KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Many shoppers on the Country Club Plaza said they were shocked by anti-abortion advertisements on the sides of trucks that trolled the business district Monday.

The Center for Bio-Ethical Reform is behind the graphic photographs seen by hundreds Monday, KMBC's Maria Antonia reported. The group describes itself as a pro-life educational organization.

"I call it a weapon of mass instruction. We're going to see thousands and thousands of people this week while we're here in Kansas City," said Bill Calvin, a field manager with the group.

Calvin added that the images of aborted fetuses are designed to educate voters about abortion in key election states.

Discussion: Mobile Abortion Billboards

One family from Kansas said they tried to escape the unexpected images Monday afternoon.

"Oh, I bet we've seen it 50 times, and we've only been here two hours," Plaza visitor Nikki Jacobs said. "I don't like it; it's a little grotesque."

Jacobs said the pictures were too much for her 7-year-old daughter, Shayna, who didn't have a choice but to look when she didn't know the images were coming.

"(I) just really don't want to look at it, like, turn around to try to look away from it," Shayna said.

The people who own and manage the Plaza said they didn't know the trucks were coming, and they've fielded dozens of calls from people who said they were surprised, shocked and disgusted.

But Calvin said the trucks aren't going to go away.

"And we're going to continue to show it to younger people, and people that aren't even sexually active today," he said. "But five years or five months from now, someone suggests an abortion to them and that image is going to go off in their mind."