The Library's digital history team completed a new website in 2018 dedicated to examining Kansas City in the 1920s and 1930s under infamous political boss Tom Pendergast: The Pendergast Years: Kansas City in the Jazz Age & Great Depression.The site is a repository of articles, photos, and other historical documentation, providing scholars, students, and general history enthusiasts with new tools and resources to gain a greater understanding of this transformational time in Kansas City's history.
A collaboration among a number of institutions and organizations that took several years to complete, the partners not only wanted to introduce the site to the public through the Library's traditional communications, but also celebrate the achievement by inviting supporters and donors to a festive launch event with the Prohibition theme. Working with the Library's development director and the digital history team, I helped plan and organize Boss Bash: Notorious Tales & Cocktails, a ticketed benefit for the Library's Missouri Valley Special Collections billed as a casual evening off drinks and entertainment in celebration of this new resource.
My role in the website project itself was largely art direction, creating the design aesthetic for the Pendergast site, as well as collaborating with the Library's web programmer and digital history team to develop styling and visual applications (more about the site design here). For the Boss Bash event I came up with the name, wrote marketing copy, and the visual identity for the materials, carrying over design elements from the site, such as the color palette and art-deco-inspired features. Invitations and promotions were primarily digital, shared through Library email and social media channels, EventBrite, and direct emails to donors and partners. I also organized a rolling slideshow projected onto large screens during the event, with partner recognition and a sampling of images and features from the Pendergast site collection.
The event sold out, and a full house of attendees enjoyed original cocktails and appetizers provided by Tom's Town Distillery, which also served as the host site. The distillery, which takes its name from Tom Pendergast, conducted research using the Missouri Valley Special Collections to develop its brand identity. and was also one of the website partners. The evening's entertainment included live jazz and an original theatrical performance of Pendergast-era stories inspired by historical events presented by Fishtank Theatre.
Attendees also received a set of commemorative postcards with historic images of Kansas City that are among the images within the Pendergast site's digital collection. I designed the set and packaged them within a clear plastic sleeve (offering some protection from wayward cocktail spills during the event).
The digital history team came up with a Prohibition-themed take on the "Guess Who?" card game that involved matching mug shots of well-known criminals and mobsters from the era with other photos of them from Kansas City Star archives that became part of the website's digital collection. I developed some signage and instructional materials for the game to place near the station, and gave the activity the name "Mobster Mash."
