Flag Flies High

The Jacob Loose Memorial Flagpole was rededicated today. The pole stands near the Meyer Boulevard Entrance to Swope Park..Refurbished and painted it stands close to 200-feet tall. Originally dedicated on July 5th 1915 in front of a crowd of 70 to 80 thousand people it had fallen into disrepair in years past and the four plaques that adorned the base were missing. All have been restored.

Parks Director Mark McHenry was master of ceremonies and other guest speakers read portions of the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address.






Mr. George Bates' Great, Great Uncle was Jacob Loose... he and his brother, Nathaniel did the unveiling of the refurbished plaque.




The American Legion Band then played the Star Spangled Banner and nearby Battle of Westport Reenactors fired a canon......

Summer Sundown

From North Terrace Park

Blatant Bragging

My client, Amber, won Crown Cover Model with the above picture we took in the America US Miss pageant in St. Louis. She also was the 3rd runner up overall. Congratulations Amber... and yes, she is taken by a fellow who has access to torpedoes.... :) Above shot taken with the Nikon D 3 at F16 and 1/250th, ASA 200... one large softbox above the camera position, one hairlight set to the same power as the mainlight and one background light on the white background....

Bond Bridge Fully Lit

Bond Bridge illuminated its LED lights along the sides tonight. They can be almost any color and move.... sliding red right to left, blue left to right, white from middle to sides.... very interesting.... makes for a very dynamic structure. Also another, much longer, fireworks display tonight from Riverfest.... good evening all round! Here's a link to a brief iPhone video of the fireworks... and you can see the LEDs changing. http://gallery.me.com/dremley#100622

Restoring the Past Final

Above the original, below the restored. Both are 18 1/8 by 47 11/16ths.... Restored version is 353 mb. The original photo was taken "1,000 feet above 13th and Summit" using Lawrence Captive Airship. Lawrence, the photographer, used a set of seven kites to raise the 49 pound camera into place. Google the airship name for more info.

Independence Eve

Bond Bridge on July 4th eve.... a short fireworks show tonight. Tomorrow night the LED lighting on the Bridge will burst forth and a much longer display of pyrotechnics will happen.
First two shots are multiple exposures sandwiched... fireworks shots are all F5.6 at 1/4 ISO 2000. Nikon D3, 24-70 lens. It would be nice if the fireworks could be higher tomorrow night :) .

Mighty MOcha

32.5 feet today.... around 3pm.... supposed to fall now... but we should expect higher levels through August. In comparison, the 1993 flood crested at 48.9 feet. We are nowhere near that and shouldn't be. The only thing that could cause issues would be levee seepage... the barriers aren't designed to hold back waters permanently... today I saw pick-up trucks driving the levee tops checking for anything amiss.

The water is quite rapid.... enough so that the bridge supports leave wakes..... lots of tree trunks and branches in the water too. All recreational boating is banned and barge traffic has a voluntary ban....

Restoring the Past Part Two

Above, step one, remove the damage in the sky and some of the microbial dots.... remove the stain in lower right corner. Below, step two, eliminate fixer discoloration and increase exposure in upper right and top. The "smoke" in the upper left corner, I've decided, is from a train... the same feature is on the Library of Congress copy of this picture. Started removing the horizontal lines. If this shot encompassed jus 7 blocks more to the south I could see the homes of my paternal grandmothers and grandfathers.... but, alas.....

Restoring the Past

Friends Janice and Richard have hired moi to restore this 1907 photo of Kansas City... Richard found it at a garage sale. The original is in terrible shape with just about everything wrong with it that you can think of from water stains to microbes... the overall tone of the image has changed also. A silver halide image it was probably originally plain old black and white. Detail in it is incredible from people on the street to clothes hanging on backyard clotheslines.

I'll post updated pix over the next few days to show the restoration progress. this will take a while. Original size is 18 1/8 inches tall by 47 11/16s.

I took three separate, full frame, photos of it and them stitched them together in Photoshop... the working size image is 7 3/4 by 20 and I will upsize it when completed.

Penn Valley Hawk

Sometimes you just get lucky. I was just under the Scout statue waiting for the sun to set a little more... when I noticed a hawk in a nearby tree. Birds are notoriously hard to shoot but I always try. As he/she took off I fired a burst or two and got three good shots. Nikon D3, F11 at 250th, ASA 400....70-200mm lens ... they are beautiful in flight.

St. Johns Gone But Not Forgotten

Back in the 1880s St. John the Baptist Catholic Church was built roughly at Independence Boulevard and Paseo to serve the burgeoning population in Pendleton Heights. The Rectory was right next door to the west. St. John's was torn down in the 50s to make way for a car dealership and the parish was served from a new building east of this location at Garfield Avenue and Independence Boulevard. Above, a view of the rectory and the church... below just the church. Second shot down shows St. Johns' in relation to the Fountain Place Apartments.

Above, another shot of the rectory and, below, the interior of St. Johns showing the main altar..... very ornate.

Above, St. John's also had a school that I don't know the exact location of but was just west of Paseo.... the school was shared with Holy Rosary Church further west in Columbus Park.
Caption, "St. John's Church First May Crowning 1943." A big thank you to Father Michael Coleman, Archivist of the Diocese of St. Joseph Kansas City, and Virginia Collura who furnished these pictures. According to AnnaMarie Inzenga, long-time friend, the Church was right across the street from what used to be Scimecas and the Capri Motel.

Coming soon a new book from Pendleton Heights, "Then and Now".... showing early pictures of 82 sites in Pendleton and a picture of what is there now. Of course St. Johns' is included. I'll keep you posted.

The City That Works (No Question Mark)

Since I was mean to the City when I thought they weren't gettin' it done, I must be effusive in praise when they do. Yesterday the house that burned at 4401 Norledge was boarded up and today both yards were mowed and the volunteer trees harvested. So KUDOS to all who agitated along with me (Julie Duvall) and to those at the city who responded. I would never have done this blog if the 311 system had resulted in the same response.

The City That Works?

Over a year and counting since reporting on these houses to the City commenced. The home on the left, 4403 Norledge, is vacant, owned by an out of town landlord and always looks like this. The "home" on the right, 4401 Norledge, burned over a year ago and nothing has happened since. Yes, they have been reported via 311 repeatedly.
The burned out house sits open to the elements, the evil doers and the creepy crawly things. Not even boarded up.
And what happens when this kind of blight is allowed to fester? See below. Multiple for sale signs. Who wants to live right across the street from this crap? Only problem for the folks trying to escape is potential buyers can also see this. Many great, energetic families in Indian Mound are just hanging on by their fingernails hoping things get better. The above pictures seem to say the answer is no.
Above, Norledge and Kensington the west side.