Bruces BFF: Barney Allis Plaza and KC's Famous Dish Pizza

Tucked in between the Convention Center and Power and Light is a one-block green space called Barney Allis Plaza. There are some beautiful benches to sit and have lunch and of course, a spectacular fountain. This fountain was documented early on in my fountain hunting adventure. In fact, it was my very first documented fountain!

The Barney Allis Plaza Fountain at 12th and Wyandotte:

The park has a tennis court right in the middle, which is home to the Kansas City Explorers World TeamTennis. Did you know this even existed???

And apparently they are the 2010 WORLD CHAMPIONS! I am ashamed to say I did not even know about this!

Looks like their season is in July. I may have to check it out!

Find out more about the Kansas City Explorers: http://www.kcexplorers.com/teams/index.aspx.

Here's a short little time lapse video of the fountain: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pl8j-BvLKY.

Anyways, on the south side of the plaza was a picture of the first municipal building in Kansas City and its story:

In 1899, Kansas City built its first convention center. It was very proud of this achievement. They even had John Phillip Sousa come and conduct the opening ceremony. The convention center was going to be the host of the Democratic Convention but three months before the convention, the center was burned to the ground. Everyone assumed the Convention would have to be moved to another city but the city and people rallied and built a new center in less than 90 days in time! This building stood until the 1970's when the current larger Bartle Hall was constructed.

KC's Municipal Auditorium

Right across the street is the Convention Center

A view of the iconic spears of the convention center

So, it was pretty awesome to discover this neat park downtown, and learn some more history about the convention center. Tonight, I discovered another wonderful Kansas City treasure: The Dish Famous Deep Dish Pizza.

I saw this pizza at Cosentino's and tried it out. It was delicious!! You have to like deep dish pizza to like it but the best part is it boasts to be the only locally handmade frozen pizza in KC.