The city is sacred to the Latter Day Saint movement, as the home of Joseph Smith's 1831 Temple Lot, and the headquarters of several Mormon denominations.

Independence was originally inhabited by Missouri and Osage Native Americans, followed by the Spanish and a brief French tenure.

Lewis and Clark recorded in their journals that they stopped in 1804 to pick plums, raspberries, and wild apples at a site that would later form part of the city.

Independence was also a stopping point for the "Donner Party", an ill-fated group of 19th-century wagon train emigrants whose westward journey along the California Trail ended in disaster, spawning one of the most well known and taboo stories of pioneer-era America.

Independence immediately became a jumping-off point for the emerging fur trade, accommodating merchants and adventurers beginning the long trek westward on the Santa Fe Trail.

In 1831, members of the Latter Day Saint movement began moving to the Jackson County, Missouri area.

Shortly thereafter, founder Joseph Smith declared a spot west of the Courthouse Square to be the place for his prophesied temple of the New Jerusalem, in expectation of the Second Coming of Christ.

Tension grew with local Missourians until the Latter Day Saints were driven from the area in 1833, the beginning of a conflict which culminated in the 1838 Mormon War.

On March 8, 1849, the Missouri General Assembly granted a home-rule charter to the town and on July 18, 1849, William McCoy was elected as its first mayor.

In the mid-19th century an Act of the United States Congress defined Independence as the start of the Oregon Trail.

Two important Civil War battles occurred at Independence: the first on August 11, 1862, when Confederate soldiers took control of the town, and the second in October 1864, which resulted in a Union victory.

United States President Harry S. Truman grew up in Independence and, in 1922, was elected judge of the Court of Jackson County, Missouri (an administrative, not judicial, post).

Truman performed his duties diligently, and won personal acclaim for several popular public works projects, including an extensive series of fine roads for the growing use of automobiles, the building of a new County Court building in Independence, and a series of 12 Madonna of the Trail monuments to pioneer women dedicated across the country in 1928 and 1929.

His wife, First Lady Bess Truman, was born and raised in Independence, and both are buried there.

Independence is located on the south bank of the Missouri River, near the western edge of the state.

A number of Restoration Branches are also located in and around Independence, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints maintains a visitor center in the town.

The Community of Christ has built a temple in Independence, and also maintains a large auditorium and other buildings nearby.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints operates a sizable visitors' center adjacent to the Community of Christ Temple, and across the street from the original Temple Lot designated by Joseph Smith in 1830.

[28] Prior to Fall 2008, parts of western Independence in the Van Horn feeder pattern resided in the Kansas City, Missouri School District,[29] but all of these students are now part of the Independence school district.

Three public high schools are located within the city limits: Two private high schools within the city limits: Santa-Cali-Gon Days is an annual Labor Day festival held in Independence intermittently since 1940 and continuously since 1973, celebrating the city's heritage as a starting point of three major frontier trails: the Santa Fe, California, and Oregon.

The Cable Dahmer Arena is home of the Kansas City Mavericks, a minor-league hockey team in the ECHL.

Crysler Stadium is the home of the collegiate summer baseball Independence Veterans of the Mid-Plains League.

After signing an agreement with TradeWind Energy in July 2008, IPL will begin purchasing annually 15 megawatts of renewable energy from the Smoky Hills Wind Farm (a wind turbine facility) in Kansas.