Article Contents A House Built of Wood A Tower Built of Stone Growing a South Kansas City Legacy A Lumber Baron’s Utopia

When Robert Alexander Long died in 1934, he left behind one of the nation's largest lumber companies with 13 mills and 110 retail lumber yards. Long-Bell Lumber’s success was the foundation of a legacy of philanthropy and visible impact upon Kansas City and the United States.

See a short video clip about the Long family and their impact on Kansas City. Historian Dr. Michael Raynor is featured >>

Besides Corinthian Hall, Long’s 1909 mansion which now houses the Kansas City Museum, Long was directly involved in Kansas City’s first steel-skeleton skyscraper, the creation of the Liberty Memorial (now the National World War I Museum), and the birth of a city in Washington state.

Long’s family legacy is wide and far-reaching, stretching across the metropolitan area and across half the U.S.

A House Built of Wood

R.A. Long’s success in the lumber business led him to initiate the construction of several important buildings in Kansas City. They were the respective Kansas City homes of two groups very close to his heart: his family and Long-Bell Lumber.

Corinthian Hall, Long’s stately, 30,000-square-foot mansion, was built in 1909. After purchasing surrounding property, Long enlisted Henry Ford Hoit to design his new family home, gardens, stables, and carriage house. The end result was Kansas City’s first million-dollar home, and is now the Kansas City Museum.

The house was designed with a melding of many different historical styles into a neo-classical appearance. Its name, in fact, comes from one feature of its façade: the Corinthian columns which grace the front portico.

After housing the operations center of Long-Bell Lumber in the Keith and Perry Building in Kansas City’s business district for 15 years, R.A. decided he and his staff needed more room. He built a 16-story office building in the Beaux-Arts style.

The tower, which was Kansas City’s first steel-skeleton skyscraper, housed United Missouri Bank since its beginning, when the financial institution leased space from Long-Bell. UMB bought the building in the early 1940s and has occupied it since. The bank began renovating the building in 2000.

A Tower Built of Stone

At the close of the First World War in 1918, calls went out immediately through the Kansas City Star and Kansas City Times for a monument to the city’s and the nation’s fallen sons. Kansas City leaders and the public embraced the cause and a plan was devised to erect a grand memorial.

R.A. Long became the founding president of the Liberty Memorial Association, and a resounding voice calling for support. Beginning in 1919 Long, J.C. Nichols, and other members of the association raised over $2 million in less than 2 weeks by public subscription throughout Kansas City and the nation.

The Liberty Memorial site was dedicated in 1921, ground broken in 1923, and construction completed in 1926. In 2002, a major restoration mission began, and the new National World War I Museum opened beneath the memorial in December 2006. The museum consists of a world-class exhibition area, auditorium, research center and library, and the R.A. Long Education Center, which hosts on-site educational programs.

Growing a South Kansas City Legacy

In 1913, Long began construction of his country estate, Longview Farm. Construction took 18 months, at the end of which the farm totaled a mansion and 50 other buildings on more than 1,700 acres.

Long’s daughter Loula lived on the farm with her husband and trained prize-winning horses until her death. Loula became a champion on the world horse-showing stage, is in the Madison Square Garden Hall of Fame, and was even known as the Queen of the American Royal.

By the late 1960s, R.A. Long’s daughters Loula and Sallie America were nearing the end of their lives, and donated land on Longview Farm to what is now Longview College, a branch of Kansas City’s Metropolitan Community College. Longview Lake, built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, also comprises land donated by the Longs.

A Lumber Baron’s Utopia

With Long-Bell Lumber burgeoning with growth in the early 1920s, operations expanded into Washington state. While planning two new mill sites in the southwest region of the state, Long and his planners realized that they would need to create a large amount of housing for necessary workers.

Kansas City-based city planners Hare and Hare, and George Kessler, a prominent St. Louis city planner, worked with Long to plan the city from scratch. Longview, Washington, was incorporated in 1924.

R.A. Long personally donated funds to build a hotel, high school, YMCA building, and a public library. Longview currently has a population of about 35,000 people and will celebrate its 85th anniversary in 2009.