It’s Stadium Drive now. It was once the main street for the historic Leeds neighborhood

Here’s a fun fact about the Leeds neighborhood east of downtown Kansas City along the Blue River. Its founding in 1889 was celebrated with a really big barbecue.

But this sleepy 1917 picture postcard, looking east down 37th Street (Leeds’ main drag) is a little misleading.

Even before Chevrolet opened an auto plant there in 1928, Leeds (named after the manufacturing town in England) was home to industries of various kinds, including quarries, woodworking shops and a plant that produced railroad ties.

Greenhouses prospered in Leeds. Many (including one that’s pictured on the postcard) belonged to the Renick family, which also operated a grocery store on 37th Street.

Kansas City annexed Leeds in 1909 and soon built the Municipal Farm to house prisoners there. The Kansas City Tuberculosis Hospital followed in 1915, built in part with inmate labor.

In a city where Black families often had difficulty buying housing, Leeds was an exception.

The semi-rural setting resembled areas of the South where many had migrated from. In the early decades of the 20th century, Leeds’ African-American population grew steadily.

The Dunbar School at 36th Street and Hardesty was one of that period’s legacies.

When the Truman Sports Complex opened in 1972, 37th Street was renamed Stadium Drive. Now on game days, the roadway still carries significant traffic through what’s left of Leeds’ once busy commercial corridor.

Having trouble seeing the video? Watch it here.

Looking for more Kansas City history?

How the Black neighborhood known as Steptoe is being commemorated

Auto racing came early to our town

Among those who once lived in Leeds was Kansas City’s celebrated civil servant Alvin Brooks