Here’s the link between new owners of KC’s Country Club Plaza and owners of the Chiefs
Two of Kansas City’s most iconic assets — the Kansas City Chiefs and the Country Club Plaza — are now owned by members of an equally iconic family: the Hunts of Dallas, descendants of H.L. Hunt, one of Texas’ most famed oil tycoons.
The Chiefs organization, of course, was started by H.L Hunt’s son Lamar, who died in 2006. He also founded the American Football League and Major League Soccer and is credited with coining the term “Super Bowl.” His son Clark is chairman and chief executive officer of the Chiefs, which he jointly owns with his brother Dan and his brother and sister from his dad’s first marriage, Sharron Hunt and and Lamar Jr.
Lamar Hunt Jr. owns the Kansas City Mavericks hockey team. Dan Hunt is president of the FC Dallas soccer club.
On Friday, the Country Club Plaza, built in 1923, was purchased by HP Village Partners of Dallas, whose owners also include members of the Hunt family.
How close are they?
Very.
“Clark lives down the street from me. Dan lives four houses the other direction. Norma (Lamar Hunt’s wife who died in 2023) lived one house over,” said Ray Washburne, one of the Plaza’s new owners. “I was in Clark’s wedding.”
Washburne is partners in HP Village with his wife, Heather Hill Washburne, his brother-in-law, Stephen Summers, and Summers’ wife, Elisa Summers. Elisa Summers and Heather Hill Washburne are sisters and — like Clark and family — are descendants of H.L. Hunt.
The Hunt family tree, which like many American families includes marriages, divorces and remarriages, is so large it can be easy to get lost in its branches.
As legend goes, Haroldson Lafeyette Hunt Jr., born in Illinois 1889, founded Hunt Oil in 1936 through leases and rights he acquired in the oil fields of East Texas. He became a tycoon, married three times (to two women at once, it was later discovered) and had 15 children. He reportedly was part of the inspiration behind “Dallas,” the 1980s television hit about the feuding Ewing oil family.
Firstborn to H.L. Hunt was Margaret Hunt Hill, who died in 2017. Lamar Hunt was nearly 17 years younger than his eldest sister.
Margaret Hunt Hill was the grandmother to the new Plaza owners.
All the family members “want this to be successful,” Washburne said of the Plaza purchase.
Another Kansas City connection, although not through the Hunt family line:
Stephen Summers, of the HP Village Partners, often spent his summers here. His mother is a Kansas Citian.
“My mom, Emily Summers, went to Southwest High School,” he said. His mom turns 80 this summer. She grew up on 60th Terrace.
“I was spending significant portions of my life in Kansas City, “ Summers said, “until I went to college.”
This story was originally published July 1, 2024 at 5:06 PM.
