By Michael Bushnell

Northeast News

May 15, 2017

KANSAS CITY, Missouri – When Connie Roscoe moved in to the faded Victorian home in the 400 block of Gladstone Boulevard that her in-laws had purchased in 1974, Northeast was a very different place. By that time school desegregation was chasing many of the areas long-time white families to suburbs in the Northland and absentee landlords had begun to acquire large tracts of homes, subdividing them in to apartments for investment purposes. Northeast was spiraling downward.

Roscoe and her husband Bob, however, made a go of the 6,000 square foot home, working tirelessly to reconvert the house from eleven apartments to a single family home where they could raise their children. Soon after their arrival they were approached by a local landlord who was interested in selling the apartment building next door.

“It was a deal we couldn’t refuse and a way for us to control who our neighbors were,” Roscoe said.

Work soon called Roscoe to Colorado and husband Bob began the arduous commute to and from Kansas City to manage their rental properties here.

Roscoe returned to the neighborhood earlier this month and enjoyed a luxurious stay at The Inn at 425, the very home she and her husband moved into in 1974.

“The area has a completely different vibe now,” she said, relaxing on the front porch at the Inn. “It’s just a completely different neighborhood and the feel is so incredibly positive.”

Roscoes sold the home in 1988 when Kansas City’s Northeast community had just begun to “turn around.” Urban pioneers began to buy up many of the old homes to begin the restoration process.

“A new couple had just bought that house,” she noted, pointing across the street to the home Bruce and Veda Rogers painstakingly restored to its original glory and operated as a Bed and Breakfast before retiring, ironically, to Colorado. “I’m really taken aback by how wonderful everything looks.”

Roscoe and some cousins stayed at the Inn at 425 for a reunion while en route to the Ozarks to check on some flooded family property.