If you’re anything like me, you’re always amazed at how massive Nebraska Furniture Mart is. It feels like pulling into the parking lot of a cruise ship terminal. Well, the former Montgomery Ward building in KC’s Northeast neighborhood is that—times two.
At 2.2 million square feet, the warehouse was the largest building west of the Mississippi River at its conception in 1914. With miles and miles of electrical wiring and piping, it was once a sprawling hub of activity—part distribution center, part department store. Now, more than a century later, the building has been reimagined with a few tenants, most notably Super Flea, which just got a makeover (we’ll get to that later).
Montgomery Ward’s home in the Northeast was actually its third location, according to Michael Bushnell, the former editor of the Northeast News who currently works as a contractor at the Museum of Kansas City. The first was in the West Bottoms. Then it moved to 19th and Campbell, which is now home to Tension Envelope. The company then settled at its final home on St. John Avenue in the Northeast neighborhood, where it attracted both shoppers and job-seeking residents. “People even petitioned the city to reroute the streetcar so it would turn around on Ward’s property,” Bushnell says. “It was a way to draw people to shop there.”
Establishing a national department store’s distribution center here was a no-brainer: Kansas City was a major hub of activity in the early to mid-1900s, thanks to its central location in the railroad network and the prominence of the livestock industry. “Kansas City was neck and neck with Chicago when it came to cattle and stock processing,” Bushnell says.
More than its size, what stands out most to Bushnell is the beauty of the building. “John McKecknie’s pioneering work with reinforced concrete is really significant,” he says. “He was the architect, but also an artist, and the Montgomery Ward building is a perfect example. If you look at the parapets, the accents, the way it’s designed, it’s visually stunning. It reflects a craftsman mindset. There isn’t a lot of ornamentation. It’s very straightforward, very utilitarian, but still designed to look good. He blended those elements beautifully.” McKecknie designed several buildings in the city, including the Dr. Herbert Tureman residence (which now houses the National Museum of Toys and Miniatures on UMKC’s campus) and downtown’s Gloyd Building, the city’s first reinforced concrete skyscraper.
In the late 1980s, shopping patterns shifted, and Montgomery Ward closed its doors on St. John Avenue—part of a broader decline that also shuttered Sears and Sheffield Steel in the area. Skip Sleyster purchased the building in 1993 and opened Super Flea, which has recently gone under renovations and had a grand reopening this past March.
Rita Strickland, sales and events manager at Cubework, the company that now owns and operates Super Flea, played a key role in revitalizing the flea market. She says that they’re working on a “Vintage Ward’s” exhibit to showcase relics found around the building. “We have some unique pieces: an old pancake maker, vintage filmmaking equipment, a Rock ’Em Sock ’Em-style game and even collectible Avon bottles from the 1970s,” she says.
If you’re interested in exploring the building, tours are available by request. One of the highlights? “There’s a boiler room from the early 1900s that is still completely intact,” Strickland says. cubework.com.
