Kansas City! Blues, Barbecue and…something else alliterative. On our way into the city we visited Harry S. Truman’s home. The house hasn’t changed much since the Trumans lived there. The whole neighborhood looked like Disney’s Main Street, USA; it had a charming turn-of-the-century feel to it.
Harry S. Truman’s House
In Kansas City proper, we went to the Federal Reserve to see the money museum. It’s pretty cool to see what 40 million dollars in cash looks like. It’s also fun to watch the robotic forklifts fetching pallets of money from the depths of the vault (even if you’re not allowed to photograph them).
Across the way from the Federal Reserve is the National World War I Museum. This is the official United States memorial museum. We had no idea it was in Kansas City. We also had no idea it was so comprehensive. We bought a two-day ticket, and spent a total of about ten hours reading everything we could find. It still wasn’t enough. World War I was an extremely complex event. The world at the time was basically a powder keg, and the assassination of the Arch Duke of Austro-Hungary by a lone radical was all it took to set everything in motion.
After all that history, it was time for some science. Specifically, a scientific comparison of Kansas City Barbecue to St. Louis Barbecue. We headed over to world-renowned Gates Bar-B-Q for the test, where I (sadly, for the home team) determined that St. Louis won.
Struttin’ on in
Another day, another museum, and I was particularly looking forward to the American Jazz Museum. The museum was fun, but small considering the scope of Jazz music. There were detailed exhibits on some of the big names like Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, but not as much coverage as I had hoped. (There was nothing on Herbie Hancock, Cab Calloway, Glenn Miller, Dave Brubeck, Louis Prima, Vocal Jazz, or Smooth Jazz, to name a few.)
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- Louis Armstrong on Time magazine
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- Save the wails
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- Blow that sax, brotha!
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- Stephanie Prima
That afternoon, it was off to Country Club Plaza – a 15-block district of fountains, Spanish-style architecture and upscale shopping. Oh well…two out of three ain’t bad. We strolled over to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, and found that someone left a few badminton birdies on the lawn. After careful consideration, we decided not to move them.
Badminton shuttlecock
There were actually numerous sculptures on the grounds including a glass labyrinth and a giant chrome tree.
That evening we headed to our couch surfing hosts on the Kansas side of Kansas City. On the way, we decided to grill. We didn’t find a park, but we did find an office building (closed for the day) with a picnic table. Good enough. Let’s grill!
Roadside burgers
In Kansas proper, we went off in search of more history, and found it at Fort Scott. That means it’s time for…
***BEGIN HISTORY LESSON***
Fort Scott was established in 1842 at the edge of American territory. At this point, most of the Native American tribes to the east had been shipped to the other side of the Mississippi River, courtesy of the Trail of Tears. A chain of forts – including Fort Scott – was established to protect the Indian from any more encroachment by settlers onto their lands. (Ha!) There really wasn’t much military work to be done, and so the army abandoned the fort and sold the buildings to civilians who converted them to hotels.
As Kansas was getting set to enter the Union, it was up to the citizens to decide whether it would enter as a free state or a slave state. Settlers began to pour in from both pro-slavery and anti-slavery regions in order to sway the vote. These highly polarized groups found themselves in two hotels across the quad from each other at Fort Scott. Naturally, they wasted no time in getting into fights, and murdering each other. These conflicts and many like them led to the term Bleeding Kansas.
Kansas was eventually admitted as a Free State, and Fort Scott was used to house and train Black soldiers during the civil war.
***END HISTORY LESSON***
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- Fort Scott
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- Army barracks were prone to bedbugs
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- Tallgrass prairie
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- Downtown Fort Scott
Fort Scott marked the most western point this trip would take. From here we began the trek back to Philly, and on the way, we celebrated our second 1000 miles by continuing to drive. Just because we were looping back didn’t mean we were out of history and sights to see!
We stopped at Abraham Lincoln’s Boyhood Home in Indiana. This is where he lived from the time he was 7 until he was 21. It is currently a living historical farm in that the National Park Service still raises some crops and livestock here.
We ended our day with a treat. A southern fried treat. Some time ago, we discovered Ryan’s – a buffet restaurant with all kinds of Southern Goodness including fried catfish, hush puppies and my all-time fave – fried okra aka Southern Popcorn! Woo hoo!
Ryan’s!
MileHighDuo Meets the World 