In a move sure to spark controversy, Kansas City parks board member Chris Goode today formally proposed removing the name of Kansas City’s most prominent real estate and neighborhood developer from the city’s most visited fountain and the adjacent parkway.
If the five-member Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners should give its approval after a process that will take at least 30 days, the J.C. Nichols Memorial Fountain and J.C. Nichols Parkway would be renamed Dream Fountain and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway.
Chris Goode
Goode submitted his proposal to the other board members in a memo last Thursday, and he made it official at today’s park board meeting, which was conducted via video conference.
(Members of the public can view the video meetings on Skype, and they have an opportunity to speak toward the end of each meeting. I was among those listening in, but neither I nor any other member of the public spoke during the public comments segment.)
Goode cited the recent protests in the area of Mill Creek Park and the Nichols Fountain — at the south end of the park — as a motivating factor behind his proposal.
In the memo, he said, “Having seen our beloved Mill Creek Park become the backdrop for the reactionary protests and visual displays of pain and frustration, I…find myself compelled to act.”
Jesse Clyde Nichols
He also lashed out at the legendary J.C. Nichols, who developed the famed Country Club Plaza and many neighborhoods south of the Plaza on both sides of the state line but whose reputation was badly stained by racially and ethnically restrictive covenants Nichols insisted be included in the deed restrictions of the many neighborhoods his company developed.
At today’s meeting, Goode said: “We find ourselseves celebrating the legacy of a man who didn’t stand for all people. He spoke for a very singular group of people, and he created broadspread division.”
A 1993 Missouri law banned the offensive covenants, but the language nevertheless remained in the deed restrictions of many neighborhood associations years afterward. In 2006, after a Kansas City Star expose, the General Assembly passed a bill that became law calling for homeowners associations “to delete violative restrictive covenants.”
And yet, some of the prohibited language undoubtedly remains in some neighborhood deed restrictions, albeit without legitimacy.
The Plaza, modeled after Seville, Spain, opened for business in 1923. The 80-foot-wide Nichols fountain was dedicated in 1960, 10 years after J.C. Nichols died. At some point, the adjacent parkway, then named Mill Creek Parkway, was renamed to honor Nichols.
The parkway extends four long blocks, from 47th Street to 43rd Street, where it becomes Broadway.
Goode’s proposal set in motion an established board process providing for two public hearings within the next 30 days. Under current policy, the board could not take final action during the review period.
A time and place for the first public hearing was not set today, but park board President Jack Holland asked parks department staff to make recommendations within about a week.
Goode, who owns the restaurant Ruby Jean’s Juicery, urged the board to take action as soon as possible. He said that “every second” the board allows the Nichols name to adorn the fountain and the parkway, “we are standing for racism as a body, as a board.”
“We need to get it going now,” Goode said. “The longer we wait, the more pain we allow…the more blood we allow to flow through our city’s borders.”
None of the other four park board members indicated whether they favored or opposed Goode’s proposal, but three members said it was important to hold hearings and give the public plenty of opportunity to weigh in. One board member, former City Councilman Scott Wagner, noted that the timing of Goode’s proposal was excellent.
Scott Wagner
“Now more than ever, symbols are important,” Wagner said, “and names tell a story as to what is important to a community and what is not.”
**
Goode, Wagner, Holland and former Councilwoman Mary Williams-Neal were appointed park commissioners last year by Mayor Quinton Lucas. Lucas also reappointed Northland resident David Mecklenburg, whom former Mayor Sly James had appointed.
The board meets every other Tuesday at 2 p.m., but it can also schedule special meetings.
Correction: When first publishing, I incorrectly reported that Commissioner Goode was proposing renaming the Nichols Fountain “Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Fountain.” It would be “Dream Fountain.”
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
I will watch with interest. Wow! Thanks for your reporting.
I think “Wow!” is the right expression, Tom. Experience tells me this is likely to mushroom.
After moving to Westport decades ago, I began walking most days to the south end of Mill Creek Park. I certainly knew Nichols Fountain was there, and I saw its streams of water. But I never really looked at it until one day, maybe three years later, I actually examined the fountain.
I was distressed. It is a celebration of human domination over nature, not harmony with it — appropriate for our petro-fueled economy. There is a lot of violence and pain in the sculptures, supposedly representing the Mississippi, Volga, Seine, and the Rhine rivers. I was unable to deter a friend and Johnson County colleague a few years ago from preaching a series of sermons celebrating the fountain, so I know my opinion is unlikely to get anybody to look beyond the gorgeous sprays of water at the horror of what the fountain sculpture portrays.
In 2017, Steve Kraske proposed renaming the fountain. Alas, the “J. C. Nichols Fountain” is a far more appropriate name for this message of environmental assault than associating it with Martin Luther King Jr.
I’ve never studied the fountain closely, Vern. I appreciate your observations.
A book the City of Fountains Foundation (of which I’m a board member) has published says the fountain originally was outside the mansion of industrialist Clarence H. Mackay in Long Island, NY. Over the years it was vandalized and a number of parts were stolen or destroyed. The Nichols family initiated the purchase in 1952, and a public-based campaign raised more than $50,000. After being brought to Kansas City, the fountain was refurbished by Kansas City artist Herman Frederick Simon, who also re-created the missing pieces.
And here’s a link to the Steve Kraske column you mentioned. Steve did not suggest a new name, he just wanted J.C. Nichols’ name to come off.
Vern: I will make a close look next time in KC. Thanks for your observations.
Changing the names of streets and plazas and getting rid of statues that some find offensive isn’t going to undo what has happened in the past, nor is it somehow magically going to change the way people start looking at things or feeling about themselves. True change begins in the heart when one is looking in the mirror and seriously examining every aspect of their life having come to the sober realization that some personal changes are in order. Robert E. Lee and J.C. Nichols were flawed individuals, but then so was George Floyd. If we want to continue this process, we might as well start going after George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and all the rest and get rid of everything associated with them. How far do we want to take this? Do we want to get to the point where we are constantly having to rewrite the history books simply to maintain an illusion like they were doing in “1984”? Hey, let’s get William Rockhill Nelson’s name out of every print edition of The Star while we’re “cleaning house,” so to speak – after all, he and J.C. Nichols were pretty good buddies back in the day. He’s guilty by association. Got to be! And no, I’m not related to J.C.
Very good points.
Personally, I wish KC had kept the name MLK Jr Blvd, rather than changing back to The Paseo. The reality is that there is no street, park, fountain, etc., that can be chosen to rename for MLK Jr that won’t meet with significant opposition. As for renaming JC Nichols Pkwy and Fountain, I don’t think that will satisfy the group of black ministers who spearheaded the drive to rename the Paseo. I think they want something more prominent than the short distance of JC Nichols Pkwy.
I also find it interesting that people in KC basically just shrug their shoulders over the facts that: 1) the county is named after a slaveholding president; 2) several streets are named after slaveholding presidents; and 3) we have Washington Square Park. What is a worse sin than holding another human being in actual enslavement? Where is the fervor to rename those places?
In any event, given the recent history of efforts to rename something in honor of MLK Jr, Jimmy is probably right: this is likely to mushroom.
The number of “views” on this post is skyrocketing, Peavy, thanks to links from Twitter and Facebook. In addition, Sam Zeff at KCUR is working on a story for tomorrow morning. (I thought earlier he was shooting for tonight.)
Thanks for the comment.
The parks department has posted a “media alert,” which included a statement from Mayor Quinton Lucas. The notice quoted Lucas as saying…
“No person accelerated white flight, redlining, and racial division in the Kansas City area more than J.C. Nichols. The time has long passed that we remove Kansas City’s memorials to his name. I fully support Commissioner Goode’s efforts to rename J.C. Nichols Fountain and Parkway.”
Here’s that media alert.
If you have access there is quite the conversation happening on nextdoor.com the Prairie Village version. In addition to a BLM march today, Wednesday, the issue of deed restrictions has surfaced and city council members are working to eliminate the offensive language. I have filed a request under Kansas law to have the deed restrictions changed, the city has 60 days to accomplish this goal. there is also quite a discussion on DWB, Driving while Black. We hope JC is spinning like a top.
Back in the mid-Aughts I was on the board of directors for the Oak Meyer Gardens HOA and it still had the racial/ethnic restrictions ( I was new to the board and thought I ought to read all the pertinent docs.)
My sense then, as now, is many HOA boards have never read their founding papers; they just assume in this day and age such things no longer exist.
We of course removed the offending verbiage.
When we lived in an historic neighborhood in StL the offending covenants were a part of our HOA Bylaws. No one would undertake the task of getting a super majority to get it removed. Thankfully they were ignored as we lived in a diverse and interesting place.
Same here. Our homes assn. at one time had deed restrictions for every block, and we still have the electronic paperwork for most, and those are on our website. A few years ago, when I was president of the assn., I was one day reviewing the restrictions for a certain block because someone had asked to build a shed or a pergola. I found, to my horror, the verboten language in the restrictions for that block. I then went through the restrictions block by block and found the same language for one or two other blocks. I called our website manager and told him to get those pages off the site immediately. They were not “word” documents, so they couldn’t be changed; we just had to make them go away.
Also when we moved into our neighborhood in 1990 there was a couple who had lived there since the 1950s. They would have been happy if the convents had been enforced. Sometime maybe I can tell you the story.
How about naming them after a person we should all remember but don’t, like Madam CJ Walker? Walker Fountain.
Stupid to name anything for a family that demands, and collects, naming rights every year. How about SCREAM Ftn? Because that’s what happens there. MLK was for judging by character, NOT the color of one’s skin. But that’s not what the riots were about.
Does anyone legitimately think businesses want to change their ADDRESS? No. This would be the death of the Country Club Plaza. Adios, Nordstroms, too.