Lamenting Sprawl In Kansas City

"It’s what is carelessly termed progress, and we’re told it is both inescapable and necessary — told that by builders and land speculators and politicians who will not be entirely satisfied until all the world is paved.

In the first months of our marriage, my wife and I lived in what I imagined had been a servant’s or groundskeeper’s cottage on what once was a wealthy eccentric’s grand estate.

The acreage — with a fabulous log mansion, a two-story house for the master’s parents, a large horse barn and two lakes — was at what then was the outer edge of the metropolitan area.

Shared with two beagles and a bird dog, that little cottage had been my bachelor place before we wed. And though it wasn’t quite in open country, the press of people and crowded subdivisions seemed far, far away.

In fact, I could walk out my door and in no more than 10 or 15 minutes afoot be hunting quail or a rabbit for the pot.

But that was a bit more than 40 years ago. Urban development crept out inexorably to destroy that idyllic corner of the world."