For decades, the stretch of land south of the University of Missouri campus was known as Campus Town, a collection of restaurants, bars and gathering spaces that were a part of students’ daily routines. Restaurants like Gaeblers Black and Gold Inn and The Shack were places students passed through constantly, from afternoon sodas to late-night meals.
Today, the same ground is home to the Reynolds Alumni Center and Traditions Plaza, spaces built for ceremonies, events and reflection. The restaurants and bars that once kept this corner of campus alive are gone, replaced by spaces designed to preserve the university’s image and traditions.
KBIA's Jack Andersen traces how one of MU’s most recognizable spaces transformed alongside the university itself.
This piece is part of Reverberations, a series from KBIA that uncovers the wealth of historical information housed within the State Historical Society of Missouri's archives and its Haskell Monroe oral history collection from the 1990s.
This episode of Reverberations features the voices of:
- LeRoy Day
- Ray McClure
Reverberations is a grant-funded, collaborative project from KBIA, the Missouri School of Journalism, and The School of Visual Studies, with support from Missouri Humanities. Special thanks to the State Historical Society of Missouri for partnering with this project to digitize and explore the Haskell Monroe Oral History Collection.