By Michael Bushnell
Northeast News
May 18, 2016

As we approach the summer rain season, it is fitting that we run a postcard showing a scene in the West Bottoms during the great flood of 1908: the “June Flood of 1908 at Kansas City – 13th & Hickory streets.”

The John Deere Plow Company building can be seen with flood waters from the Missouri and Kansas rivers lapping at its door and loading dock.

Back then, there were no levees or dikes to channel the river’s water away from business and residential districts along the banks.

Five years earlier, the “great” flood of 1903 occurred, flooding the same area and interrupting train service to Kansas City for almost two weeks.

It should be no surprise that following that flood, plans were drawn up by city leaders to move the Union Depot from the oft-flooded West Bottoms to a higher location.

The Pershing Road location was chosen for the new depot now known affectionately as Union Station.

This Real Photo postcard was sent to Miss Rose Dierks, who resided at “Armour Blvd. & The Paseo.”

It reads: “Best regards and wishes from yours truly.”

It is signed with the initials P. L. D. The card was mailed July 13, 1908.