A Century of Change

The Johnson County Museums is pleased to announce a new partnership with the Grinter Place State Historic Site in Kansas City, Kansas. The 1950s All-Electric House and the Grinter Place will be the two sites used in the new Century of Change program. The program, designed for 3rd and 4th graders, provides a glimpse into Kansas life in the 1860s and in 1954. Students have a unique opportunity to tour both structures to learn about two important times in the history of Eastern Kansas: early settlement and suburbanization. The following article provides more insight into the two homes that provide the foundation for the Century of Change program.

Wyandotte County, Kansas: 1860s

In the 1850s and 1860s, Eastern Kansas was a place in the process of transformation. Since the 1820s the land had been parceled into Indian Reservations for tribes including the Shawnee, Delaware, Wyandot, and Kickapoo. With the passage of the 1854 Kansas- Nebraska Act, this land opened up to make way for white settlement. Soon white settlers moved into the landscape, establishing farmsteads, homes, and towns. The movement of settlers required the services of ferryboats across the Kansas River and of traders. One settler, Moses Grinter, is thought to have provided ferry services to new Kansas residents.

Grinter began living among the Delaware, in present day Wyandotte County, as early as the 1830s. Some sources say he was a soldier at Fort Leavenworth who received a discharge and was commissioned to run a ferryboat on the military road. Other theories say that he led a group of Kickapoo Indians to their new Kansas reservation. A ferryboat on the Kansas River was adjacent to Grinter’s property and some sources say he operated the ferry.

Grinter built what would be the first of a series of log cabins near the ferry. In doing so he established the first permanent residence in the area. In 1838, Grinter married Anna Marshall, a member of the Delaware tribe, and the couple began their family.

During this busy and prosperous time, Moses Grinter built his impressive home amidst the Delaware. The family lived in several different log cabins before moving to their new home in the 1860s. The new home would be much different from the earlier log cabins. This house would be a testament to Moses Grinter’s entrepreneurial spirit. The grand new Grinter home was built on Anna’s allotment of 78 acres of farmland from the Delaware Nation.

The Old Kentucky Home

Homesick emigrants from eastern states sought to emulate their native architecture on the frontier. Moses Grinter, a Kentucky native, was no different. Nostalgia for the grand homes in his boyhood state inspired his dream home. He built his elaborate home, known today as Grinter Place, in the “vernacular” style. The “vernacular” style was very popular in the eastern United States in the early 1800s and achieved popularity in western, rural areas by the early 1860s. Elements of Federal and Greek Revival, such as columned porches and gables, typify the “vernacular” architecture of Grinter Place. The house is built in a Georgian I-plan, with a pair of rooms on each of the two levels. The rooms are arranged symmetrically around a central hallway.

Local materials were employed in the construction of the house. The bricks for the building were made of local clay and fired, or “burned,” at a kiln close to the house. Walnut and oak trees contributed to the structural wood of the house. Finished lumber shipped by boat to Leavenworth and hauled overland to Grinter Place completed the structure.

Grinter Place represented the ideal home of mid-nineteenth century Kansas. It was functional as well as fashionable. At a time when most settlers lived in log cabins, Grinter Place was a palace of the eastern plains. The two-story brick home had a formal parlor, three bedrooms, a dining room, a breezeway, and a kitchen. In the days before indoor heating and air-conditioning, the house had a functional design that allowed for the most year-round comfort possible. The kitchen, as was typical in nineteenth century houses, was separated from the main house by a breezeway to keep it from getting overheated in the summertime. A large porch on the second floor served as a sleeping porch on warm nights. The house’s twenty-two windows provided welcome cross- breezes on hot days. In the wintertime, five fireplaces provided heat throughout the house. Food was prepared using the fireplace in the kitchen.

Although Grinter Place represented Moses Grinter’s dream home, and that of other early Kansas settlers, by the 1850s tastes began to change. The Greek Revival and Georgian homes began to fall out of favor. Architects in the eastern United States, Andrew Jackson Downing and Calvert Vaux among them, criticized Greek Revival homes for being improper dwellings for the American family. They insisted that family homes should possess moral attributes (good or bad, honest or dishonest). Gothic Revival and Italianate homes fit this category, and subsequently replaced Greek Revival and Georgian homes in the East. In remote Kansas, however, Grinter’s home was the embodiment of everything stately and noble. A monument to the homes left behind in the East.

Today, Grinter Place stands in its lofty position overlooking the Kansas River. The home is more than an example of architecture. It serves as a window into the early history of the state and a monument to the fortitude of its early inhabitants.

Prairie Village: 1954

One hundred years later, just across the Kansas River, another world emerged from the prairie. Automobiles would replace wagons. Supermarkets would replace farmland. Suburbs named “Indian Fields” would replace Indian Reservations. The one-time homes of the Delaware and the Shawnee became populated with ranch houses.

The suburbs of Johnson County blossomed in the mid-nineteenth century, thanks to the county’s proximity to Kansas City, Missouri, and to the vision of developers such as J.C. Nichols. Nichols had been creating and developing neighborhoods since the early 1900s. Most of these neighborhoods, Mission Hills and Indian Hills, were designed for the wealthy businessman and homeowners. Luxury neighborhoods suited the county’s upper class, but left little room for middle class families. In the 1940s, J.C. Nichols Company took steps to change that. J.C. Taylor, chairman of the board for J.C. Nichols, stated, “some of us felt, however, that the [Country Club] District as a whole lacked a complete rounding out because no provision had been made for the home of moderate size and price. Prairie Village was opened with the determination of all of us that this development would be held for homes of moderate size.” Platted in 1941, Prairie Village was named after the Prairie School that had opened in 1866.

Prairie Village was at the center of a suburban explosion of the 1950s. Federal Housing Administration Loans and Veterans Administration Loans made homeownership a real possibility for many American families. The automobile and the development of highways facilitated the commute from the suburbs to the cities. Developers rushed to meet the demand of new homes by people flooding into the suburbs. Real estate developers built model homes to attract residents to new subdivisions. Department stores, utility companies, and appliance manufacturers built their own model dream homes to display their goods and services to potential homebuyers. Kansas City Power & Light Company got into the act by building the All-Electric Model House in 1954.

California Dreaming

Kansas City Power & Light’s All-Electric Model House was an example of the post-war craze for the ranch house. To many, ranch house architecture represented the easygoing lifestyle of “California living.” Ranch houses were one-story, horizontal homes with an open floor plan, indoor/outdoor living, and an attached garage. The all-electric house’s floor plan was divided into three work zones: the living area, the housework center, and the private area. Each space communicated ideals about life in the 1950s.

The living area contained the combination living room and dinner room in a large space. The space was meant as a family gathering place, complete with a television, a dining room table, and a compartment under the mantel to store card tables and chairs. An expansive picture window looked out onto a green-tinted patio, reinforcing the idea of indoor/outdoor living. Indoor/outdoor living was the idea that the patio was an extension of your living room, and should be furnished with as much care and planning as the formal living room.

The ranch house design allowed for a revolutionary change in housework space. Earlier kitchens, like the Grinters, had been built at the back or side of the house to keep the heat and smells from drifting into the rest of the house. Ranch house design moved the kitchen to the front of the house. This made it possible for the lady of the house to watch her children play in the front yard while she made dinner and cleaned. The utility room with more appliances was handily located next to the kitchen.

Privacy was at a premium in the small ranch houses of the 1950s. The all-electric house changed all that with the placement of the private area at one end of the house. The private area consisted of two bedrooms and a bathroom. The master bedroom featured twin beds and a built-in vanity with daytime and nighttime light settings. The den showcased the versatility of the ranch house – it could be used as a study or a guest room.

The attached garage was the great innovation of the ranch home. This addition officially made the car a part of the family by giving it a room of its own. The garage was significant for other reasons as well. It contained a built-in workbench where the man of the house could work on weekend handyman projects. The garage was also the home of the heat pump. This revolutionary apparatus supplied year-round heating and cooling to the house. The workbench, automobile, and technology contained in the garage lended itself to being described as a purely masculine space.

Control is the Keyword

Modern architecture and décor were not the only attractions of the All-Electric House. The House was advertised as the “House of the Future.” Kansas City Power & Light described the house as “a truly modern home, incorporating the latest electrical developments for opening a new world of convenience, comfort, and safety…” The all- electric house featured more than just the revolutionary heat pump. It contained lighting technology unlike any seen before. The house had four Selector Switches with nine possible settings that controlled lights inside and outside. Three of these remote switches were wired to a Master Control Operator that could switch twenty different circuits for lights and outlets inside and out. A Master Pilot Light Panel indicated if certain lights were on and allowed the homeowner to turn off the lights form the panel location. Time- Delayed walk-through lights in the kitchen, utility room, and garage turned off after two minutes, allowing safe passage outside. A photocell in the garage turned on the night- lights and floodlights at dusk and turned them off a dawn. Recessed lights and dimmer switches made mood-light and task-specific lighting a possibility. In the living room, single switch moved a slide-away painted panel to reveal the television set. The same remote control turned on the television. The garage contained an auto sonic garage door opener operated from a single button in the car. It opened the door from as far as two hundred feet away and even turned on a light.

The innovations in this house were significant because they marked a change in the American home and lifestyle. Increased reliance on technology in the home and a desire for architecture that was more fashionable than functional were major changes in the home.

Making Connections

The first one hundred years after the Kansas-Nebraska act were a time of unprecedented change. The government relocated entire populations of Native Americans and white settlers took their place. Revolutionary transportation, the railroad, the automobile, and airplane, transformed the infrastructure of the country and mobilized Americans in ways they never dreamt possible. Countless other innovations, from the telephone to the television, had a profound impact on everyday life in America. In no place were these changes more apparent than in the home. The architecture of a home speaks volumes about the technology, lifestyle, and values of the time of its construction. The goal of the Century of Change program is for students to make the connections between mid- nineteenth and mid-twentieth century life. By visiting the Grinter Place and the 1950s All-Electric House, they see firsthand what life was like in each era. Students can easily compare and contrast the furniture, clothes, appliances, and structures in each house. In doing so, they leave with a renewed understanding of local history, the development of their communities, and a vision of things to come in 2054.

The Century of Change program is available Tuesday-Friday mornings, from 9:30-1:30, September-November and January-May. For more information, or to make reservations, contact Tracy Steitz at the Johnson County Museums, (913) 631-6709.

--ALBUM vol. 14, no. 4 (fall)