Secret Kansas City Stops

 One of my sources for adventures is the book, Secret Kansas City by Anne Kniggendorf.

We have gone to many of the stops.

Time to finish up more. 

WW II Plane crashes into homes, Merriam, KS.

On July 26, 1944, a bomber plane took off from Lincoln, NE.

“Their mission was to calibrate their compass flight 7,000 feet within about 100 miles of the airfield. If everything was working well, they'd deployed to Europe,” said Andrew Gustafson from the Johnson County Museum.

The pilot Kenneth Keech had family in the Merriam area. Keech decided to ‘buzz’ his family. Buzzing was a common occurrence then. It usually meant flying low, fast, and even doing some tricks over an area.

This caused the plane to crash.

“It ultimately destroyed several homes. The bomber was completely destroyed. There was a pretty large fire. Three people in the bomber were injured, three people in the neighborhood were injured, and three people in the bomber died in the crash,” said Gustafson.

Then I needed to run to Ikea which is just across the street from the crash site.

I had lunch there.

There meatballs are pretty good.

I needed one thing for the closet but walked out with multiple items.

Our next stop is a grave site.

Dedicated to the pioneers of this community.

The Cross Cemetery.  Washington and Nancy Cross are buried here.

Washington died in 1872 and Nancy in 1886.

This is next to Mr. Goodcents at the intersection of Lamar and Johnson Drive

Only the headstones remain.

One final stop - a three-ton Danforth anchor.

The navy donated it in 2004 for the Mission, Kansas Pearl Harbor Survivors Memorial Park 

on the the 63rd anniversary of V-J Day.

There is a piece of the USS Arizona in the box

That's the piece with my reflection.

There is a hole so you can touch it.

Along with my reflection this shows what part of the ship the piece came from

This park is near Johnson Drive and Nall.  It's a tiny park but well cared for.

That's it for today.  We got 3 things in today plus an IKEA errand.  The closet was finished yesterday afternoon.  I'm still working on putting everything in the closet.  I painted and painted yesterday.  I still have the hallway to paint.  That's the plan for my afternoon.

Until tomorrow.