Askren donated photographs and negatives to the Missouri Valley Special Collections in 2006. Find more aerial photographs by putting aerial in the search box above to search all the collections. The company's name derived in 1929 from pioneer aircraft engine developer and airplane manufacturer Glenn Curtiss and the famous Wright brothers. The cards reached their height of popularity in the 1880s and 1890s.Ĭurtiss or Curtiss-Wright Flying Service, Photo Division New York City, shot these Kansas City area aerial views in the 1920s and '30s. Victorian trade cards, one of the more picturesque collections in the Missouri Valley Room, provide not only a rich resource for researching the history of printing, advertising, medicine, fashions, late nineteenth-century culture, etc., but also Kansas City companies. The project produced thousands of images of residences, businesses, schools, churches, and government buildings, including many structures that are no longer in existence or would not have otherwise been photographed. In 1940, the Works Progress Administration, in conjunction with the Jackson County Tax Assessor’s office and other local agencies, provided the manpower and partial funding for a photographic survey of all standing buildings in Kansas City, Missouri.
