Flatland
Flatland Staff
Stories by Flatland
A Celebration of Culture and Kindness: Yo-Yo Ma in KC
Last week, world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma arrived in Kansas City with a full dance card. Ma was in town for a master class and several performances at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. He also made a surprise appearance at a “neighborhood” event. The master class, part of Ma’s work with international artists, featured…
Can You Improve an Area Without Gentrifying It?
By Anne Kniggendorf As a traffic engineer, Jay Aber worries that some of the improvements he designs have the exact opposite effect of what he had hoped. “We try to improve the street for the people who live there,” Aber said. “Then, the people who live there end up getting pushed out in favor of…
An Exchange of a Lifetime
By Debbie Coleman-Topi Amid the riots unleashed following the 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., a spark of hope quietly ignited in the center of the country. That flicker was right here, in Kansas City, where Catholic leaders launched an experiment that confronted race head-on by bringing black and white students literally face to…
Searching For Her Dad’s Technical High School
By Jack Harvel Like so many men of his generation, Jack Harrigan was a small-town kid born early in the 20th century, weathered the Great Depression, fought in World War II, then returned home to raise a family while working a blue-collar job until passing away in 1990 at the age of 75. His daughter…
The Faces of Eviction
In January, together with the Kansas City Public Library, we hosted a live public town hall to talk about evictions, gentrification and affordable housing in the metro. The standing room only-crowd heard from and asked questions of the six panelists, Tara Raghuveer, eviction researcher; Terrence Wise, community member; Jacob Wagner, co-founder of Center for Neighborhoods…
The Rise and Fall of a Boomtown
Get a deeper history of the port town of Quindaro and hear from a local woman who used our curiousKC initiative to ask why excavations had not been finished for the important site.
Vote! What Would You Like Us to Cover in Our Reporting?
As we dig into housing issues in our months-long Public Works? A Level Foundation reporting initiative, we want you to share your questions with us and weigh in on what you think we should tackle. Below is our first voting round with three questions from curious Kansas Citians. Tricia Bushnell asked what percentage new developments…
What Are the Open Belief Centers in KC?
By Humera Lodhi Sharon Divine found faith as an adult. Or rather, she lost religion and then found faith. Divine grew up as a Christian attending Methodist, Lutheran, and Unity churches at various points in her life. The older Divine got, however, the less traditional religion seemed make sense to her. “There‘s nothing wrong with…
A Trip Back to a Childhood Spent in Westport Orphanage
By Tess Vrbin Joe Bessenbacher’s most vivid childhood memories include “a white triangular bonnet.” This piece of headgear is part of the habit that the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent De Paul wore. The order of nuns ran the Kansas City Orphan Boys’ Home, where Bessenbacher spent nine years of his childhood. Over time,…
Drawn Home: A KC Artist Sets Out To Find Home While On the Road
Recently, local artist Charlie Mylie ventured out from here in KC’s geographic middle to explore our country — its countrysides and city-sides — and understand the parts of it he doesn’t normally get to see. He’s set out (without a car we might add) also to challenge himself as an artist. Here at Flatland we asked Mylie: Can…