Our retirement club, KCP&L Power Partners, toured the Kansas City Union Station on February 12, 2013 as a part of our regular monthly event plan. We had about 45 people attend the tour and the luncheon that followed at Harvey's in Union Station. Sigrid didn't join me on this outing because we had been to the Station many times before. I went primarily to take photos for the Club's web site. The tour and the luncheon were actually very good....I wish Sigrid had come.
Kansas City Union Station is the second largest rail station in the U. S. with Grand Central Station in New York being the largest. Union Station was dedicated and placed in service in 1914.
Our group was too large for one guide, so we broke into two. I went with the second group in the photo below.
Club executive, Ron Marchisio introduces our tour guide. The guide is dressed as an original "Harvey Girl". I would suggest you Google "Harvey Girl" to learn more about them. Their history is fascinating and an important part of American history.
The famous Union Station Clock.
In the stations hey-day, this was the departure area. It was filled with wooden benches and thousands of rail travelers. Something like 300 trains per day passed through Union Station.
My Grandfather Browning, worked for the Kansas City Terminal Railroad at Union Station. In 1927, he was killed in an accident as he stepped between two cars that we then pushed together for coupling. That left my father, Charles Browning, fatherless from age 9.
The ceilings are breathtaking.
Our tour guide as full of facts and stories about the station.....she did a great job.
Pierponts is one of the restaurants in the building....very nice.
The tour took us to places that I had never been for some great new views.
An old photo, taken at the time of the dedication of Liberty Memorial in 1921, looking down at the station.
This photo was taken from Union Station looking up towards Liberty Memorial.
A model engine under the Big Clock in the Station Lobby.
Our guide points out some of the bullet holes left in the building after the "Kansas City Massacre" in 1933.
Lunch at Harvey's after the tour.
I remember riding one of these as a kid growing up in KC. You used plastic tokens to pay for the fares. Tokens were worth 1/10 of a cent.
A very nice day.
No comments:
Post a Comment