Kansas City Museum
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The Kansas City Museum at Corinthian Hall is a small museum in the historic Northeast Neighborhood in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. The three-acre plot consists of Corinthian Hall and its outbuildings, most of which have been renovated to contain various displays concerning local area history and natural sciences, a 50-seat planetarium, and a 1910-style soda fountain that serves up phosphates and ice cream.
Named for its six Corinthian columns, the estate was also known as the "Palace on Gladstone Boulevard". Built in 1908 by Robert A. Long and designed by architect Henry Hoit, this 25,000 square-foot mansion served as the residence for the Long family until R.A. Long's death in 1934. The estate was donated to the Kansas City Museum Association in 1939 by the Longs' daughters and was opened to the public in 1940.
While it was a residence, the mansion contained a myriad of closets and rooms filled with ornate tapestries, paintings, and antique furniture. However, the building was ill-equipped to house a museum, and much renovation was required to consolidate the smaller rooms into larger ones with space enough for exhibits. Though these changes have lessened the value of the building as a "historic house", during its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s it was a pioneer of natural science, housing hundreds of stuffed animals in lifelike dioramas as well as offering various presentations and classes in taxidermy. Over the years the majority of this collection was handed over to larger establishments more suited to the upkeep of the animals, with just a fraction remaining today.
In 1948, the entire museum was deeded to the City of Kansas City. In 2005 this ownership would, in turn, be merged with Union Station Kansas City Inc., the same organization that maintains Kansas City's Union Station, where it remains today.
