District History
This is a historical timeline highlighting important dates, terms, figures, and events in a chronological fashion of USD 500-Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools. The timeline also includes important historical events on the national level that impacted public education systems across the country.
The events highlighted in this interactive timeline were chosen based on historical significance for the Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools system. The timeline begins years before KCKPS was officially established as a school system. The timeline captures the presence of small schoolhouses in the community as early as the mid to late 1800’s.
The information, photos, artifacts, and videos used to produce the historical timeline were provided by several sources:
- Kansas Historical Society
- Kansas State Library
- The Kansas Room/Collection Kansas City, Kansas Public Library
- The History of Public Schools in Wyandotte County
- Wyandotte County Museum and Historical Society
- Kamiasha Tyner - Sumner High School
- Local residents, Dr. Raymond Daniels, Historian Mr. Chester Owens, Mr. Gerald Hall, Don Wolf, and many more.
- The Beginning
- A History of Segregation in Kansas Schools, Part I
- The Birth of KCKPS
- A History of Segregation in Kansas Schools, Part II
- At the Turn of Our First Century
- 1911-1955
The Beginning
1843 - One Room School Houses
Listen to the beginning of the KCKPS Story here.
Audio Transcript
Long before the existence of what we know as USD-500- Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools, small one-room schoolhouses were part of the landscape as early as 1819. This was before Kansas became a state, the county seat of Wyandotte County, and a public school system was established in this area. Most schoolhouses were built to serve students living within four or five miles, which was considered close enough to walk. The school year was shorter, and attendance was often determined on when the children were needed to help their family harvest crops.
The Indian Removal Act of 1830 forced several easter tribes from their land in Ohio. Before beginning their exodus to this part of the region, they had a plan for building a school in the new territory. Money had been set aside from the scant payments provided by the government from land acquisitions. When they arrived in 184, the Wyandot Nation purchased large sections of land from the Delaware and Shawnee tribes in the area. They built homes, schools, and churches in the towns of Wyandotte and Quindaro, which today we know as Wyandotte County and Kansas City Kansas.
John M. Armstrong built the first free public school using these funds at 4th and Nebraska Ave. on Indian territory. The one-room log frame structure was often referred to as the council house. Mr. Armstrong had been a member of the Ohio bar since 1839, but he was not allowed to practice law on Native American Territory. So, he became the first teacher at the new school and taught in the school until 1845. The school was open to Indian and White students for free.
Tribal business kept Armstrong in Washington D.C. and Ohio for much of the time in the late 1840's. On one of his trips to collect money from the government he unexpectedly became ill and later passed away in Ohio. The building housed the school from 1844 to his death in 1952. When the Wyandot sold land to white settlers in 1856, no school existed publicly until after the Civil War.
Reference Materials
KCK Public Library - Quindaro Township
Kansas Historical Society - Wyandotte Tribe
1850s
1854-1861: Bleeding Kansas
These were turbulent years in the territory of Kansas. The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 established the territorial boundaries of Kansas and Nebraska and opened the land to legal settlement. It allowed the residents of these territories to decide by popular vote whether their state would be free or slave state. Three distinct political groups occupied Kansas during this time; pro-slavery, Free-Staters, and abolitionists. Murder, mayhem, destruction and psychological warfare were the common methods of intimidation in Eastern Kansas and Western Missouri. In May 1856, John Brown and his sons killed five pro-slavery advocates at Pottawatomie.
Kansas and Wyandotte County
1859 – 1861
On July 5, 1859, the legislative delegation of the territory of Kansas gathered in Wyandotte, Kansas to write a constitution. The Wyandotte Constitution was the fourth and final proposed Kansas constitution following the failed attempts of the Topeka, Lecompton, and Leavenworth conventions to create a state constitution that would pass Congress and be signed as a bill by the president.
The U.S. Senate finally approved the Wyandotte Constitution on January 21, 1861. Eight days later, on January 29, the House passed the bill as amended and sent it to the president for his signature. President James Buchanan, a man despised by most free state settlers in Kansas, signed the bill officially approving the Wyandotte Constitution and admitting Kansas into the Union as the 34th state. This would bring an end to five years of bitter conflict over slavery in the Kansas Territory.
The first Kansas State Legislature convened on March 26, 1861.
The same territorial legislative delegation that approved the Wyandotte Constitution approved the organization of Wyandotte County to become a free and independent political entity on January 29, 1859. After Kansas became a state, the state legislature passed a law the same year allowing for the establishment of a free public school system.
Kansas City Public Library - The Wyandotte Constitution
Kansas Historical Society - the Act of Incorporation of Wyandotte City
Picture of the Wyandotte County Court House erected in 1882
1873 - 1876
Armstrong/Garrison was constructed in 1873 and was one of nine original schools when Wyandott, Kansas City, and Armourdale were separate cities. The school was located on South 8th Street between Cornell Ave and Colorado Ave and was originally named after the Wyandot Chief Silas Armstrong. The name was later changed to Garrison in 1926 when African American students were reassigned to the old Armstrong School. The building was demolished in 1956 to make way for the Kansas Turnpike.
MACCOCHAQUE SCHOOL
The name "Maccochaque" is a Native American name, which means "Place of Refreshment." The original one-room frame schoolhouse was built in 1876 on the East side of Hudson near 42nd Street on land that the government had given to the Shawnee Indians. The school was a country school known as "District 39" and "Malvern Hill." In 1911, Maccochaque School became a part of the City of Rosedale when the city limits were extended, and construction began on a new two-story eight-room building. It was later enlarged to 12 rooms and an auditorium. In June 1958, the building and property were sold to the K.U. Medical Center. Pupils from Maccochaque were transferred to the new Snow School and the Thomas A. Edison School. After the Maccochaque pupils were transferred, the school served as class room space for the K.U. Medical Center School of Practical Nursing. In the spring of 1968 the old land-mark was torn down and the property cleared for a parking lot for the K.U. Medical center.
A History of Segregation in Kansas Schools, Part I
1877
The Kansas legislature passed a statue specifically allowing first class cities (those with populations of 15,000 or more) to conduct separate elementary schools. This law remained in effect into the 1950s. High schools were not segregated in Kansas except for in the City of Wyandotte.
1879
Kansas legislature passes law authorizing mixed high schools.
Legislation in 1879 states, in part, “The board of education shall have power … to organize and maintain separate schools for the education of white and colored children, except in high school, where no discrimination shall be made on account of color.” (Laws of Kansas, 1879, Chap. 81, Sec. 1) This law would change in 1905.
1882
Armourdale School was a four-room, two-story building erected on the corner of what is now 5th and Shawnee. There was an additional room made later from the hall where the bell was. There was a large bell in a tower which was used to call the pupils to classes. A four-room annex was added to the building on the south side in 1890.
The Birth of KCKPS
Consolidation Act of 1886
The Formation of USD 500-KCKPS
The Kansas City, Kansas school district came into existence in 1886 as the result of the Consolidation Act, which combined the cities of Wyandot, Kansas City, and Armourdale (including Riverview and Armstrong). The school district was comprised of nine consolidated schools and were organized under the leadership of the County Superintendent, John W. Ferguson. The school district had an enrollment of 3,643 students and employed 56 teachers.
Those schools were:
- Armstrong (1873)
- Barnett (1880s or possibly earlier)
- Central (1868 - Huron Square - picture at left))
- Chance (1882)
- Everett (1881 - picture at left)
- Lincoln (1857)
- McAlpine (1885)
- Riverview (1882)
- Wood (1871)
The unification formed a city of the first-class known as Kansas City, Kansas covering 10 square miles.
The first School Board Members 1886
J. M. Squires, President
W. J. Brouse, Vice President
S. W. Day
N. P. Northrup
J. F. Nettleton (resigned - replaced by W T Mead),
E. P. Godwell.
(In 1885, a new law was enacted by the legislature to cut the number of board members from twelve to five.)
More Early Schools
Riverview School
Riverview School, located at 7th and Pacific, was one of the nine original schools when Wyandotte, Kansas City, and Armourdale were separate cities. The school was built in 1882 and used as an elementary school for one year before adding high school grade levels. The original bell and steeple were removed after a lightning strike around 1900. In 1908, Freemont Street was graded and paved, and the school grounds leveled, which left the school building high above street level. A retaining wall was then built around the entire property. In 1916 when Junior High schools were inaugurated in Kansas City, Riverview was changed from an eight grade to a six-grade school. Grades seven and eight were moved to Central Junior High School. The school closed in 1977 and the building was razed. The site was deeded to the city and is now the site of the Pala Vista homes.
Columbian School
Columbian School operated beginning in 1886 and was located at 519 Seminary (current corner of South 7th St. and Southwest Blvd.). It and closed after the 1965-66 school year and the building was demolished in 1966.
Bruce/Lincoln School
The Bruce School was constructed in 1888. The school was located at the southwest corner at 24th and Strong Avenue. The two-room frame building served African American students in grades K-5. During the school's early years, high school pupils attended classes in two rooms upstairs until the completion of the new Argentine High school building in 1908. The name was changed to Lincoln, when the City of Argentine was annexed in 1910.This elementary school was the oldest building in the public school system when retired from service by the Board of Education in June 1961. It was replaced with the completion of the new Emerson school and the addition made to Stanley School.
1890 - Douglass Elementary School
Douglass Elementary School, located at 9th and Washington in Kansas City, Kansas, was constructed in 1890 and named for abolitionist Frederick Douglass. The Douglass school served African American students. The building was demolished in 1962 to make way for the new Douglass Elementary which opened in 1963.
Early KCKPS By the Numbers
For the year 1886-87
- Cost per pupil was $11.40
- The maximum yearly salary paid for teachers was $720
- The entire budget for the school year was $41,533
- The first graduation class consisted of eleven girls.
For the year 1886-87, the cost per pupil in the grades was $11.40; in 1910 (24 years later), it was $24.06.
Maximum yearly salary paid for grade teachers
- 1886 = $440
- 1910 = $720,
- 1932 = $1788
Maximum yearly salary paid for high school teachers
- 1886 = $720,
- 1910 = $1395
- 1932 = $2508
Total School Cost
- 1886 = $41,533
- 1910 = $576,042.70
- 1932 = $2,008,620.80
Average number of Students per Teacher, based on enrollment
- 1886 = 66
- 1910 = 38
- 1932 = 36.4
Teachers employed
- 1886 = 55
- 1910 = 366
- 1932 = 669 (including teachers, Principals, and supervisors)
A History of Segregation in Kansas Schools, Part II
At the Turn of Our First Century
1897- 1910
- 1897 - Kansas City, Kansas High School
- 1898 - Hawthorne
- 1900s- Kealing School
- 1904 - Strawberry Hill, Booker T. Washington School
- 1908 - 1910: Argentine High School
- KCKPS By the Numbers at the Turn of the 20th Century
1897 - Kansas City, Kansas High School
Kansas City, Kansas High School
According to school records, the Kansas City, Kansas High School was organized in “several unused rooms at the Riverview Elementary School, 7th and Pacific Avenue, and several of the smaller classes convened at the principal's home nearby.” The first graduating class in 1887 consisted of eleven girls.
It was not long before the high school got its second location when it was relocated to the former Palmer Academy building on the southwest corner of North 7th Street and Ann Avenue. President Grover Cleveland had signed the Consolidation Act, which was intended to make education available to everyone through free schools. The Palmer Academy had been a private secondary school which closed due to lack of enrollment, which some believed was caused by the Consolidation Act. Parents no longer wanted to pay for an education that was now had become free to students and families.
A bond issue was passed in 1897 which funded the erection of a new building for the Kansas City, Kansas High School on the west side of North 9th Street from Minnesota Ave. to State Ave. The building was designed in the Richardsonian Romanesque style by W.W. Rose and included a great peak-roofed tower that dominated the downtown skyline for many years. The construction of the school was completed in 1899 and underwent substantial additions in 1905 and 1910. Space was also provided for a junior college in 1923.
The next expansion came in that same year, when the Kansas City, Kansas High School gymnasium and laboratory building was erected across the street on the southeast corner of 9th and State. There was a tunnel underneath 9th Street that connected the two buildings.
The three-story gym and lab building featured specialized classrooms, such as chemistry and physics laboratories and a home economics department, and indoor athletic facilities that included a spacious two-story gymnasium, swimming pool, and locker rooms with showers. A Junior College program moved into the gym and lab building after the fire and would later expand into the nearby Horace Mann Elementary School. They occupied the facilities until 1968. The high school left the building for good when the new Wyandotte High School opened in 1937.
Click here to view artifacts from the original Kansas City, Kansas High School
1898 - Hawthorne
Hawthorne
Hawthorne Elementary School was constructed in 1898 and named after Nathaniel Hawthorne. The school was located at 1126 Waverly Avenue. There were a number of additions to the structure over the years and an annex was built next to the school in 1909. In 1962, plans for a new school began and the new buildings were completed in 1964. The old Hawthorne school was razed in 1977 and in 2002 the school's name was changed to Caruthers.
1900s- Kealing School
1900s
Originally known as Eugene Field School, Kealing School was constructed in 1900. It was name in honor of Dr. H. T Kealing, former president of Western University. Kealing was a four-room brick school with four more rooms added in 1907. The school operated until 1972, when the building was closed and demolished to make way for the new Banneker Elementary School.
1904 - Strawberry Hill, Booker T. Washington School
Strawberry Hill
Like other cities nationwide, Kansas City, Kansas, also had a handful of traditional ethnic neighborhoods. Strawberry Hill remains one of the most historic neighborhoods in KCK for people of Croatian and Slavic heritage.
Most Croatian immigrants that came to Kansas City had only four years of education. However, it was necessary to them that their children received a quality education. In addition, their religion was equally essential to their daily lives as well.
They constructed St. John the Baptist Church on the Hill just west of the area called the Bottoms. The first services were held there in 1902. Once the church was completed, the basement was converted to a temporary school. By 1907, the members had raised enough money to build a new school. This was the first Croatian Catholic school in the United States. By the 1920s, more than 700 Croatian American children attended this school. Another school had to be built in 1925 to accommodate the increase in enrollment.
Not only was there a school and church, but there was a grocery store, hardware store, and theater within walking district of the Strawberry Hill neighborhood. Although the school was not part of the Kansas City, Kansas public school system, the Strawberry Hill community remains a historical part of the city's diverse community.
Many second, third, and fourth generations of Croatians still live there today.
Unknown Date
Booker T Washington School
Booker T. Washington school served African American students and was at one time located at the corner of Greystone and Cambridge Avenues in the southern part of old Wyandotte, Kansas. It was a room frame structure with a large, pot-bellied stove which was anchored to the wooden floor in the center of the room. There was no plumbing or electricity in the building, therefore, the children had to use two outhouses when the rest room was needed. The actual date of construction and occupancy for this school is not known.
1908 - 1910: Argentine High School
Argentine High School first existed as a space in other buildings for a small group of students studying at the high school level. By 1901, there were 88 students, and the Superintendent was asking for more rooms, more books for the library, and more equipment for science instruction.
In 1908, a new Argentine High School was constructed at 22nd and Elmwood (now Ruby) to educate the growing number of high school students in the Argentine area. The nine-room brick building school had an occupancy of six teachers and 100 students. Argentine merged with USD 500 in 1910 after the City of Argentine was annexed by the City of Kansas City, Kansas. In just eight years, enrollment reached 200. A gymnasium and cafeteria were added to accommodate the growing population. F. L. Schlagle served as principal from 1919 to 1924, when he became Superintendent of Schools. By 1935, enrollment had increased to 1,130 students and 29 teachers. The original 1908 building was demolished in 1954, and a new building was constructed in 1955-56.
By 1910, Kansas City, Kansas had increased to 40 schools, which included three well organized high schools, and enrollment increased to 5,000 students.
- Argentine High School
- Bruce
- Chelsea
- Emerson
- Franklin
- Lowell
- Oakland
- Stanley
- Waterworks
KCKPS By the Numbers at the Turn of the 20th Century
1911-1955
Superintendents of KCKPS
Years of Service | Superintendent's Name |
---|---|
1867 |
Henry Alden (2 schools in district - Principal/Superintendent) |
1869 |
O. C. Palmer |
1874 |
Professor M. Waters |
1886-1890 |
John W. Ferguson |
1890-1893 |
Arvin S. Olin |
1893-1898 |
Louis Larkin Latney Hanks |
1898-1902 |
Lloyd E. Wolfe |
1902-1932 |
Mathew E. Pearson |
1932-1962 |
Frank L. Schlagle |
1962-1986 |
Orvin L. Plucker |
1986-1992 |
Dr. David L. Lusk |
1992-1993 |
Dr. Jerry P. Franklin (Acting Superintendent) |
1993-1997 |
Dr. Jim B. Hensley |
1997-1998 |
Dr. Jerry P. Franklin (Acting Superintendent) |
1998-2005 |
Dr. Ray L. Daniels |
2005-2010 |
Dr. Jill Shackelford |
2010-2018 |
Dr. Cynthia Lane |
2018-2018 |
Dr. Julia Ford (interim) |
2018-2020 |
Dr. Charles Foust |
2020-2021 |
Dr. Alicia Miguel (interim) |
2021-present |
Dr. Anna Stubblefield |