The history of housing discrimination in KC (not a thread for race baiting/etc.) (Kansas City: neighborhoods, school district)

[luzianne]

Tried to edit my last post, but it was too late. The Kansas City mafia history is fascinating too. Was going to say that my relative born in 1919 also knew a lot about KC politics and about Pendergast, and the Kansas City crime families, including Civella and Gambino. When I lived in northeast KC, I lived just a few houses from Willie the Rat's (William Cammisano) house. I never saw anyone come or go from the house, but our Italian neighbors told us that was his house.

[luzianne]

Interesting articles on Troost as the dividing line.


How Troost Became A Major Divide In Kansas City | KCUR

Beyond Our Borders | KCUR

[MOKAN]

I'd have to say the most interesting thing I've learned from this thread is the fact there was a plantation with slaves centered in the area of 27th and Troost. I knew most of the plantations in Missouri were along the Missouri River and about in the area called "Little Dixie", but it simply never occurred to me there could have been any on the land that became urban Kansas City.

Edit: It seems Kansas City was blanketed with slavery. I already knew of the Wornall, Harris, and Majors houses, it just never crossed my mind that there were slaves on that land.

http://littledixie.net/Slave%20Housing.htm

The plantation I originally mentioned above, which was talked about in one of the links KCMO provided, was that of Rev. James Porter. It doesn't even seem to be mentioned in the above link, so who knows which others are accounted for on that list.

[todd00]

OP, A good book by Kevin Fox Gotham, “Race, Real Estate, and Uneven Development: The Kansas City Experience, 1900 – 2000", might be worth a read for more detailed information.

Below you can read a few parts of the book.
Race, Real Estate, and Uneven Development: The Kansas City Experience, 1900-2000 - Kevin Fox Gotham - Google Books

[ProspectiveTransplant]

Thanks for the great information, everybody. It turns out the JoCo Central Resource has a copy of the Gotham book linked to; there's a few people ahead of me in line for it but I put in a request.

I knew Nichols was a mixed bag for Kansas City but not the extent of his complicity in what has resulted. I wonder if eventually there will be a push to rename the street. Tulsa went through something similar recently; apparently a major street there (Brady Street) was named after a Klansman. They ended up retaining the name but changed its namesake to a different Brady.

Of course, there's a very strong argument that you don't simply erase history as it does nobody any favors.

[CrownVic95]

Originally Posted by ProspectiveTransplant

Thanks for the great information, everybody. It turns out the JoCo Central Resource has a copy of the Gotham book linked to; there's a few people ahead of me in line for it but I put in a request.

I knew Nichols was a mixed bag for Kansas City but not the extent of his complicity in what has resulted. I wonder if eventually there will be a push to rename the street. Tulsa went through something similar recently; apparently a major street there (Brady Street) was named after a Klansman. They ended up retaining the name but changed its namesake to a different Brady.

Of course, there's a very strong argument that you don't simply erase history as it does nobody any favors.

Nichols died in 1950....and thus lived in a culturally unrecognizable world as viewed from 2014. And I'm one of the few here old enough to remember American society prior to the social upheaval of the 60s.

Was Nichols personally complicit or was he merely an ambitious developer who was also a product of his time....as most of us are?

Over the years, there have been a lot of postings here vilifying the man. But I'm not sure that is any more fair than vilifying Jacob Ruppert for his 1927 Yankees being an all-white team. Things were profoundly different back then and the blame for the structural injustice that had been in place for many generations at that time could hardly be placed at the feet of any one man.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know this man's life in any great detail. So maybe there is more to the story that would support singling him out. And maybe there isn't.

One thing's for sure....and that is that J.C. Nichols did not segregate America.

[luzianne]

Originally Posted by ProspectiveTransplant

I knew Nichols was a mixed bag for Kansas City but not the extent of his complicity in what has resulted. I wonder if eventually there will be a push to rename the street.

Why would they rename the street? Society was totally different in JC Nichols' time and every other city was just like Kansas City. You can't take today's societal acceptance of blacks as equals and then go back to the early to mid-1900s and blame people who lived then for not thinking the way we do now. It was what it was. It is part of the history not only of Kansas City, but the entire United States. There were separate buses and separate schools and separate bathrooms and separate drinking fountains and separate baseball teams back then too. Are you going to assign blame for those things to someone too? We can't change history and it's not fair to blame people who were thinking in line with the norm of their day 50 or 100 years after the fact when society has changed. There were US presidents who owned slaves. Are you going to blame them for that all these years later based on TODAY'S societal norms?

On the positive side, JC Nichols was a great contribution to the Kansas City area because of his planned communities that are STILL great communities many years later. Where would Kansas City be without his participation? Kansas City would be a far different place today if not for JC Nichols.

http://www.kclibrary.org/blog/week-k...eath-visionary

[ProspectiveTransplant]

To be clear, I'm advocating no such thing; I was only speculating as to whether somebody might make it an issue at some point in the future.

[kcmo]

National story about KC area deseg issues. I find it a bit optimistic as KC's racial problems and lines have not really changed much and very little "gentrification" occurs in KC. But some interesting info regardless.

Cities moving beyond segregation

[PVPete]

Originally Posted by luzianne

Why would they rename the street? Society was totally different in JC Nichols' time and every other city was just like Kansas City. You can't take today's societal acceptance of blacks as equals and then go back to the early to mid-1900s and blame people who lived then for not thinking the way we do now. It was what it was. It is part of the history not only of Kansas City, but the entire United States. There were separate buses and separate schools and separate bathrooms and separate drinking fountains and separate baseball teams back then too. Are you going to assign blame for those things to someone too? We can't change history and it's not fair to blame people who were thinking in line with the norm of their day 50 or 100 years after the fact when society has changed. There were US presidents who owned slaves. Are you going to blame them for that all these years later based on TODAY'S societal norms?

On the positive side, JC Nichols was a great contribution to the Kansas City area because of his planned communities that are STILL great communities many years later. Where would Kansas City be without his participation? Kansas City would be a far different place today if not for JC Nichols.

Death of a Visionary | Kansas City Public Library

Isn't the rep of Troost starting to change anyway? My sister lived on Troost very recently - it was a nice neighborhood, right by Rockhurst. She said she never really felt like it was a rough place to live. A lot of Troost has changed dramatically I think. You go a bit east and its still rough I suppose, but Troost itself has become kinda nice. Rockhurst and UMKC have invested quite a bit in it, and isn't the streetcar going down Toorst?

I wonder if the Paseo will be the new dividing line.