The Founding of Kansas City Missouri
by Brad Finch

The Town of Kansas - 1848

Kansas City has a very interesting history. It began as nothing more than a boat-dock providing supplies for those headed further west. It was a town founded, at least in the beginning, to serve people who had no intention of staying. But we're getting ahead of ourselves here. Let's go back about 160 years to what really started in Westport, Missouri.

In 1834, a speculator named John Campbell bought a tract of land that had been sold by the state to help fund school construction in Missouri. This land was located about 4 miles south of the Missouri river on the border of Missouri and the Kansas territory. Campbell then laid out a town site and sold the plots. Soon, a small trading town evolved. However, one of the buyers, John Calvin McCoy, had bigger plans. He saw all the commerce and trade brought to Independence, Missouri as a result of western emigration and figured that if he could establish Westport as the last stop for supplies on the way west, Westport could truly prosper.

The only problem was, how would they get the supplies to Westport? It made little sense to carry wagon-loads of goods from Independence to be resold in Westport (although this was done for a time) as these items could just as easily be purchased by the travelers. The only other way was by water, specifically, the Missouri River. Directly north of Westport was a settlement of French fur trappers founded by Francois Chouteau in 1821. Here, McCoy and his group found a natural outcropping of rock on the bank of the river that was deemed the perfect boat dock. They cut a straight path from the dock to Westport, and began taking boats and unloading cargo. The dock became know as Westport Landing, and the path to Westport soon became Main Street.

An opportunity to buy the land surrounding the dock came up when the owner, Gabriel Purdhomme, was killed in a bar fight. A local court decided that the heirs of the Purdhomme estate would be best served if the land (257 acres) were sold and the money divided, so in 1838 the land was auctioned to the highest bidder. There remains today some skepticism concerning the fairness of that auction. The Purdhomme family complained of collusion among the participants (including the auctioneer) to keep the bidding low, but nevertheless, the land was sold to the newly- formed "Town Company" in November of 1838 for $4,220. The Town Company, formed just minutes before the sale, consisted of 14 men determined to get the property: John C. McCoy, William Gillis, Fry P. McGee, William Sublette, Moses G. Wilson, Abraham Fonda, William M. Chick, Oliver Cadwell, George W. Tate, (the auctioneer), Russel Hicks, Samuel C. Owens, James Smart, William Collins, and Jacob Ragan.

Soon afterward, the debate over what to name the town began. Abraham Fonda wanted it named after him, but that was quickly dismissed. Other suggestions, including Possumtrot and Rabbitville, were similarly rejected. Finally it was decided that the town should be named after the Kanza Indians who lived just beyond the boundaries of the new town. Thus, the Town of Kansas was born. The first plat for the Town of Kansas was filed in Lexington, Missouri, in 1839 and the town was officially incorporated by the state of Missouri as the City of Kansas on March 28, 1853.

Those are the facts. But beyond those facts are some things you may not have considered before. Like: Westport is older than Kansas City! Kansas City is older than the state of Kansas! What I find most interesting, though, is that over 160 years later, Kansas City's origin is STILL our point of reference. Think about it! The city began as a boat dock at Main Street and the river. All our streets begin here! All our roads south of the river running east and west are numbered beginning here. Any address east of Main is E. something, everything west is W. something. If you wanted to, you could walk down to Main and the river and stand on the very spot that started it all!! (I'm not recommending you do this, however. Nature has reclaimed this piece of land, and it gets pretty rugged down there!)

Sources of Information

Theodore Brown & Lyle Dorsett - K.C. A History of Kansas City, Missouri 1978, Pruett Pub. Co., Boulder, CO

A. Theodore Brown - Frontier Community: Kansas City to 1870 1963, Univ. Mo. Press, Columbia, MO

George Fuller Green - A Condensed History of the Kansas City Area 1968, The Lowell Press, Kansas City, MO

Dory DeAngelo - Voices Across Time 1987, Tapestry Publications, Kansas City, MO