A historic landmark that sits across Vine Street Brewing Co. in the 18th and Vine Jazz District is part of a real estate offering that includes 21.47 acres of land.
The Kansas City Workhouse Castle, placed on the Kansas City Register of Historic Places in 2007 and located at 2001 Vine St., is listed by Clemons Real Estate and UrbanAmerica, a minority real estate development and investment company based in Grapevine, Texas.
There is no price listed on Clemons Real Estate’s website, but the price is negotiable, according to the listing’s brochure.
UrbanAmerica had been involved in a previous attempt to develop the 21.47 acres as a part of the Enterprise Village Ecosystem in 2019 and proposed a $150 million development on the mostly vacant land.
The proposal was derailed by an investigation into the alleged misuse of funds involving the Black Economic Union of Greater Kansas City, which at the time had partnered with UrbanAmerica for the development. The story was first reported in 2018 by The Call, Kansas City’s oldest African American weekly newspaper.
The yellow limestone structure opened in 1897, replacing the old Kansas City Workhouse or municipal jail across the street.
By 1924 at the latest, all cells at the Workhouse Castle had been emptied, according to a previous Star story. Over the next few decades, the city used it for offices and equipment storage, and reportedly at one point for Marine training exercises, before abandoning it entirely in 1972.
These locations surround the Workhouse Castle and are included in the real estate listing, according to the brochure:
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21st and Vine streets
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22nd Street and Woodland Avenue
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24th and Vine streets
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23rd and Vine streets
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E. 22nd Street Terrace and Vine Street
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E. 23rd Street and Flora Avenue
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E. 22nd and Vine streets
The Star’s Randy Mason contributed to this report.