Kansas City By The Numbers

 Kansas City, MO

I liked this sticker that represents KC.  You can buy it here if you want.

Kansas City by the Numbers

Our time in Kansas City has come to an end.  We booked it way back in November of 2021 and it seemed like such a long way away for a long time and now it is in the past.  Funny how time flies when you are having fun and have a new thing to do every day.  We did a lot but we could have done a lot more.  Here are some stats for our stay.

States visited: 2 (Missouri and Kansas)

New Counties: MO 14, KS 8

Purple is this year

Purple is tis year

New Breweries: 6 (all on the MO side)

New State Capitols: 1 (on the KS side)

New Pinball Venues: 3 (on both sides)

New Tiki Bars: Zero 

Miles and Miles of New Highways: Both Sides

Kansas just edged out Wyoming

New Museums: 10 (on both sides)

Puppet Shows Celebrating the Bicentennial of Missouri: 1

State Fairs: 1 (Missouri)

Doughnut Shops Visited: 1 (Kansas Side)

Botanic Gardens: 1 (Kansas Side)

Amazing Public Libraries: 1

If you missed yesterday's post you can find it here.  

Kansas Liquor Laws

 Kansas City, MO

A photo I took at a local Kansas City, Kansas Grocery Store

Kansas Liquor Laws

Kansas is a city so great it's too big for one state so we can talk about the Kansas side of things today.  We spent most of our time in KCMO but did spend some time in KCK and even had a beer there.  We didn't talk to any bartenders there so I am getting all of my info off the internet.

Wikipedia starts off with this sentence which shows the contrast between the 2 sides of Kansas City, "The alcohol laws of Kansas are among the strictest in the United States, in sharp contrast to its neighboring state of Missouri.".  I don't think I can distill the info that Wikipedia has any more than it is so here is more straight from the site, "Kansas had statewide prohibition from 1881 to 1948, longer than any other state, and continued to prohibit general on-premises liquor sales until 1987. Kansas's strict and highly regulated approach to alcohol stems from lingering vestiges of its long era of prohibition. As of January 2019, Kansas has 3 dry counties, where on-premises liquor sales are prohibited, but the sale of 3.2% beer is permitted. As of April 2017, Kansas still has not ratified the 21st Amendment, which ended nationwide prohibition in 1933."

There is a lot that I can copy and paste about the history but I will just keep it high level and give you the state of the state as it stands today.  One thing that I found interesting about the history of it includes the fact that "Happy Hour" was not legal in Kansas until 2012.  Before that, prices could be reduced but had to be reduced all day.

Today Kansas divides alcohol into 6 categories (not just the 3 that I am used to); "Alcohol Liquor" is anything over 3.2%, A "Cereal Malt Beverage" (CMB) is beer less than 3.2%, a "Nonalcoholic Malt Beverage" is beer less than 0.5%, "Domestic Table Wine" is wine less than 14% and made in Kansas, "Domestic Fortified Wine" is wine between 14% and 20% made in Kansas,  and "Domestic Beer" is beer 8% or less made in Kansas.

Packaged Liquor sales are only allowed by licensed liquor stores.  Grocery Stores and Gas Stations can sell CMB, which is the beer that is 3.2% or less.  If you want to open a liquor store in Kansas, you need to be a US citizen and have lived in Kansas for at least 4 years, as well as be 21, have no felony, never had a liquor license revoked, not be in law enforcement, and your spouse needs to meet all of these requirements as well.  Your liquor store needs to be 200 ft. from schools, colleges, and churches.  It also can't have an indoor entrance or opening which connects to another store.

On premises sales of Liquor need to be accompanied by at least 30% sales of food unless voters in a county vote to remove that requirement.  There are still 3 counties that have not approved any sale of alcohol, 63 counties that allow alcohol sales with the 30% food sales, and 39 counties that allow what I call normal bars, establishments that serve liquor and no food.  Alcohol sales are not permitted between 2am and 9am.  Due to Covid-19, to go beverages are allowed to be sold as long as the drinks have tamper evident packaging (one can clearly see if it has been opened).

This explains why most of the bars in KC are on the MO side.  We did have a few breweries picked out to visit but getting there by bus is just too much of a hassle because frequency is terrible. Checking off a Kansas Brewery will have to wait.

The one beer I had in Kansas while playing pinball. It was over 3.2%

An ad for Montucky Cold Snack on the side of the bar we went to in Kansas City, KS

That's it for today.  Kind of interesting hu?  I don't think we will choose to settle down in Kansas but it is nice to visit.  If you missed yesterday's write up on Missouri Liquor Laws you can check it out here.  I will leave you with some more official links below.

2021 Liquor Law Amendments

2022 Changes

Department of Revenue site with all the laws 

MO Liquor Laws

 Kansas City, MO

My Bronson's Milk Punch at Grunauer.

Missouri Liquor Laws

As we travel, I like to get familiar with local liquor and alcohol laws.  There are some surprising things out there and I find them interesting.  All of this info is either gathered from talking to bar tenders, our experiences, or the internet.  These are my observations from a consumer's standpoint and should be used for entertainment only.  Something I write here isn't going to stand up in court.  

So far, while in Missouri, we haven't experienced a situation where we couldn't order a drink of some sort unless we were at a place without a license.  In general, alcohol can be bought between 6am and 1:30am all week including Sundays.  Most bars need to be closed by 1:30 but there are at least a few in Kansas City and St. Louis that are allowed to serve until 3am and there is 1 "super secret" place called The Mutual Musicians Foundation that serves until 5:30am.  It has special status as a National Historic Landmark and a special law was passed by The Missouri House of Representatives to allow only this place to serve alcohol all night.  It's now the place that all of the bartenders, musicians, and late night partiers go after the bars close.  We have heard you can hear some epic music there after 1:30am but we can't stay up that late.

Packaged alcohol can be purchased at Grocery Stores, Gas Stations, and Liquor stores in Missouri.  This includes all three categories of alcohol (Beer, Wine, and Spirits).  Missouri state law specifically prohibits any counties, or unincorporated city or town from banning the retail sale of liquor, but only allows incorporated cities to ban the sale of liquor by the drink by public referendum. No incorporated Missouri cities have ever chosen to hold a referendum banning alcohol sales.

As far as I can tell, there is no law that requires food to be served with alcohol like there is in other places and no law that says food must be served at an establishment that serves alcohol.  There are real bars in all of Missouri as far as I can tell unlike our experience in Texas which was county by county.

We hear the open container laws for walking around are strictly enforced like they are in other places (our experiences with this are mixed as there are places we walk in the morning that are littered with bottles and cans of various libations). There is one district, The Power and Light District, that has a special carve out.  You can carry around an open container within a certain area.  The area is much like City Walk or Downtown Disney where there are multiple bars, food establishments, and outdoor entertainment going on in the evenings.  There are also legal carve outs for "festivals" and "events".  We have been to at least one "festival" where they opened up the area for people to bring their dogs to the antique district and then called it something fun and served alcohol.

The REALY interesting law here is the open container law as it pertains to vehicles.  There is NO OPEN CONTAINER LAW FOR VEHICLES!  This means that Donna can chug a bottle of Jack Daniels in the passenger seat while I drive 70 MPH down the interstate.  She would never do this but she could if she were so inclined to do so.

We will be able to have a drink in our campsites while we are camping throughout Missouri but you can't drink on beaches or in parking lots at state parks.  We will be traveling to some states where you can't have a beer while camping which I think is pretty dumb.  

And now here are some photos of various beverages we have enjoyed in Missouri so far.

I got a free sample at a brewery so that isn't necessary illegal.

Museum Beer!

That's it for today but you can read about yesterday's adventure here.  

Greetings From the River Market

 Kansas City, MO

A nice River Market mural

Penn Valley Dog Park

This morning we took Francis to Penn Valley Dog Park so he could blow off some energy.  He met some nice dogs, put a few dogs in their place, but mostly he sat in the sun.  He loves sitting in the sun.  At one point he was lounging in the sun so we walked over to some shade and he stayed there so I took a photo of him.  Can you find him?

You can just see his ears sticking up to the right of the tree that is starting to turn yellow.

River Market

A bit later in the afternoon we walked down to River Market.  Our plan was to buy something for dinner and see more sights.

It's just that easy!

You can see the paddle wheel outside The Arabia Steamboat Museum for free!

We went to a Vietnamese Market to look for dinner

We bought Bahn Mi Sandwiches and then went to Strange Days Brewing and ate them with a beer.

They had a Banana, Peanut, Chocolate Stout on tap and I was curious but not curious enough to pay for it so I asked for a sample and got one.  It wasn't good IMHO.

It was a pretty mellow day.  When we got home we made some dinner with a steamed pork roll we bought at the grocery store and finished watching Stranger Things.  

If you missed yesterday's post you can find it here.

The National WWI Museum and Memorial

 Kansas City, MO

The View from The Liberty Memorial Tower.  

The WWI Museum

Today I went to The National WW1 Museum and Memorial.  Gordon, Alan, and Augie were back in town and it was on their list of places to visit so I joined them.  I rode the KC Streetcar to Union Station and then hiked up the hill to the memorial.  When we bought our tickets we were told that we should start in the Liberty Memorial Tower so that's what we did.  The tower is 217 feet from it's base and 268 feet from the grass lawn below the elevated base the tower sits on.  That's still well below the Kansas Capitol Dome which is 306 feet high.  While we were up on the tower Gordon asked about the Kansas Capitol Dome and I said it was way scarier and that this tower that we were on fits inside the dome.  It gave the dome even more perspective.  It was a fairly short visit up top.  It was a small area and it was 85 degrees and in the sun.

Volunteers worked the elevator shuttling people up and down.

There were 45 easy steps after the elevator to the top.  It wasn't anything like the Tower steps in the Kansas Dome.

I am sure the downtown views would be amazing at night but the tower closes at 4:30.

After the tower, we wandered into a smaller part of the museum that had some Russian and Austrian War Relics from The Eastern Front.  It was off in a smaller building away from the museums main entrance.

We made our way to the main entrance of the museum and waited for the intro movie to start.  The main part of the museum is broken up into 2 parts.  Part 1 is before the US entered the war and Part 2 is the second half of the war during the US involvement. There were 2 movies at the beginning of each part to set the stage for what was going on at the time.

The entrance featured a glass bridge with poppies below it.  Poppies were common sight along the western front and have become a symbol of remembrance in many places.

I'm drawn to the art wherever we go so I liked these old posters.

It all started with an assassination, partly due to economical inequities going on at the time. 

This started a huge chain reaction with each nation jumping into the war for different reasons.

They had old photos that you could explore with this magnifying glass.

Will Rogers makes a solid point

Some foreshadowing here.

This was a big take away for me.  The US wasn't considered a world power before the war and Germany wasn't too concerned about our entry.  After The Great War the US vowed to avoid war on foreign soil and that vow stayed strong for about 22 years.  And then we forgot the vow and continued to fight wars around the world for various reasons.

The spoils of war go to the consumers at the Museum Store

The Cafe was closed

Get your Propaganda Cola!

Marketing keeping it classy.

The WWI museum was good for what it was.  It told the story of how it all played out and had some cool stuff to look at.  I suggest you save $20 and visit this timeline they have posted online.  It pretty much lays out everything for you while you drink coffee in your underwear.  

Dinner

After the museum we went to early dinner at a Chinese place that Gordon picked out.  We went to Peking Chinese Restaurant. It was good Fast Food Style Chinese Food with a fun server / probably owner.  We were only 1 of 3 groups when we got there but she still felt the need to rush us to order.  She let us know that they do not serve tap water because it is poison.  If we wanted water we would have to buy bottled water and all of the drinks are $1.50.  We discussed the dangers of drinking tea made from poison water but decided that the word poison was probably an overstatement because Donna and I have been drinking the water for almost a month.  We figured that the $1.50 per drink would ward off any ill effects the poison may cause.

The menu complete with hand edits.  

It was a fun day with Gordon.  He heads back to Orange County tomorrow and we will pick up with him again in January at Disney World.  We are both looking forward to that but not looking past the fun adventures that we still have between now and then.  We only have 5 days left in Kansas City and 2 of those will be cooking and packing.  We have a 2 week road trip between here and Baltimore.  We are looking forward to the camping we will do and I hope to add to our bird list.  There hasn't been much nature the past month but that is about to change.

That's it for today.  If you didn't read about The Money Museum yesterday you can check it out here.  We got to see what $40 million dollars looks like stacked up against the wall.