The Guadalupe Center Scrapbooks

1920 - 1940

Located in Kansas City’s Westside, the Guadalupe Center is one of the most prominent Latinx organizations in the region. Founded in 1919 by the Agnes Ward Amberg Club, a group of affluent white Catholic women, the center sought to address the needs of the Mexican immigrant community and the discrimination they faced locally. Despite its initial ties to the Settlement House movement during the Progressive Era, the Mexican community demanded that the organization’s services move beyond Americanization and focus on programs to uplift the Latinx community.

These images are part of three photograph albums created by Dorothy Gallagher, the organization’s director from 1926 to 1944. The albums documented life in the Westside and activities at the Guadalupe Center during her tenure. The selected photographs capture the types of services provided to the Latinx community, including health services, youth programs, and adult education. The Guadalupe Center also played a role in cultivating a sense of cultural pride. The center became a space where the Mexican community could celebrate their heritage through dances and events. One of the images depicts the organization’s Grupo Artístico, a regionally renowned dance troupe, performing on the U.S. Capitol lawn at the National Folk Festival in 1938. 

The Guadalupe Center is the longest continuously operating Latinx organization in the United States. A century later, the center maintains its mission by providing social, educational, and cultural services to the Latinx population. The history of the Guadalupe Center offers a small—yet significant glimpse—at the Mexican American and Latinx experience in Kansas City and Missouri.