Kansas City’s Green Duck Tavern, at 26th Street and Prospect Avenue, was once an unassuming seat of power, owned by politician and civil rights activist Leon Jordan and a place for him and other leaders of the political organization Freedom, Inc., to map out strategy. A recent addition to the Kansas City Register of Historic Places, it also is where Jordan was gunned down gangland-style one early morning in 1970.

Joelouis Mattox, who serves as historian for the city’s Historic Preservation Commission, discusses the Green Duck and other notable places in KC with … um, checkered reputations. Also among them: the Castle Theater at 12th and Paseo; the Rhythm Lanes Skating Rink, Ray’s Golden Lounge, and Inferno Lounge on Troost; the Carver Theater and the Linwood Theater, both on Prospect; and Party House and the Log Cabin Lounge, both on 31st.