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Yes, people from Kansas aren't going to like this post, I realize that. But now, without Kansas City Missouri, what would that do to Kansas? And its universities? And, you nailed the hammer on the head, our Mayor was a Kansas grad. How sad. And plus, don't get me wrong, I don't mind Kansas being apart of this city, its just, I want this city not to take a back seat to them. For what I do want, is for this city to at least be more of what it really is, and that is, whether you like it or not, Missouri.
Edit: Now if Kansas City were to change its name, who would that hurt more? Our city of Missouri? Or Kansas? For Kansas feeds off having this metropolis for its universities, but it does not however, feed off of Wichita. And also, yes this is sport ranted. But trust me, there is a whole lot more going on than with sports. It's just my attention catches more of the sport scene.
If it weren't for Kansas City, I would imagine the influence would have infused some other city, maybe Wichita, maybe Leavenworth, maybe St. Joseph. Remember, the Hannibal bridge had a lot to do with Kansas City, MO taking off as the largest city historically in the region. Had that bridge been built in KCK or Leavenworth or St. Joseph, any one of those cities could have been what KCMO is now. Another possibility is that without Kansas's influence being infused into Kansas City, that it might have been infused more into Wichita and Wichita might be a bigger city. Who knows. Just the same, if JoCo hadn't become so dominant in the region, it might have been the Northland, or Lee's Summit, or whatever.
There's nothing wrong with Kansas City being the city it is. Big cities often aren't state-centric anyway. They often have their own unique identities not strongly tied to the state they're in as a whole. There's really no issue here. If thinks were different and Kansas City were infused much more with Missouri, people would be complaining about that, about the hillbilly association, Southern influence, evangelical Christians, slavery, etc.
Well then why don't we just billboard the university of Illinois in this city. And Ohio! And Iowa! Certainly it doesn't matter. States and their borders and their fans and their loyalties and their universities and their tax dollars and their pride do matter. And it does make a difference. And so please, if it didn't matter, then let's see if Kansas shall accept Missouri billboards and etcetera in its state.
Because those universities have nothing to do with Kansas City. KU does.
"Truly Missouri," you signed up on city-data just to post this thread? Your whole train of thought is kind of bizarre if you ask me. Changing the name - which you are right, isn't going to happen - would change nothing. Kansas City doesn't "belong" to Missouri. The Kansas City metro includes parts of Kansas and Missouri; you might as well accept it and get over it. Lawrence/KU is actually 45 minutes away from Kansas City, while Columbia is 3 hours away. And MU plays for the SEC now, so they aren't even part of our region as far as sports, and that was their decision.
I have no desire for KU to be "Kansas City" and I'm pretty sure no other KU alums do either. I'd much rather watch KU play at Allen Fieldhouse than Sprint Center. The reason games are scheduled in the Sprint Center is that there is a large KU fan population in Kansas City. Wichita, I think, would tend to be more K-State.
The "home of the Chiefs" thing? Oh get over it. Chiefs fans do that EVERYWHERE that the national anthem is played - I have even heard it when I was other states at various sporting events, including when I was in Florida. In the case of KU, it had nothing to do about KU fans proclaiming Allen Fieldhouse as "home of the Chiefs." How ridiculous. And actually Bill Self asked that fans NOT say that - because he thought it was disrespectful of the national anthem, not because of anything to do with Missouri.
As much as KU fans try to declare Kansas City as a KU city (which they do), it is still a city very divided between MU/KU. If Kansas City didn't exist the universities on the Kansas side would be all like Wichita State, MU would still have St. Louis.
Because those universities have nothing to do with Kansas City. KU does.
But do you realize they are billboarding in Missouri? Trying to shove it in our throats when they said that this was their city. And so, why then would it be upsetting for me to try and better clarify that this city technically isn't their city. But is Missouri's.
Missouri left the Big 12 or 10 or whatever conference because of what i do believe was Kansas officials who were catering on bend and knee to Texas. Something which caused Nebraska to leave, Texas A&M to leave, Colorado to leave, and Oklahoma wanted to leave. But God forbid that Missouri left also. In leaving Kansas with no out of state rivals, for Nebraska didn't want one, neither did Colorado, and certainly Missouri didn't care to continue one. Even though they offered. And so perhaps Kansas can pursue out of state rivals with maybe the likes of Wyoming? or South Dakota? I mean wow?! Shall we really flame the SEC?
Kansas City Missouri doesn't belong to Missouri? What?! What?! How Bizarre! Does St. Louis belong to Missouri? Does New York City belong to New York? What world are you in? For there are two different Kansas Cities you know: and they are not one. For one does indeed belong to Missouri.
Of course, I will agree with some, but not all of the original post of this thread. I think once you put aside the animosity and really think about it, Kansas City has become more Kansas and less Missouri and I have been saying it for years. And it has had more negative impact on the metro than positive. It would be nice if people could actually discuss this topic though because it’s actually quite interesting.
The Downtown, nearly anything “urban” and most of the culture remains on the Missouri side, but the economy and wealth has definitely shifted to the Kansas side and due to a lack of cooperation between KS and MO and more and more companies becoming less interested in urban KCMO, it has drastically changed the business and cultural landscape of KC over the past several decades and not for the better IMO.
As far as KU and what not. As a born and raised KCMO resident, I find it annoying that KC is a KU town for the most part (although probably half and half MU metrowide), but Lawrence is practically part of the metro area. I actually think Lawrence and KU are good for the city as a whole. KC is lucky to have a large university town right down the road. However, we watch a LOT of Royals games on TV and all the University of Kansas ads are annoying simply because they add to the confusion of where KC is nationally. There is an ad behind home plate for much of every home game. I can justify it though since it’s advertising a regional hospital and a pretty good one at that, but it is more proof that KCMO itself doesn’t have much corporate presence left within the actual city on the MO side. The vast majority of business growth, large corporations etc are in Johnson County now and KU Med has somehow trumped large MO side hospitals like St Lukes, Childrens Mercy etc in the marketing game. It is what it is. It would be nice if people stopped wearing college apparel to pro games though (in such large amounts), you know what I think about that .
I think one of the biggest signs of KC becoming more Kansas was when the Missouri Repertory theater dropped Missouri and become Kansas City Repertory Theater, which was obviously to better market themselves to the Kansas side and specifically Johnson County. However I don’t have a problem with the name change because like the sports teams, KC means the metro region. At the same time, I dislike the names Missouri Mavericks and Missouri Comets, I think they should be called the Kansas City Mavericks and KC Comets. I think the Kansas Speedway should be called Kansas City Speedway. However, people should KNOW THAT THE CORE OF THE CITY IS IN MISSOURI, even if the name is Kansas City. There is nothing wrong with the KS side, but it's the suburban side of KC. People don't know this and that is very annoying to most people from the MO side and even a lot of people from the KS side.
The reason teams like Colorado and Arizona are nicknamed using the state is because they want to market to the entire state, not just the city. In KC’s case, sports teams, the zoo, etc are marketed to and used primarily by western MO and eastern Kansas. It’s about 50/50. So I don’t think it makes sense change the names of the teams to something that seems to only represent one side of the city. However, I think it totally sucks that a city with a 50/50 fan support can only get the MO side of the city to financially support regional venues. Again, the lack of regional cooperation comes into play.
I actually like the name Kansas City, Missouri while I think Kansas City, Kansas is a lame name. If anything, KCK should be changed to Wyandotte (which is what most of the city was originally named) and KCMO left alone. Why should KCMO change its name when it was a city before the state of Kansas was even a state? KCMO is not named after the state of Kansas, it’s named after the Kansa Indian Tribe just like the state of Kansas is. In the early years of “KC”, it was the Town of Kansas in Missouri and the smaller Wyandotte in Kansas.
Having said all that. I do think that KC has become more Kansas and less City/Missouri and I also think the name of Kansas City really screws with KC’s national image. Would Missouri City be any better? Not really. While I think Missouri has a much better image than Kansas nationally, I don’t think it would improve KC’s image much because nationally, Missouri might sound more appealing to most people, there are probably 30 other states that people would rather live in than MO.
So what really needs to happen is for Kansas City to try to market itself better. One way to do that is to “attempt” to change the name of the city as more of a publicity stunt than anything. If KC and Missouri actually did this and pushed it far enough that the national press picked it up and sports broadcasters talked about it etc, then people would at least take notice. USA Today, Good Morning America, CNN, Sports Illustrated etc all would have articles/interviews explaining why Kansas City needs to changes its name and would give reasons for the proposed name change. Reasons like the city and metro area are nothing like what most people perceive Kansas to be like or the simple fact that the core of the metro is simply in Missouri.
Honestly, while the name gives KC a weird image, I find that people out here are pretty clueless about any city between the coasts. It’s just easy to make fun of Kansas and KC takes a lot of heat from that. I do find it odd that Kansans deny that the state has this image. Kansas has a TERRIBLE national image and it does directly effects KC's image. But that is mostly the fault of Hollywood and Topeka (politics), not the actual state itself.
KC doesn’t really need a name change.
It needs:
1. Get Johnson County, KS and Jackson County, MO on the same page first. That’s the one thing that is killing metro KC. The two largest counties that contain the vast majority of the population and business in the metro are fierce competitors and Johnson County has been the aggressor unwilling to think regionally.
2. The regional corporate community needs to find its civic passion again. KCMO is hollowing out economically and every year things get worse with companies having less and less interest or involvement in urban KCMO (or KCK). It’s okay to have the majority of your metro companies in the suburbs. That’s pretty normal now for cities of KC’s size. But the lack of interest in KC is off the charts. There has to be more that what KCMO and KCK are getting for the city to ever truly come back.
3. Investment in infrastructure both by the core cities of KCMO/KCK and the region as a whole. Yea, this means replacing airport terminals, building light rail/regional transit, recreational infrastructure etc. KC is still way behind and the gap is widening and much can be blamed on the state line.
4. Get away from MO and KS politically. Outstate MO and KS tend to have their way in Jeff City and Topeka and urban KCMO and KCK interests both are completely ignored for the most part.
Good post KCMO. For both your post and MOKAN's posts are very insightful. Really respectfully adding interest, and facts, and history unto this debate. For I must admit, that yes my original post may have been a bit naive. But, what it is trying to shed light on is not. And that is, that people from Missouri do want their border, and their city to be distinguished, and respected. For we gladly respect Kansas, it's just they didn't seem to respect us. With us, allowing it. And lastly, trust me, Missouri has so much more to it than you would think, but it almost seems deliberate at times, in how Kansas gets sponsorships when there are indeed more than enough corporations in Missouri that could fair equal, or even better.
I've noticed the same thing about KU. When ever I'm in KC, I see a ton of KU advertisements and memorabilia on peoples cars. I rarely see anything Mizzou. Even here in Warrensburg I see my fair share of KU stuff.
I've noticed the same thing about KU. When ever I'm in KC, I see a ton of KU advertisements and memorabilia on peoples cars. I rarely see anything Mizzou. Even here in Warrensburg I see my fair share of KU stuff.
That means there are a lot of KU fans and alumi, which makes sense since Kansas City is 45 minutes from KU. Mizzou is three hours away, but I still see a lot of Mizzou stuff. It just depends where you go. Since MU isn't in a conference anymore that encompasses this area, maybe they are doing their advertising in the area where they DO have their conference.
I don't see a lot of K-State stuff, either, in Kansas City. Some, but not as much as KU. Again, you can attribute that to the fact that K-State isn't 45 minutes away like KU is, and their fans and alums aren't largely congregated in the Kansas City area.
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Your whole train of thought is kind of bizarre if you ask me. Changing the name - which you are right, isn't going to happen - would change nothing. Kansas City doesn't "belong" to Missouri. The Kansas City metro includes parts of Kansas and Missouri; you might as well accept it and get over it. Lawrence/KU is actually 45 minutes away from Kansas City, while Columbia is 3 hours away. And MU plays for the SEC now, so they aren't even part of our region as far as sports, and that was their decision. 
How ridiculous. And actually Bill Self asked that fans NOT say that - because he thought it was disrespectful of the national anthem, not because of anything to do with Missouri.
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