Long ago on independence square (Kansas City, St. Louis: credit, how much, buying)

[Mad Anthonie]

Us workin' folks are having trouble keeping up! Here are a few responses to some of your earlier posts.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Here are some reminisces concerning McCoy grade school at 1010 South Pearl in Independence, now the Music/Arts Institute...

Miss Vada Trask was the principal.

My Beloved's mother and brother attended McCoy. By the time she started school the new Hanthorn was open, and Miss Trask moved over there as principal.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Someone previously mentioned their favorite soda pop and who could talk about old Independence without Polly’s Pop being a subject?

The Polly’s Pop plant was six blocks directly west of the square. Polly Compton...

Polly Compton lived in a beautiful old stone house on the west side of Delaware just north of Truman Road. It was on the south side of the alley, and had a large (4 or 5 car) detached garage in back. I lived another block north of him. Each Christmas he had large candles on the sides of his front steps.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Mad, glad you have this information. York Archery was manufactured under the company name of Woodcraft Manufacturing. They made other things also but I cannot remember exactly what. I do recall that 1970 fire. I was in the service at the time and now remember reading about it in my Examiner subscription. That same photo might have been in the Examiner, I am not sure...

There may have been a photo in the Examiner, but it wasn't this one. I was there and took a series of photos.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Clarence Heflin ran successively for state representative in 1966 and then state senator and I guess their partnership went downhill after his first election. I think they might have split the stores with Clarence perhaps selling his half but Jerry operating his stores as Jerry’s United Super. A

...I do not know Mel Waits but the store at 23rd and Kiger might have been sold to him and he kept the original name.

A clarification to my earlier posts about Mel Waits. We checked his obit, he owned the stores in Maywood and on Crysler. Heflin did run a store for many years at 23rd & 291. The building is now a DAV thrift store.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Those tracks going under that Main Street bridge were a branch line. If you followed the tracks eastward they crossed Noland Road at Walnut Street and went through residential neighborhoods generally following Spring Branch Creek out to or almost to Lake City. Today those tracks end just past the underground space around what is now Missouri 291.

There is also a remnant of those tracks coming from the east. It is a split off the UP line that is still active along the north side of Lake City. It used to end in the back of the Independence power plant, but recent road work has removed portions at Bly and the new Little Blue Expressway. That portion of spur hasn't been used for many years.

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Before arriving at the main, the tracks west also went by the Waggoner Gates Milling Company, maker of Queen of the Pantry flour. This was supposed to be the best flour produced in the Midwest. I cannot vouch for that statement but I do know we sold an awful lot of it in the grocery store where I worked. The mill exploded and burned sometime around 1965 or so but the National Frontier Trails Museum is now on that site.

As kids we played in the woods and fields of the Bingham/Waggoner estate. There were large chunks of the plant in the woods. The explosion was triggered by lightning.

More when I have time!

[WCHS'59]

Mad,

If anyone would have asked me about age, I would have said Vada Trask was the oldest of all at the McCoy School building. chuckle. Of course, everyone was old to me then.

I did not know she went over to Hanthorn and that must have been when they closed McCoy down.

The school district closed the old Benton school just after I left McCoy. It was kept for a while by the school district for storage or something. I can recall playing baseball at the new Benton school on Leslie Street on weekends.

On my last trip back to Independence, I could not find the old Benton School and it seemed like there were houses where the school should have been.

I found an Obit on line saying that Clarence Heflin passed away in 2007. I was not able to find any thing concerning Jerry Fisher.

[WCHS'59]

[quote=WCHS'59;24361130]
Across Truman Road from the fire station was Cable Chevrolet. I am not sure who owned it before him. Bostian might have moved there from Maple Street. Cable later moved to a location on south Noland.

At 315 N Main was the building that Cable Chervolet occupied. It was formerly the Oscar Maples Motor Company, a Chevrolet dealer I believe.

After Cable Chevrolet moved out, the building served as a medical supply place and ambulance barn for a few years.

The city of Independence owns the property now and Jackson County has recently issued bid solicitation to rehabilitate the Oscar Maples Motor Company building.

The rehabbed building will be for the use of Myarts, a nonprofit organization of some type.

I also found that there was a Latimer Motors, a Dodge-Plymouth dealer at 301 S Main.

[WCHS'59]

[quote=Mad Anthonie;24418960]
There is also a remnant of those tracks coming from the east. It is a split off the UP line that is still active along the north side of Lake City. It used to end in the back of the Independence power plant, but recent road work has removed portions at Bly and the new Little Blue Expressway. That portion of spur hasn't been used for many years.

Mad,

Without that rail line, how does the power plant get its coal, now?

If I remember correctly IPL built that Little Blue plant to originally run on natural gas because gas was so much cheaper than coal.

Then when natural gas got so much higher than coal, they converted to coal.

I know they run a plant at Missouri City now and are buying electricity wholesale from somewhere.

Does that Little Blue Valley plant even produce anymore?

[WCHS'59]

In Independence Junior High, school skating parties in the fifties were bussed to the Walker Cooper skating rink in Buckner, Missouri, east of Independence on 24 Highway.

Beginning in 1940, Walker Cooper was a catcher for the St Louis Cardinals and other teams.

He also was a coach for the Kansas City Athletics in 1960.

Cooper was born in Atherton, Missouri, which is located north and west of Independence a few miles from Fort Osage.

The rink is no longer standing.

[WCHS'59]

Fields Furniture was for many years on the northeast corner of Truman and Noland Road. I think it might have had to relocate slightly when Noland Road was widened.

For many years there was a huge unsightly junk yard on the northwest corner across from Fields. The yard was covered by a tall fence.

That junk yard covered the block west to the rear of the Cable Chevrolet dealership on Main. No one ever seemed to complain about the junk accepting it as a fact of life.


There is a local bus terminal of some sort there now that has shrubs and greenery. That must have been a big chore to clean up the junk yard mess.

[WCHS'59]

Fort Osage on the Missouri River near Sibley, Missouri, was a favorite visiting ground for WCHS high school students in the fifties.


There has been quite a bit of historical re-construction at the fort since I graduated from high school, including a two-story concrete and glass interpretative center.

And, one now has to pay admission to the grounds.

I enjoyed the fort but was later disappointed to learn that it existed on the Missouri frontier only from 1808 to 1823.

I also remember wondering why there were no Osage in Jackson County as there once were when the fort was built.


Turns out all the Osage in Missouri were moved to southeast Kansas and the role of Fort Osage was transferred to Fort Scott, Kansas. Fort Osage was no longer needed.


Apparently a lot of folks settling in the Sibley area raided the abandoned fort for building timber.


By the time Jackson County decided to begin reconstruction of the fort in 1949, there was only a portion of a sub-basement left in the factory building.

[WCHS'59]

In the early days, there was a trolley line running by the square in Independence.


This was the line that ran by the Swope mansion.


On the square, the rails ran in front of the future Jones Store on Liberty.


Those rails were not torn out when the line was abandoned but the space between the rails and the rails were covered over with asphalt.


In the mid-fifties, one could see where the asphalt had worn down and the two rail surfaces could plainly be seen for about one hundred feet or so.


I learned of this from a history teacher at Independence Junior High school—so I had to go take a look.


When Urban Renewal came in I do not know whether those rails were finally ripped out or if they are still down there, but you cannot see them the last time I looked.

[Mad Anthonie]

[quote=WCHS'59;24421305]

Originally Posted by Mad Anthonie

There is also a remnant of those tracks coming from the east. It is a split off the UP line that is still active along the north side of Lake City. It used to end in the back of the Independence power plant, but recent road work has removed portions at Bly and the new Little Blue Expressway. That portion of spur hasn't been used for many years.

Mad,

Without that rail line, how does the power plant get its coal, now?

If I remember correctly IPL built that Little Blue plant to originally run on natural gas because gas was so much cheaper than coal.

Then when natural gas got so much higher than coal, they converted to coal.

I know they run a plant at Missouri City now and are buying electricity wholesale from somewhere.

Does that Little Blue Valley plant even produce anymore?

That plant is still in use. The coal is trucked in. Soon the plant will burn natural gas again for parts of the year in order to comply with new federal standards. There is a story about that in today's Examiner.

[WCHS'59]

Allin’s Taxidermy was on east Lexington Street in the fifties. It is still there.

Mrs. Cooper’s Hobby Shop was on west Lexington about one block before the Safeway store and the Natatorium. She operated out of her house with what would have been her living and dining room serving as her sales area.

Monte Parker printing was on west Lexington, also.

H. Tupper Smith, a popular local photographer, was in the same general area on west Lexington.

At the bridge over the railroad tracks, Lexington split off into Crysler Street and Winner Road.