Kansas City History Class - Week 2

City Market Bull Mural
Originally uploaded by Chris in KC

This has been the best history class I have ever taken, and that comes from someone who has actually enjoyed most of his history classes. I have never had a class, however, where we toured the areas discussed and that has been really interesting. This week we toured the City Market area in downtown Kansas City. This is where Kansas City actually started approximately 150 years ago as the City of Kansa (named after the Kansa indians). Many of the original buildings still exist, although many of them have been torn down also. One of the most interesting things about this area are the murals and paintings on the sides of the buildings. It was difficult to photograph some of them because they are so large and there is no good angle without a street sign blocking some part of it.
We also walked out onto a river overlook point where we could see the Hannibal bridge. The Hannibal bridge was the first bridge to span the Missouri river in this region allowing the railroad to cross the river. Four towns were competing for this bridge (Atchison, St. Joseph and Leavenworth) but Kansas City won out. This is the single most important reason Kansas City is the largest city in this region as opposed to the other three. In fact, at the time this bridge was built both St. Joseph and Leavenworth were almost three times larger than Kansas City.
Here are some photographs of the other murals in this area. Enjoy.