Legoland Lampoon

Kansas City’s Legoland attraction at Crown Center has been a tremendous plus for KC area and regional tourism.  The Lego Group boasts of $5 billion in revenue with individual sites attracting 400,000 to 600,000 local citizens and tourists per year.  To put that in perspective, that is 3 to 4 times the visitors that walk in the doors of all 16 heritage tourism sites in the Independence in spite of our annual investment of $1.4 million of public money for marketing.  The Lego Group’s parent company, Danish firm Merlin Entertainments, boasts of 60 million guests per year in their international market.  As a corporate goal, they work directly with local groups to promote local attractions by re-creating in miniature local tourism sites and landmarks from Legos which is quite interesting and creative in itself.  And because a majority of its patrons are young people, this effort connects our youth to these important sites also.  History that is presented and taught to our children plays a vital role in shaping their values and beliefs.  These types of public/private partnerships, especially those connected to our youth, are valuable in supporting and sustaining local tourism programs which translates to local economic development, increased tax revenue, and community pride.  It’s a winning combination unless you are talking about Independence.  Earlier in the year, I observed at Legoland a Lego re-creation of the very ornate Victorian Truman Home pictured above situated on a very prominent corner at Truman Road and Delaware Street in the heart of the Truman National Historic Landmark District in Independence.  Unfortunately it was labeled as the “Harry S. Truman Farm Home, also known as the Soloman Young Farm, the Harry S. Truman Farm Home was the resident of the Future President from 1907-1917” which is in Grandview, Missouri.  Oh well, I guess that is close enough for the KC folks.  In the age of information technology, we have to do a better job with educating our youth and citizens about our own local and national histories.  I noticed this blunder back in July.  Now I’m wondering if it has been fixed yet.