“Local boy makes good” – such stories are traditionally earnest and heartwarming, and, to be frank, often a little on the dull side. The saga of Blevins Davis, however, is anything but predictable. He was born Charles Blevins Davis, the son of Julia Blevins Davis and Charles Ammon Davis, in Osceola, Missouri, in May 1903. […]

Cricket West was a fresh, new shop at 108 West 47th Street on the Country Club Plaza in 1938. Its owner was from an old Kansas City family, one steeped in retail. Arnold Adler’s mother was Emma Ganz Adler, the daughter of Bernhard Ganz, whose obituary described him as a “pioneer merchant.” Arnold’s father, Bernhard […]

In 1942, Random House published Instruct My Sorrows, a first novel with a distinctly unusual author’s bio: “Clare Jaynes was born some thirty years ago in Kansas City and again the following year in Chicago. She attended Vassar for one year and was graduated from Vassar after completing a four-year course. And although she already […]

Are these the eyes of a killer? Technically, no. All that was years in the future… Back in July 1939, our scribe wrote glowingly of a young woman who graced our pages: “A success story that we delight in telling is that of Ann Eden (Ann Crowell, as we knew her less than two years […]

She married a jazz musician. That doesn’t completely explain Tillie Heyle’s love for the Conservatory, but it’s a good start. During his college days at the University of Missouri, Alvin K. Heyle was the pianist and leader of Rocky Heyle and His Radio Band. He was 27 when they married in 1934 and already an […]

Author’s note: A decade ago, Michael Churchman wrote Storied Halls: The Brookside Hotel, Treadway Hall, and the Crestwood Condominiums Through Ninety Years, and this scribe is heavily indebted to him for his research. For anyone who grew up enchanted by the stories of Eloise at The Plaza, (in New York, alas, not on the Country […]

Reprinted from the May 9, 1942 issue of The Independent: Unheralded was Mr. and Mrs. Pasquale Di Cicco’s bow into Town’s social life last week-end. Guests at the Hotel Bellerive, the erstwhile Gloria Vanderbilt and her husband were initiated into Kansas City’s Saturday night merriment by Carol Hagerman and her Fort Riley house guests, Lieutenant […]

So lovely! The proposal, the ring, the wedding…  Oh, dear! The 10,000 details that go into planning the wedding…   Of course, you could always elope… In the early days of World War II, many young people were dealing with new and unpleasant realities. “’Til death do us part,” always a solemn statement, took on […]

[Editor’s note: The archives are an ideal place to find the unexpected. This article, originally published in the August 10, 1929, issue, is a reminiscence of happier days written by Clara E. Kellogg, publisher of The Independent.] While going through an old volume of The Independent recently I chanced upon a picture of the Chimney […]

Evan S. Connell, the novelist, grew up in Our Town, frequently drawing inspiration from the world of his childhood for his writings. His novel, Mrs. Bridge, a 1959 bestseller, introduced readers to a thinly veiled version of The Independent:  “The Tattler was Kansas City’s magazine of society: it consisted of photographs of significant brides, of […]

Sometimes, we like to imagine the places we’ve loved in the days long before we knew them. The Country Club Plaza is one such site. J. C. Nichols created it, and other entrepreneurs gave it their own stamp. Here is the story of two of them, Mary McGavran (Mrs. John C. McGavran), who found her […]

Molybdenum. That’s probably not what you first think of when The Independent magazine is mentioned. Here’s the story. Nearly 20 years ago, our scribe interviewed the chief executive officer of a local company involved in mining and minerals. After the article ran, the executive received a call: Would he be interested in partnering in a […]

Long ago, our scribe called Daniel MacMorris “multi-faceted.” He worked in oil, watercolor, charcoal, and pen-and-ink, creating portraits (including many of prominent Kansas Citians and benefactors and chancellors at The University of Kansas), murals (for the Kansas City Public Library, a local Sears store, and the city hall of Houston, Texas, among others), sketches, and […]

Back in September 1926, The Independent published a photo with this caption: “Winthrop Williams, good-looking, popular, young business man, who has signed a contract for life!” That was our scribe’s way of saying that Frances Royster had agreed to become Mrs. Winthrop Williams. We’ll spare you some suspense: death parted Frances and Winthrop only briefly […]

Need inspiration for your holiday shopping? You’ll find it here. Ours isn’t the most practical approach – the biggest item on our wish list is a time machine. (Imagine Santa Claus with his fingers plugging his ears, singing “La la la la” in a less than festive manner. Oh, well.) In 1950, for the darling […]

When Sue Cunningham married William Granger Blair in 1952, he had already launched his professional career. (Hers was still to come.) Bill was a newspaperman, as was his stepfather, the legendary Arthur Krock. (Arthur, known to nearly everyone who worked with him as “Mr. Krock,” was lauded in his 1974 obituary as “one of the […]

In 1950, Sue Cunningham was photographed feeding the pigeons in St. Mark’s Square. She turned 20 that August, and spent most of July, all of August and the bulk of September traveling in Europe with two friends. The picture was a sign of the future – her appearances in The Independent would frequently have a […]

Her maiden name was Margaret Frances Sally. She was born in April 1903 and grew up in Rolla, Missouri. After attending Springfield Teachers College and serving as a St. Patrick’s Queen at the Missouri School of Mines, she wed Artileus Vosteen Eulich in December 1922. Art was a mining engineer, and his career took them […]

(Continued from the July 21, 2018 issue) On July 5, 1944, Hans Schwieger’s wife, Elsbeth Bloemendal Schwieger, died unexpectedly, just hours after he had been sworn in as a citizen. The young conductor, still in search of a job, was grieving in New York when he was offered a position in Fort Wayne, Indiana. For […]

The new conductor of the Kansas City Philharmonic and his missus arrived in Our Town in 1948. “I’m bringing the best part of Fort Wayne to Kansas City,” Hans Schwieger told the Kansas City Star, in reference to his recent bride, Mary Fitzpatrick Shields Schweiger. He was in his early forties then, and his cheerful […]

As unlikely as it sounds, R. Hugh “Pat” Uhlmann might never have met his bride if he hadn’t attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, which was an all-male school back in the 1930s. His roommates were a pair of brothers, Bucks and Bobby Weil from Montgomery, Alabama. Pat visited their home – and fell for […]