was to dominate the monumental landscape. They also attempted to shape school curricula with books and other materials that minimized the harms of slavery and presented those who took up arms against the United States as similar to the American colonists who took up arms against England. The UDC installed hundreds of Confederate monuments, with at least one in every state.To counter the narratives put forth by the UDC, the NAACP protested Confederate iconography on government property from 1980 to 2015. In the 1987 Southeast Regional Conference of the NAACP, they passed a resolution calling for the removal of Confederate Flags from the Alabama and South Carolina state houses and petitioned the Georgia and Mississippi flags to remove the Confederate Flag imagery. Beyond removing existing monuments, the NAACP and other local activists across the country have proposed "counter monuments" that further contextualize and fact-check the UDC narratives.Kansas Citians called for the removal of this monument for many years, but with national events centered on protests against monuments, greater attention was placed on the effort to remove this monument in 2016 and 2017. A letter dated August 14, 2017, from a local resident pleaded for the removal of this monument. Within a week the monument was vandalized with spray paint in the shape of a red hammer and sickle. After that, the UDC volunteered to have the monument removed to an undisclosed location. Early morning on August 20th, the monument was removed.

Between 1958 and 2017, this Ward Parkway intersection was home to a Confederate monument. The United Daughters of the Confederacy dedicated the memorial "To The Loyal Women of the Old South" in 1934. The monument was originally located near the entrance of the Country Club Plaza and was moved to this location in 1958. The monument's design differed from typical Confederate monuments centered on soldiers or generals. Instead, this memorial featured two benches on either side of a headstone with a United States flag and a Confederate flag. The memorial was vandalized in 2017, and within a week, the United Daughters of the Confederacy removed the monument to an undisclosed location.

Memorial To Loyal Women of the Old South (1958-2017)

Until 1825, Native American tribes such as the Kansa and Osage occupied most of the land now known as the Kansas City area. In that year, the Indians were compelled to negotiate with the federal government and subsequently accepted lands further west and southwest. This removal coincided with several other forcible and negotiated displacements spearheaded by President Andrew Jackson, including the 1830 Indian Removal Act. Early in 1831, a group of Mormon missionaries and families arrived in Jackson County, hoping to settle the region and also convert Native Americans. The small congregation, which had only been organized one year earlier by Joseph Smith in Fayette, New York, on April 6, 1830, believed that Jackson County was a place of Zion (the New Jerusalem). The Mormons settled on farms, opened shops, established a printing press, built a temple, and established a school. However, they only briefly preached to Native Americans before the Department of Indian Affairs forced them to leave, accusing Mormons of disturbing the peace between the indigenous populace and a growing number of non-Native residents. Meanwhile, other pioneers of European descent, who mainly were Baptists and Methodists, strongly opposed the pressure of the Mormon settlers because of their belief in the Book of Mormon. The fact that Mormons generally held anti-slavery beliefs in a slave state was also a cause for concern for some Missouri settlers. As a result, violent interactions transpired between Mormons and other Christians, eventually forcing Mormons to flee Jackson County in November 1833. By 1838, the Mormons left Missouri completely. Alexander W. Doniphan, one of the attorneys hired by the Mormons to gain compensation for the land they fled, received the property now known as the Ward Homestead as part of his fee. In 1840, Doniphan sold a portion of the now-historic property to Dr. Johnston Lykins. In addition to practicing medicine, Lykins served as a Baptist missionary who interacted with the Shawnee Indians. After a few years, he abandoned the missionary work and moved to the rapidly developing Kansas City, where he helped found the first newspaper, the city's Chamber of Commerce, and is considered to have been Kansas City's first "duly elected mayor" in 1854 and 1855. A Westport farmer named William Matney purchased the eventual Ward property from both Doniphan and Lykins on the same day, sometime before the U.S.-Mexican War. After Matney died in 1857, Matney's son-in-law took over the land, and he subsequently sold the land in 1858 to William W. Bent. He and his brothers established a trade business along the Santa Fe Trail. Much of the trading took place at a fort Bent built (Bent's Fort) in the 1830s along the Arkansas River in present-day Colorado. Bent not only negotiated peace among the many Plains in the High Plains and along the Arkansas River but routinely served as a mediator in disputes among Native Americans and the U.S. government. In 1835, Bent married Owl Woman, the daughter of Cheyenne chief and medicine man White Thunder; Bent became an accepted member of the Cheyenne nation. Bent's Cheyenne Wife died in 1847 and by the 1850s, Bent no longer used Fort Bent as a central location for trading, eventually selling it to the federal goverment in 1859. While owning the now-historic Ward property, he worked as an agent to the Cheyenne and Arapaho, continued his trading business, and freighted goods for the government. During the Civil War, some of the events of the Battle of Westport transpired on the Ward property which was then William Bent's farm. On October 23, 1864, Union and Confederate forces launched artillery, fired weapons, and engaged in hand-to-hand combat on or near Bent's farm. The Battle of Westport was the largest Civil War battle west of the Mississippi River, with combined casualties and deaths exceeding 3,000; the defeat effectively ended any Confederate military action in Missouri. Seth E. Ward, who exemplified the "rags to riches" narrative as a former hired hand on trading expeditions in the late 1830s, purchased this land from Bent's estate and widow after the Civil War. At age twelve, in 1832, Seth Ward lost his father and consequently had to work to support his family. Ward left his Virginia home and worked as a farmer's apprentice in Indiana but left one year later and traveled by foot for six months to return home. His mother found enough money for Seth to leave home again to find work, but after three years, in 1837, he arrived as a penniless seventeen-year-old in Independence, Missouri. However, in Missouri, he found work as a laborer in the fur trading business, living off the land and routinely sleeping in the open on bare ground for two decades. Still, he learned business and other lessons that eventually earned him a fortune later in life, including learning several Native American languages and marrying a Native American woman. Over time, Ward went from a greenhorn trading worker to a highly profitable trader, eventually gaining the position of post sutler (a civilian authorized to operate a store on or near a military camp or fort) at Fort Laramie in the southeast corner of present-day Wyoming, a role he maintained until 1871 when he moved back to Westport, Missouri. Ward's accumulated wealth allowed him to retire in his early 50s, when he and his second wife Mary, daughter of Westport hotel owner Colonel John Harris, purchased the now-historic property from Bent's estate. He commissioned acclaimed architect Asa Beebe Cross to design the mansion where Ward lived the rest of his life; the mansion sat within walking distance of the spot where, as an impoverished teenager, he had camped on his first trip west. Seth and Mary Ward continued to add to their property, eventually owning several hundred acres. But, as Kansas City rapidly expanded in both size and population, its boundaries eventually pushed past the Ward estate. Seth sold large tracts of his land to various developers. The Ward family maintained a significant portion of the land and the mansion until they sold it in 1942.

This expansive Greek Revival mansion was constructed around 1871 for the family of Seth Ward, a frontier trader who arrived in Independence in 1837 and joined a fur trading expedition. Over the next three decades, Ward earned a fortune by providing supplies to frontier military units and later outfitting explorers and settlers at Fort Laramie. After several decades on the frontier, Ward returned to the Kansas City area in 1871. He and his second wife, Mary Ward, daughter of Westport hotelier John Harris, purchased this land from William Bent, another influential and successful trader and land owner in Kansas City history. At that time, Ward's property extended from 51st to 55th Street and Wornall Road to the Kansas-Missouri state line. The property enjoys a rich history that goes beyond Ward and Bent, entailing Mormons, Native Americans, western expansionism, Kansas City's first elected Mayor, and the bloody Battle of Westport during the Civil War in 1864, which took place on the historic property.

Seth Ward House

Mary Rockwell Hook's father, Bertrand, left the Union Army after the Civil War in 1865 and settled near Fort Riley in Junction City, Kansas. He founded a mercantile company, a grain company, and then became a bank president. One of five daughters, Mary Hook was the middle child and was born 1877. Bertrand's wealth allowed him to send his daughters to what he considered superior schools in the Northeast. Mary Hook studied at Dana Hall, a girls' preparatory school in Wellesley, Massachusetts. She later enrolled at Wellesley College, which she attended from 1896 to 1900.After graduation, the Rockwell family traveled to numerous locations, such as the Philippines, Japan, Europe, eastern Canada, and New England, which allowed Mary to witness an array of architecture that inspired her to pursue a postgraduate architectural degree. In 1903, at the age of twenty-six, she spent the year studying in the architecture department of the Art Institute of Chicago. After a term teaching English in Puerto Rico and trips to Venezuela and Sicily, Mary Hook's second period of architectural instruction came in Paris in 1905 in an atelier préparatoire directed by a recent graduate of the lauded Ecole des Beaux-Arts.Mary Hook (still Rockwell at this point) studied in Paris as the only female student, alongside seven other American men. Sources indicate that her male peers excluded her, but she faced the gender bias head-on and returned from Paris with a mission to succeed as an architect. The first office to which Hook applied refused her because of her gender, but the second, a prominent firm — Howe, Hoit &amp; Cutler — welcomed her.Two years later, in 1908, Hook began to design homes, including the now-historic Bertrand Rockwell House in the Country Club District. Her first house, a bungalow, arose on a lot her father purchased for her. She followed that by designing a home for her oldest sister in Santa Rosa, California, and one in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Finally that year, she began work on the Bertrand Rockwell estate, which builders completed in 1909.The historic home's location in the Country Club District alongside numerous other mansions in the Country Club District and along Ward Parkway speaks to the early-twentieth-century trend of Kansas City's wealthy moving southward away from the city center to exclusive (usually racially restricted) suburban-style communities. J.C. Nichols, a nationally recognized urban planner, designed the Country Club District community and several other developments south of the city, mainly catering to the wealthy. In 1907, the Nichols Investment Company purchased approximately 1,000 acres of land beyond the city limits that became the Country Club District, named for the nearby Kansas City Country Club. Along with Nichols' idea to bury the water and sewer lines, design roads that followed the terrain instead of using a grid pattern, develop cul-de-sacs, and provide extensive green space and landscaping, the communities included plenty of strategies, rules, and deed restrictions that prevented (or expressly forbade) people of color from living in the neighborhoods.However, while the communities existed as racially restricted, several wealthy residents accepted the idea of hiring Hook, a woman, to design their homes at a time when men dominated the field. Extant records list only five female architects working in Kansas City from 1910 to 1930. Despite producing fewer works, Hook gained fame as one of Kansas City's most innovative architects. Nelle Peters, another female architect, also earned a considerable reputation. Peters designed Kansas City's Ambassador Hotel and numerous large apartment buildings in the Country Club District. She even designed the office building where Walt Disney established Laugh-O-Gram Studios. Unlike Peters, who became more productive following a divorce, Mary Hook's architectural work slowed after World War I into the 1920s. At the tail end of World War I, from 1917-1918, Hook lived in New York's Greenwich Village and worked for a post office translating "Spanish trade mail." In the spring of 1920, Hook joined the American Committee for Devastated France, organized by the philanthropic daughter of J. P. Morgan, and traveled to an area of Paris destroyed during the war. Morgan selected Hook to supervise the rebuilding of hospitals and schools and organize technical assistance programs for the district's farmers.When Hook (still Mary Rockwell at the time) returned from France around 1921, she married Inghram D. Hook. From 1924 until 1929, Hook maintained an architectural partnership with Eric Douglas MacWilliam Remington, who also studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Still, Hook began to split her time as she settled into the routine of an affluent, suburban wife and mom of two adopted sons, melding that role with that of a professional architect. In 1927, she completed her last Kansas City home when she designed the grand Four Gates Farm for her longtime friend Marvin Gates and his family, affluent Kansas City residents.In 1935, at age 58, Hook purchased fifty-five acres of shore property on Siesta Key, south of Sarasota, Florida. She spent the next fifteen years (roughly) designing an informal resort hotel, two vacation homes, and a guest house. Finally, at around age 73, she decided to end her career. But Mary Rockwell Hook lived beyond the age of 100, dying in 1978 at age 101.

Kansas City architect Mary Rockwell Hook designed numerous homes in this part of Kansas City, including this stately residence for her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Bertrand Rockwell. Despite facing scrutiny from her male peers, Hook and other female Kansas City architects like Nelle Peters broke the "glass ceiling" and earned a reputation as one of the most innovative architects in the city. The house she designed for her parents was built between 1908 and 1909 in the Country Club District, one of several exclusive communities near or along Ward Parkway. Hook did most of her work in Kansas City early in her career while also leading a rebuilding project in Paris after World War I. Hook worked into her 70s, designing resorts and hotels in Florida.

Bertrand Rockwell House

Mary Rockwell Hook's father, Bertrand, left the Union Army after the Civil War in 1865 and settled near Fort Riley in Junction City, Kansas. He founded both a mercantile business and a grain company and later became a bank president. Mary Rockwell (born 1877) was the middle child of five daughters. Bertrand's wealth allowed him to send his daughters to what he considered superior schools in the Northeast U.S. Mary Hook studied at Dana Hall, a girls' preparatory school in Wellesley, Massachusetts, which led her to enroll at Wellesley College, which she attended from 1896 to 1900. The Rockwell family traveled to several locations worldwide, including Asia, the Pacific Islands, Canada, and the U.S., which allowed Mary to witness an array of architecture that inspired her to pursue a postgraduate architectural degree. In 1903, at the age of twenty-six, she spent the year studying in the architecture department of the Art Institute of Chicago. After a term teaching English in Puerto Rico and trips to Venezuela and Sicily, Mary Rockwell Hook's second period of architectural instruction came in Paris in 1905 in an atelier préparatoire directed by a recent graduate of the lauded Ecole des Beaux-Arts. She studied in Paris as the only female student, alongside seven other American men who did not think too kindly of her. Indeed, finding acceptance among her male peers proved exceptionally difficult. Nevertheless, she faced the gender bias head-on and returned from Paris with a mission to succeed as an architect. The first office to which Hook applied refused her because of her sex, but the second, a prominent firm — Howe, Hoit &amp; Cutler — welcomed her. Two years later, in 1908, Hook began to design homes, mainly for Kansas City's wealthiest residents. The Ostertag arose in 1922 when Hook's architectural work began to slow down. At the tail end of World War I, from 1917-1918, Hook lived in New York, specifically Greenwich Village, and worked for a Post Office translating "Spanish trade mail." In the spring of 1920, Hook joined the American Committee for Devastated France, organized by the philanthropic daughter of J. P. Morgan, and traveled to an area of Paris destroyed during the war. Morgan selected Hook to supervise rebuilding hospitals and schools and organizing technical assistance programs for the district's farmers. In 1921, the year before building the Ostertag House, Hook (still Mary Rockwell at the time) returned from France and married Inghram D. Hook. In the early 1920s, the Rockwell and Hook families bought three adjacent home sites at the crest of a hillside serviced by a cul-de-sac drive. Hook started with arguably the most famous of the three, the "Pink House," where the Hooks lived from 1924-1931. And, close to those three lots, Hook also built the house for Janssen-Ostertag Manufacturing Company president Robert A. Ostertag in the same year. As a wealthy business owner in a large house, Ostertag's presence speaks to the abundance of luxurious residential estates along Kansas City's Ward Parkway, a development conceived and organized by famed urban planner J.C. Nichols as part of his plan for the Country Club District, where Hook also built a mansion for her parents. The parkway plan consisted of large lots, extensive green space, ornate parks, and several statues purchased in Europe. Many of the communities along Ward Parkway included racial covenants and rules that prevented or outright forbade Jewish families and people of color from owning property. The iconic Kansas City boulevard connected exclusive communities that were explicitly restricted to white residents in the first half of the 20th century.The house sitting just east of the actual Parkway speaks to its less-extravagant nature than the grand estates lining the main Parkway, but the timeless design still attracts attention, as does the home's connection to one of the city's most prominent female architects. From 1924-1929, Hook maintained an architectural partnership with Eric Douglas MacWilliam Remington, who also studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Still, Hook began to split her time between being a wealthy suburban wife and mom (of two adopted sons) and a professional architect. In 1927, she completed her last Kansas City home when she designed the grand Four Gates Farm for her longtime friend Marvin Gates and his family, affluent Kansas City residents.In 1935, at age 58, Hook purchased fifty-five acres of shore property on Siesta Key, south of Sarasota, Florida. She spent the next fifteen years (roughly) designing an informal resort hotel, two vacation homes, and a guest house. Finally, at around age 73, she decided to end her career. But Mary Rockwell Hook lived beyond the age of 100, dying in 1978 at age 101.

Pioneering Kansas City architect Mary Rockwell Hook designed this home for Robert A. Ostertag, President of the Janssen-Ostertag Manufacturing Company, in 1922. Hook designed many of the prominent homes in Kansas City in that era, and the Ostertag House demonstrates that even some of Hook's less grandiose designs still attract attention in Kansas City's mansion-filled Ward Parkway. Despite facing many obstacles as a female architect, Hook gained a reputation as one of Kansas City's most innovative. Most of her designs were built in Kansas City early in Hook's career, from roughly 1908 to 1927, but she also managed a rebuilding project in Paris after World War I. Hook completed projects in other parts of the U.S. in her later years and she spent the last fifteen years of her career (into her 70s) designing resorts and hotels in Florida. The longevity of her career matched her life as Hook lived past the age of 100.

Robert Ostertag House

Mary Rockwell Hook's father, Bertrand, left the Union Army after the Civil War in 1865 and settled near Fort Riley in Junction City, Kansas. He founded both a mercantile business and a grain company and later became a bank president. Mary Hook was born in 1877, the middle child of five daughters. Bertrand's wealth allowed him to send his daughters to what he considered superior schools in the Northeast U.S. Mary Hook studied at Dana Hall, a girls' preparatory school in Wellesley, Massachusetts, which led her to enroll at Wellesley College, which she attended from 1896 to 1900. The Rockwell family traveled to several locations worldwide, including Asia, the Pacific Islands, Canada, and the U.S., which allowed Mary to witness an array of architecture that inspired her to pursue a postgraduate architectural degree. In 1903, at the age of twenty-six, she spent the year studying in the architecture department of the Art Institute of Chicago. After a term teaching English in Puerto Rico and trips to Venezuela and Sicily, Mary Hook's second period of architectural instruction came in Paris in 1905 in an atelier préparatoire directed by a recent graduate of the lauded Ecole des Beaux-Arts. She studied in Paris as the only female student, alongside seven other American men who did not think too kindly of her. Indeed, finding acceptance among her male peers proved exceptionally difficult. Nevertheless, she faced the gender bias head-on and returned from Paris with a mission to succeed as an architect. The first office to which Hook applied refused her because of her sex, but the second, a prominent firm — Howe, Hoit &amp; Cutler — welcomed her. Two years later, in 1908, Hook began to design homes, mainly for Kansas City's wealthiest residents. The Pink House arose in 1922 at a time when Hook's architectural work began to slow down. At the tail end of World War I, from 1917-1918, Hook lived in New York, specifically Greenwich Village, and worked for a Post Office translating "Spanish trade mail." In the spring of 1920, Hook joined the American Committee for Devastated France, organized by the philanthropic daughter of J. P. Morgan, and traveled to an area of Paris destroyed during the war. Morgan selected Hook to supervise rebuilding hospitals and schools and organizing technical assistance programs for the district's farmers. In 1921, the year before building the Pink House, Hook (still Mary Rockwell at the time) returned from France and married Inghram D. Hook. In the early 1920s, the Rockwell and Hook families bought three adjacent home sites at the crest of a hillside serviced by a cul-de-sac drive. The Pink House was the first of the three sites constructed. Hook chose to use the pink plaster after seeing it at San Francisco's World's Fair in 1915. The Hooks lived in the house from 1924 to 1931. For much of the time the Hooks resided in the Pink House, from 1924 until 1929, Hook maintained an architectural partnership with Eric Douglas MacWilliam Remington, who also studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Still, Hook began to split her time as she settled into the routine of an affluent, suburban wife and mom of two adopted sons, melding that role with that of a professional architect. In 1927, she completed her last Kansas City home when she designed the grand Four Gates Farm for her longtime friend Marvin Gates and his family, affluent Kansas City residents.In 1935, at age 58, Hook purchased fifty-five acres of shore property on Siesta Key, south of Sarasota, Florida. She spent the next fifteen years (roughly) designing an informal resort hotel, two vacation homes, and a guest house. Finally, at around age 73, she decided to end her career. But Mary Rockwell Hook lived beyond the age of 100, dying in 1978 at age 101.

Mary Rockwell Hook, a pioneering Kansas City architect, designed several extravagant homes in Kansas City, including this structure in 1922. Known then as the "Pink House" this home in the Country Club District and near Kansas City's famed Ward Parkway is an example of Hook routinely drawing inspiration from her travels as she was intrigued by pink exteriors she saw in San Francisco during the 1915 World's Fair. Despite obstacles as a female architect in male-dominated the field, Hook gained a reputation as one of Kansas City's most innovative architects. She did most of her work in Kansas City early in her career, from roughly 1908 to 1927, and managed a rebuilding project in Paris after World War I, and she completed projects in other parts of the U.S. She spent the last fifteen years of her career (into her 70s) designing resorts and hotels in Florida; she lived past the age of 100.

Mary Rockwell Hook's Pink House

The Union Position was the initial position of the Union Army during the Battle of Westport. On October 23, 1864, Maj. Gen. Samuel R. Curtis set up his line along Brush Creek in order to protect the town of Westport, what is now a neighborhood in modern day Kansas City. At Westport, “Curtis believed that ‘the citizens and soldiers had so improved the natural strength’ of the place ‘as to make this position almost impregnable.’” (Gerteis, 198). Here is how Union forces got into their positions. At about 7:00 in the morning Maj. Gen. James G. Blunt moved south out of Westport, fording Brush Creek, either on horses or on foot, and then advanced southward. At about 9:30 in the morning, Confederate Gen. Joseph O. Shelby pushed Blunt back north, where the Union troops established a defensive line along the north side of Brush Creek. While pushing the Union forces back the Confederates had them outflanked and outnumbered. (The Historical marker is south of Brush Creek, even though the Union line was north of the creek because it is on public land, so the Monnett Battle of Westport Fund, did not have to pay to put it on private land) Shelby’s men got as far as the south bank of Brush Creek, but his attack stalled, due to being low on ammunition. So instead of pursuing the Union forces, he took up a defensive position along a stone fence along what is now 51st (for more information look at the Confederate Position below). At the same time that Shelby was taking up his defensive position, Union reinforcements arrived. At this point, the Union Position was set up.It is important to keep in mind that military formations are typically mobile either advancing or retreating. They are just stationary unless they are taking cover or holding a position, thus maps depicting these positions may show slightly different locations. The Union Position was set up with Col. Thomas Moonlight’s Cavalry Brigade covering the Union’s right flank (flanks are right or left as seen from a person in the formation) at the far left along State Line Road. Col. Charles W. Blair’s and Maj. Gen. George W. Deitzler’s cavalry brigades were in the middle left of the line covering a Union artillery battery. To the middle right were Maj. Gen. James G. Blunt’s and Col. Charles “Doc” Jennison’s cavalry brigades. Charles Jennison, of Jayhawker fame, also had an artillery battery in support positioned north of modern-day Loose Park. Lastly, Col. James H. Ford’s cavalry brigade was positioned on the far right perpendicular to the east side of Wornall Road all the way to present day Oak Street.At about 10:00 in the morning the Union line skirmished with the Confederate line. Ford’s brigade fought especially hard along Wornall Road. Blair accidentally desynchronized the attack, causing the entire line to not attack at the same time. The Union artillery, which consisted of about thirty guns, also shelled the Confederate line around 10:00 in the morning. The timber along Brush Creek proved a challenge because the Union could not get their artillery through the terrain in order to better support the attack. As Maj Gen. Curtis explained: “I tried to get through the timber with Dodge’s battery and two little howitzers of my escort, but the roads were not favorable and I left the farther movement of the right to Colonel Blair.” (qtd in Collins, 105) Both sides skirmished back and forth with neither making any real progress. The main Confederate attack failed and the Union regrouped on the north side of Brush Creek. The Union forces ended up out flanking the Confederates with the help of a local farmer named George Thomen, who was mad at the Confederates for stealing his horse (this action can be read about at the Union Flanking Movement historical marker at the intersection of Sunset Drive and Rockwell Lane) and ultimately won the battle. In 1979 the members of the Howard N. Monnett Battle of Westport Fund created markers at twenty-five significant Battle of Westport sites, as well as a thirty-two-mile self-guided car tour. Several of the markers are within walking distance in Loose Park and the surrounding area, such as the Union Flanking Movement marker, the Union Artillery historical marker, and the Battle of Westport Monument. The Union Position marker is more difficult to find as it is located in between two trees that are a bit overgrown. This marker is very helpful in understanding the position of Union forces, which allows one to better understand how they were able to win this very important battle.The Battle of Westport is an important part of Kansas City history as well as Civil War history. The position of the Union is crucial to understanding how the Union was able to use solid tactics as well as a local’s knowledge of geography and reinforcements in order to win a decisive victory. Arguably, the Confederates had the better position atop the bluff, but lacked the resources to capitalize on their advantage. The legacy of this marker is interesting, it is easily missed by the general public, but those interested have a bit of a challenge for them, due to it being technically in the wrong spot compared to the actual Union position, and being a bit of a walk from Loose Park. Its obscurity just adds to the adventure.

Historical Marker Inscription: At 9:30 a.m., Oct. 23, 1864, Gen. Curtis's troops from Blunt's Division formed a line along Brush Creek facing south. Jennison's Brigade was west of Wornall; Ford's Brigade east of Jennison's to Oak St.; and Moonlight's Brigade along State Line facing east. Col. Blair's Kansas Militia Brigade was west of Jennison. Union artillery was to the north firing on the Confederates to the south. About 4,500 men were in line. At sunup Blunt moved south with part of his division but was driven back by Shelby's Confederates.The Union positioning is crucial to understanding the Battle of Westport, which occurred on October 23, 1864, which is notable as being the largest battle west of the Mississippi River and is often referred to as the “Gettysburg of the West.” This significant battle was the final nail in the coffin of Price’s 1864 Raid into Missouri, causing the Confederates to retreat southward, ending the last major Confederate offensive in the Trans-Mississippi theater of the war. The objective of Price’s Raid was to seize St. Louis and take Missouri for the Confederacy; the Union had been in control of Missouri since early in the war. The Union was able to maintain control over most of Missouri for the remainder of the war. The Union Position historical marker is located on the triangle divider between Ward Parkway and Sunset Drive on the south side of Brush Creek and is part of a larger tour of the Battle of Westport developed by the Monnett Battle of Westport Fund.

Union Position (Price's Raid and the Battle of Westport) Historical Marker

This statue sculpted by L. E. “Gus”
Shafer is a larger-than-life depiction of a wagon train leader. It is one of several monuments in the Kansas City area that commemorate the region's connections to the Santa Fe, Oregon and California trails during the mid-19th century.The artist used
his own face as a model for this sculpture. The bronze statue stands on a large limestone rock. It
was a gift from Catherine and Miller Nichols, their four daughters, and the
artist. &nbsp;It was dedicated on September 8,
1973.

A plaque accompanying the statue reads:

<blockquote>"God slumbers in the rock He
breaths in the plant He dreams in the animal He awakens in man. – An Indian
proverb." </blockquote>

Other nearby bronze plaques
recount the history of the Santa Fe Trail and the Civil War Battle of Westport
that happened nearby.

Bronze sculpture of a wagon train leader sculpted by Gus Shafer. It is one of several monuments in the Kansas City area that commemorate the region's connections to the Santa Fe, Oregon and California trails during the mid-19th century.



Wagon Master statue

The Diana Fountain is a bronze replica of the original lead sculpture Diana and the Loves created by Walter Gilbert, founder of Bromsgrove Guild of Warwickshire, England. The eight-foot wide sculpture depicts the Roman goddess Diana lying on the ground with her bow and arrows, surrounded by cherubs as they pursue her with flowers. As enthusiasts of European art, the Nichols Company commissioned New York artist Bernhard Zuckerman for the Diana replica as the centerpiece to a grand display at the entrance of the Alameda Plaza Hotel (now Intercontinental Hotel) when it opened in 1972. The bronze sits on a pedestal inside a round basin and backed by a large wall fountain, 17 feet tall and 56 feet wide, designed by Kansas City architecture firm Kivett &amp; Myer. Diana was the goddess of wild animals and the hunt, often seen accompanied by her bow and arrow or deer. She was eternally young and beautiful and a defender of her virginity, later becoming known as a goddess of the moon, as the moon was a symbol of chastity. Despite this, she was also worshiped by women seeking to conceive. She was also the guardian of children and patron to the slaves, especially those seeking asylum. The Diana Fountain encapsulates her mythological image and is described by her creator Walter Gilbert as: <blockquote>"Diana, the virgin goddess, exhausted by the chase, has fallen behind the fir tree (the emblem of chastity) and is imploring the water spouting from the tree to hide her from the Loves pursuing her and pelting her with flowers."</blockquote>Diana and the Loves was originally cast in 1912 for Moreton Hall in Warwickshire, England, the private residence of Charles Garland, son of the co-founder for the National City Bank in New York. It still rests at its original location, which is now the campus of Warwickshire College of Agriculture. These are the only two casts of the piece. Bromsgrove Guild of Warwickshire also created two other works of art seen on the plaza, the Fountain of Bacchus (also originally located on the Moreton estate) and Neptune Fountain.

The Diana Fountain is a bronze replica of the original 1912 lead sculpture Diana and the Loves, and are the only two casts of the piece. The Nichols Company commissioned New York artist Bernhard Zuckerman for the replica as the centerpiece of the grand entrance of the Alameda Plaza Hotel (now Intercontinental Hotel) for its opening in 1972. The eight-foot wide sculpture depicts the Roman goddess Diana resting on the ground, surrounded by cherubs as they pursue her with flowers. It is located in the center of a round reflection pool, backed by a 17 foot tall wall fountain.

Diana Fountain

Tribute to Married Love is a larger than life bronze sculpture depicting Sir Winston Churchill seated next to his wife Baroness Clementine Spencer-Churchill. This 6 foot by 12 foot sculpture is a larger replica of the original Married Love, which now resides on the grounds of The Churchill's former family home in Chartwell, Kent, South England. Married Love was created by British artist Oscar Nemon, known for his many works of Churchill and other notable individuals. Nemon was commissioned for the sculpture by Miller and Jeanette Nichols in 1981 as a showpiece at this major intersection into the Country Club Plaza in tribute to Churchill’s political connections to the area and friendship with Joyce C. Hall, founder of Hallmark (1910).Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (1874-1965) was an influential political figure for Britain. He served in the House of Commons, was elected as a Statesman from 1901 to 1915 and Prime Minister from 1940 to 1945 and 1951 to 1955, and won the Nobel Prize in 1953. In response to the invasion of Nazi’s into Czechoslovakia in 1939 and the onset of World War II, Churchill started a national coalition, partnering with Premier Joseph Stalin of Soviet Union and United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt to promote unity through alliance in resistance to Germany. Once the war ended, the Soviets and their communistic policies were quickly gaining control of eastern Europe. Dr. Franc McCluer, President of Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, invited Churchill to speak at the school. Carrying on the allied relationship of Churchill and President Roosevelt, successor and now-President Harry Truman endorsed this invitation personally with a hand written note at the bottom remarking, “This is a wonderful school in my home state. Hope you can do it. I’ll introduce you. Best regards, Harry Truman.” Churchill accepted the invitation and on March 5, 1946 he gave his famous “Iron Curtain” speech - titled “Sinews of Peace” - which warned of the Soviet’s control and is seen by many as the initiation of the Cold War. The Hall-Churchill relationship started when the two first met during the reception of the “Sinews of Peace” speech. It wasn’t until a few years later when Hall was reading a book written by Churchill, Painting as a Pastime, that he realized Churchill had artistic talent. Hall proposed an idea that would showcase a variety of Churchill’s paintings in a series of Hallmark Christmas cards. Churchill was modest about his own work and hesitant at the thought of it not selling, however, he quickly responded telling his lawyers, “That’s a good firm. Make a deal with them!” Hallmark was granted a three-year contract with sole reproduction rights to Churchill’s art. First, eight oil paintings were sent to be considered and photographed for the card collection. In 1950, the first boxed set collection was released, receiving four and half million pre-orders. With that success, Hallmark produced more of Churchill’s work over the years which included cards, calendars, and prints. This relationship with Hallmark led to Churchill's first art exhibition, “Winston Churchill, The Painter,” which debuted at Nelson Gallery of Art on January 22, 1958 and traveled the country. After Churchill’s passing in 1965, Joyce Hall and long time friend Dwight Eisenhower flew to England together in a White House aircraft for Sir Churchill’s funeral services. Artist of Married Love Oscar Nemon (1906-1985) was an admirer of Churchill and known for creating many sculptures of him. Born as Oskar Neumann to a Jewish family in Osijek, Croatia, he was a self-taught artist with instinct and affinity for portraiture and sculpting, commissioning work in his teenage years. With rising anti-Semitism after World War I he moved to Vienna, Austria and worked as an apprentice with local sculptor Anton Hanak. A short time later he set up a personal studio where he commissioned portraits while experimenting with expressionism and cubism. His uncle owned a bronze factory which allowed him to cast his work. After a year he moved to Brussels, Belgium and studied at the Académie des Beaux Arts. Here, he won a Gold medal and went on to show at his first major exhibition. Shortly afterward, he changed the spelling of his birth name and started a career. Nemon had a personal charm, amusing his sitters with stories and anecdotes, drawing their animated impressions to produce his expressive sculptures. Throughout the 1930s Nemon sculpted many notable people, including Sigmund Freud, in which the wooden bust is now on display at the Freud Museum of London. As the political landscape continued to darken with the uprising of Hitler, Nemon moved to England and in 1941, he met Patricia Stuart and started a family. World War II struck personally tragedy to Nemon as he lost his mother, grandmother, brother, and most of his extended family as victims of the Holocaust. This is when his admiration for Churchill grew stronger. Nemon first met Churchill at La Mamounia hotel in 1951 and secretly sketched him in the dining room, impressing both Sir and Lady Churchill. They developed a friendship and Nemon went on to sculpt Churchill many times. In one sitting, Churchill attempted to sculpt Nemon, which is now on display at the Chartwell home. In 1981, the Country Club Plaza continued to rebuild and expand after the devastating flood in 1977. As Miller Nichols oversaw the construction on the Wornall bridge at Ward Parkway, he pursued to adorn the southwest corner with a new piece of art. Oscar Nemon was a personal recommendation from Nichols’ dentist and determined that a statue of Winston Churchill would be fitting due to his connections to the area. After deciding on a companion piece to his original sculpture Married Love, the $250,000 bronze was commissioned. To help pay for the artwork, Nichols partnered with the English Speaking Union who arranged a theatrical performance to spark interest. The ESU is a program established in the UK in 1918 that empowers peace through better communication between people of different cultures and countries, in which Churchill was Chairman from 1921-1925. On November 28, 1982 a benefit was held at the Folly Theatre in which the one time showing about Churchill’s life, “Churchill” succeeded in raising the funds. A Tribute to Married Love was installed on the Plaza and dedicated on May 12, 1984 and is accompanied by benches and a sound box playing recordings of Churchill’s speeches. The statue is a reminder of the 15 year partnership and friendship with Joyce Hall, the relationships he built with notable political figures from the area, and the remarkable day in Fulton, Missouri that started it all.

Tribute to Married Love is a bronze sculpture of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill seated next to his wife Clementine and was dedicated on May 12, 1984. It is a larger replica of its original, both created by Oscar Nemon. Sir Churchill was an influential political figure for many decades and created relationships around the world. His ties to Kansas City started when President Harry Truman endorsed an invitation to speak in his home state of Missouri, at Westminster College in Fulton. Here, he would go on to deliver the famous “Iron Curtain” address on March 5, 1946. At the reception following this event, Churchill met Kansas City’s Joyce Hall, the founder of Hallmark. Their partnership started a few years later when Hall discovered Churchill’s artistic talents and used several of his paintings to create a Christmas Card collection for Hallmark in 1950. Their friendship continued until Churchill’s death in 1965. During construction around the Country Club Plaza in 1981, Miller Nichols commissioned Nemon for a piece to adorn the busy street corner. Nemon chose a statue of Churchill due to his personal ties to the area. The nearly 6 foot by 12 foot sculpture is accompanied by benches and a sound box playing recordings of Churchill’s speeches, and is a reminder of his international contributions and friendship with Hall that started on the remarkable March day in Fulton, Missouri.

Tribute to Married Love

This historic Kansas City structure was built within the former Loma Linda subdivision which was built as the city expanded and previously home to a rock quarry and brick year. In 1919, Sunset Hill Gardens opened for business at this location and the former flower shop was later moved to 4901 Glendale Road where it now serves as a private residence. As this area became home to the Country Club Plaza, developer J.C. Nichols saw the potential of this area overlooking the Plaza to offer luxury apartments that would resemble those next to desirable areas of other major cities. Inspired by the luxury apartments overlooking New York City's Central Park, the McCanles Construction Company built the Villa Serra Apartments in a style that complimented the Plaza's architecture in consultation with Nichols. The nine-floor structure utilized a mirrored design with the building consisting of two identical sections divided by an eight-foot concrete wall.The Villa Serra Apartments featured modern fire-resistant construction methods using thick brick walls that also reduced the cost of utilities and limited noise for residents. These features, along with the prime location on Ward Parkway were featured in the first advertisements for the Villa Serra Apartment Hotel in the summer of 1928. Rates ranged from $70 per month for a "bachelor suite" to three-bedroom and two-bath units for $200 per month, and all units included laundry service and maid service as well as utilities. The building was also home to a beauty salon in a space that is now home to the hotel's Chaz Restaurant. In addition to affluent residents of the city, tenants included TWA who utilized an apartment for pilots and flight attendants in an era when the city's main airport was closer to the city center.In 1974, the J. C. Nichols Company purchased the building and began a 180-day renovation process to prepare the structure for conversion to a luxury hotel. The hotel opened on September 8, 1975. Maxine Hill, the first manager of the hotel, had previously worked as a teacher before becoming a travel agent and spending three years working at the neighboring Alameda Plaza Hotel, now the InterContinental Kansas City. Famous guests who have stayed at the Raphael include Marvin Gaye, Steve Martin, Barbara Walters, Walter Cronkite, Frank Zappa, and George McGovern.The hotel is best known for its Spanish Renaissance architecture and its twin watch towers above the guest rooms on the hotel's highest levels which offer some of the best views of the Country Club Plaza, especially during the holidays. The hotel is also known for its ornate lobby featuring an oak-paneled ceiling and twin eighteen-torch chandeliers. In its early years, the lobby walls were adorned with salmon-colored velvet that required weekly vacuuming. The hotel patio has been home to a hand-carved marble replica of "The Boy With the Thorn" since 1976 when it arrived from Italy. The hotel is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is part of the Historic Hotels of America program.

Constructed in 1923 by Kansas City developer J. C. Nichols as the Villa Serena Apartments, this historic Kansas City building has been home to the Raphael Hotel since 1975. The building's architecture was designed in the Spanish Renaissance style of architecture to complement the adjacent Country Club Plaza and was inspired by the fine apartment buildings adjacent to Central Park in New York. The Villa Serena was acquired by the J.C. Nichols Company in 1974 and opened as a European-style boutique hotel the following year. Highlights of the hotel include the ornate lobby with two eighteen-torch chandeliers and the courtyard featuring a white marble statue by Italian artist Bernard Zuckerman. The Raphael is a member of Historic Hotels of America and has received recognition for its preservation efforts by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Ward Parkway Driving Tour

Sixty-Ninth Street Fountain

Introduction

Images