 "Meet me under the clock."
In Kansas City, that expression tends to say it all. No further explanation needed. People have been saying it every since Union Station first opened in 1914. They realized there's no simpler way to arrange a meeting in the vastness of the Station.
Just say it: "Meet me under the clock." For a business lunch... a family reunion... a romantic rendezvous...
Through the years, dozens of couples have gotten engaged or even married under the clock. Countless other encounters have occurred under the clock, which certainly does stand out in the archway separating Grand Hall from the Sprint Festival Plaza. Perhaps the Station's most famous icon, the clock - at 6-1/2 feet across and 3 feet thick - weighs a whopping half-ton. Light illuminates the enormous clock face.
It seemed only natural for Kansas Citians to mark the passage of time under the city's greatest timepiece. Ringing in New Year's "under the clock" rapidly evolved into a KC tradition, although the federal prohibition on alcohol kept party crowds small much of the Roaring '20s. The police were constantly on the prowl for bootlegged booze, which flowed fast and furious at "underground" parties.
Nonetheless, the gatherings inside the Station steadily swelled. Throughout the 1930s, as many as 15,000 revelers packed a smoky Grand Hall and waiting room each Dec. 31. As train travel withered, so did Union Station's New Year's Eve parties. Finally, in the early 1960s, they stopped altogether. But with the Station reopening in 1999, the tradition was renewed.
Today, the clock, computerized to adjust automatically to daylight savings time, is working better than ever. During the first 80-some years it was hanging in the Station, the clock's hands would routinely scrape against each other.
Getting the clock ticking again was considered essential to the Station's renovation, for if Union Station is the heart of Kansas City, then this clock represents the heart of the Station.
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