Long ago on independence square (Kansas City, Lee's Summit: sponsorship, pink, sales)

[CaseyMO]

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

I gathered this information from some sites on the web. Latimer Motors started at 101 E 24 Highway in 1946. They must have transfered to the 301 S Main site when the Kaiser-Fraser dealer went out. Info on the Truman Library web site says that Latimer made sure that Harry Truman drove his cars. Latimer sold Dodge Plymouth. I saw Harry Truman in '57 driving a '57 Chrysler. The library indicated that Latimer also supplied Chrysler cars to Truman.

Thanks WCHS'59. The picture of the ad is so cool. My brother played for Latimer Motors in Kiwanis baseball. When they quit sponsoring a team, Gateway Sporting Goods took their place.

[WCHS'59]

From various places on the web:

Guy Hinkle incorporated on August 5, 1957, selling Edsels. He located at 300 N Noland, which would be right where the Police Department is today considering that Noland once ran straight through downtown rather than jogging east from Farmer to Walnut as it now does.

Hinkle soon relocated to 218 N Osage. Someone said that McIntosh Motors (VW) was located here but in 1963 McIntosh was at the old Latimer site at Main and Walnut and suffered a $200,000 fire. The fire was caused by some cleaning solution that McIntosh was using on new cars. A building heater was in the vicinity of the work area.

McIntosh leased from Latimer and Latimer sued McIntosh in state court as being liable for the fire and because McIntosh immediately terminated the lease and went elsewhere (maybe 218 N Osage before relocating to 1900 S Noland Road?).

The Walnut and Main site was out of commission until 1965 when Latimer leased a repaired building to someone else. In 1974, the court found that McIntosh was not responsible for the fire but awarded Latimer $800 for some cleanup for which McIntosh was determined responsible.

Prior to Guy Hinkle, the 218 N Osage may have been an Oldsmobile dealership. The Olds dealer relocated to a rather nice building (then anyway) at 11323 E Truman Road sometime in the early to mid fifties. Because of the messed up Independence address system, Google Maps shows this address as 11323 E. West Truman Road, chuckle.

Diamond Bowl is at 218 N Osage, having relocated from the old site on Spring Street behind Lund Studebaker, and apparently still going strong.

Guy Hinkle must have disappeared with the Edsel.

[WCHS'59]

Casey, what are your thoughts as to the year that Independence went to one way streets around the square?

[Mad Anthonie]

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Guy Hinkle incorporated on August 5, 1957, selling Edsels. He located at 300 N Noland, which would be right where the Police Department is today considering that Noland once ran straight through downtown rather than jogging east from Farmer to Walnut as it now does.

I recall a grocery store at that location, the SE corner of old Noland & Truman. I think it was Thriftway. It was demolished to make room for the PD.

[MRG Dallas]

"Hinkle soon relocated to 218 N Osage. Someone said that McIntosh Motors (VW) was located here but in 1963 McIntosh was at the old Latimer site at Main and Walnut and suffered a $200,000 fire. The fire was caused by some cleaning solution that McIntosh was using on new cars. A building heater was in the vicinity of the work area."

Hmmm, maybe that is the infamous fire that I watched from The Square with my buddies and their dads, circa 1963 I knew I wasn't making that up!

[CaseyMO]

Originally Posted by WCHS'59

Casey, what are your thoughts as to the year that Independence went to one way streets around the square?

Good question. I am thinking that West Maple was one way going back to the 1950s. I don't recall the street in front of the old high school as being two way traffic. On the other side of the high school was Lexington and I recall it being two way then and now.

I cannot recall pulling up in front of Bundshu's from the south and parking in front. I believe the square was totally one way in the 1950s. When it became one-way, I have no idea.

Don't forget, I suffer from foggybrainitus, so if was the late 60s, I guess I just cannot recall. LOL!

[WCHS'59]

Originally Posted by Mad Anthonie

I recall a grocery store at that location, the SE corner of old Noland & Truman. I think it was Thriftway. It was demolished to make room for the PD.

His incorporation "papers" say 300 N Noland Road.

At first I had trouble envisioning a grocery store at that location. But over lunch I began doing a RAM check. Seems to me it was a longish building and maybe had the entry door on Truman with store windows fronting on Noland? I believe it was a Thriftway.

[WCHS'59]

Originally Posted by CaseyMO

Good question. I am thinking that West Maple was one way going back to the 1950s. I don't recall the street in front of the old high school as being two way traffic. On the other side of the high school was Lexington and I recall it being two way then and now.

I cannot recall pulling up in front of Bundshu's from the south and parking in front. I believe the square was totally one way in the 1950s. When it became one-way, I have no idea.

Don't forget, I suffer from foggybrainitus, so if was the late 60s, I guess I just cannot recall. LOL!

Chuckle. I thought I was pretty darn young when it happened. I also recall a "campaign" in the Examiner to remind people of the coming change that took place at midnight.

I put forth 1949 as the changeover date but the lady that started this Long Ago thread opined as to the streets being two-way when she graduated from Chrisman in '53. I found a photo of Maple Street that was supposed to be '52. The photo was taken on a Sunday with no traffic and it seemed to have the street going in two directions in front of the courthouse.

Whenever it happened, Maple became one way east from Grand to Lynn or Noland while Truman was one way going west from Noland or Main to Grand. They even built a new portion of Maple in the area off Truman Road going by where Pollys Pop used to be to accommodate the changeover. All the other square streets were one-way in the general vicinity of the square.

[WCHS'59]

Originally Posted by MRG Dallas

"Hinkle soon relocated to 218 N Osage. Someone said that McIntosh Motors (VW) was located here but in 1963 McIntosh was at the old Latimer site at Main and Walnut and suffered a $200,000 fire. The fire was caused by some cleaning solution that McIntosh was using on new cars. A building heater was in the vicinity of the work area."

Hmmm, maybe that is the infamous fire that I watched from The Square with my buddies and their dads, circa 1963 I knew I wasn't making that up!

I just checked the inflation calendar and $200,000 in '63 is now about $1.6 m.

Some kind of electric business is there now in what appears to be a "new" garage area. I can only recall going there and have no recollection as to what the building looked like back then.

[WCHS'59]

Discussing that Thriftway store on Noland brought back some general grocery store memories.

Remember when super market customers would place groceries on a smooth counter service at the checkout inside a simple oblong wooden device with an open front? The sides of the wood contraption were maybe four inches high. In the case of C&J United Super the counter was a shiny tin surface. The clerk would pull the groceries to him/her with a wood handle attached to the simple wood contraption.

Nowadays, the groceries are placed on a moving belt, although we have King Soopers out here in which the clerk takes the items out of the buggy one at a time and then places that item on a moving belt going to the sack boy/girl.

At check out, we often times had to call out the price on each item as it was rang up at each of the stores that I worked. That practice, though, would come and go and clerks did not care for the practice.

In the early 80s, Safeway out here used a scanner that also had a speaker attached and a synthetic female voice would call out the item and the price. It drove me crazy hearing that constant drivel and I am sure the clerks got tired of it much more than I did. That practice did not seem to last very long, either.

In ’65 I was home for a visit. My dad showed me a #303 can of peas or corn and asked me what the small square with black and white markings was on the label. I told him that it had to do with computers and would someday be used to check out groceries. He worked at the time in a United Sooper in northtown and no one there knew what the markings were. But I had no clue as to how it would work and I don’t think I had ever heard or read the term “scan." I think the term "swipe" comes to mind.

The only reason I knew about the scan label was that I had read about it in Time or another magazine. It was years before the grocers actually started scanning but the canning industry and others got a big head start.