Charles’ 
Slide of the Week: October 8th, 2008
Union Station, Kansas City, MO, 1949
Art deco skyscrapers soaring among brick buildings and billboards provide a dramatic backdrop for Kansas City’s monumental train station. When it opened in 1914 it was the second largest rail hub in the country. After the final trail left the station in 1988 it closed. Thankfully it was spared the wrecking ball and today it has been reinvented as an entertainment and cultural center.
Union Station was just one of the many spectacular places I visited last week while in Kansas City to do my retro slide show at the wonderful Airline History Museum. The first thing I did after I arrived in KC was go to the Airline History Museum. Much to my shocking surprise I was greeted at the hanger entrance by the TWA Rocket to the Moon, the twin to the one that was in the original Tomorrowland at Disneyland. This rocket was originally placed on the roof of TWA headquarters in downtown Kansas City in 1956. Already flabbergasted by the rocket, I nearly had to be hospitalized when I boarded the world’s finest remaining example of the most powerful and luxurious passenger plane of the 40s and 50s, the Constellation. I knew the exterior had been restored to its original red and white TWA paint scheme glory but I had NO idea that the interior had been flawlessly restored to its high-fashion-fifties glamour down to the gold lurex threads in the turquoise upholstery fabric and silk-screen map-of-the-world murals.
While exploring the north south, east and west of Kansas City, I enjoyed a delicious low-cholesterol diet. At Villa Capri, a total time-warped 1961 Italian restaurant complete with checkered table cloths, I savored yummy-salty-cheesy eggplant parmesan, while being hypnotized by hand painted black-lite murals of the “old world” that lined the walls. Next door at John’s Space Age Donuts, I sat at the original turquoise on white daisy-print Formica counter, unchanged since the grand opening in 1967, and gobbled down several of their delicious deep fried threats. For lunch it was off to Fritz’s Railroad Restaurant where model trains double as waitresses. Yes, choo-choo trains deliver your cheeseburger, French fries and cherry limeade to your table. If you want music served with that no problem. Each table furnished with a vintage Seeburg Consolette jukebox. The unique and uber-charming train-themed diner “that could” began in 1954. By the time I got to Gate’s BBQ stand and devoured what seemed to be half a pig served sliced, smothered in sauce my arteries were clogging for sure. But, oh, was it all delicious!
Then it was of to Crown Center, a very 70s utopian style work/shop/live/play place and world headquarters of Hallmark Cards. My too-quick spin through the visitors center there inspired me to realize that Hallmark is, in the scheme of all creative and cultural institutions in this country, very underrated to say the least. The creativity unleashed there over the last nine-plus decades is not to be taken for granted. J.C. Hall began making cards in 1910. Thank you Mr. Hall!
The unexpected super surprise treat of KC was a museum called The Treasure of the Steamboat Arabia where the contents of the greatest early American time capsule is on display. In 1988 locals discovered the buried intact remains of a cargo-packed steamboat called the Arabia that sank in the Missouri River in 1856. Through a miracle of odd environmental circumstances the boat and the vast majority of its cargo were preserved over the 131 years it was buried in mud 40 feet beneath what had become a corn field after over the years the course of the river had changed. Over a three year period the boat and its contents were unearthed and carefully reacclimatized to light and oxygen before being meticulously cleaned, detailed and put in display. The 200 tons of what seemed to be countless items including wool clothing, housewares, farm equipment, building supplies, bottled pickles, guns, and even the entire paddle wheel of the boat itself are as mind-boggling as the legend itself.
But the true highlight of my KC experience was my slide show opening act, the TWA stewardess uniform fashion show put on by a dozen former stewardesses. They modeled forty years of 30s -70s high altitude hostess wear. It was almost more than I or the audience could take. Thunderous applause erupted as each of the vintage uniformed ladies emerged from the Constellation and gracefully descended the staircase that was also their catwalk. The shapely suits of the 40s and 50s, short-lived paper (yes, paper) gold lame mini dress uniforms of the 60s and polyester prints of the 70s were a thrill to see. But what we were cheering for even more were these former stewardesses. Their sophisticated poise and cool confidence reminded us of the era when flight attendants actually performed their duties with dignity.
Here’s to former TWA stewardesses, the World’s most beautiful Constellation, model train lunches, black light murals, 100 years of Hallmark, the treasures of the Steamboat Arabia, the rocket to the moon and YOU!
Charles Phoenix
Los Angeles
October 2008
14 Comments on “Union Station, Kansas City, MO, 1949”
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October 8th, 2008 at 9:01 am
CP, you always explain in such glorious detail your trips through Americana. Man I can do some KC BBQ for sure. Take care.
October 8th, 2008 at 10:05 am
Mr. Phoenix, you make Kansas City sound so delightful. I wish I could have been there with you. Your loyal fan, Donna
October 8th, 2008 at 11:18 am
I’m sure my late wife and I saw more artifacts from the Arabia about 10 years ago at a small town near the site of the dicovery in what had been the riverbed, and later became a corn field. Go easy on the delicious “poison.” I need my weekly Phoenix fix.
Mike
October 8th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Oh how I wish you would post photos of your trip - the rocket, the Constellation, the fashion show, even the cheeseburger trains. What a wonderful, unsung vacation destination!
October 8th, 2008 at 5:47 pm
Wow! What a Travelogue Charles!
Regarding “Caroline B.’s” above post… “MAYBE A ‘CHARLES OF THE FUTURE’ WILL COME ACROSS YOUR TOSSED-OUT KC VACATION PICS… AND POST THEM, ON HIS HOLOGRAPHIC, ‘WALK-INTO-THE-PAST!’ PICTURE READER OF THE FUTURE (ala the “Holodeck”)!!!”
October 8th, 2008 at 7:24 pm
I lived in the Kansas City area for 31 years and loved it. Your slides made me homesick. It is a beautiful city.
October 8th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Charles, as impossible as I would have thought it could be, YOU HAVE OUTDONE YOURSELF this time, Buddy! What a glorious retelling of your recent trip to KC. Made me wish I had been there, and at the same time (because of your wonderfully detailed description) made me feel as if I actually had been there. THANKS FOR SHARING!!!
October 9th, 2008 at 11:26 am
I was raised and lived in Kansas City MO for 57 years, rode the BUS with my mother to Union Station to see my cousin on her way from Wisconsin to Montana to marry her soldier after the end of WWII. Ate my first pizza with my sister and brother at Villa Capri when we were in high school–anchovies being standard, you had to ask them to “hold ‘em.” Married, had kids, worked 34 years for TWA until bought out by American Airlines. Ate lots of BBQ, favored Argentine BBQ and Fiorella’s Smokestack. (There was an industrial-residential area of Kansas City KS called Argentine.) Spent lots of time at Crown Center, the over-the-top American Restaurant there, the disaster at the Hyatt Regency hotel in memory where a co-worker died and some others were hospitalized. So glad to hear the choo-choo still delivers the burgers. I wish you had been to the Nelson Gallery, a world-class institution that just recently tripled in size including an outdoor Henry Moore display and Claes Oldenburg pieces. The Steamboat Arabia museum and the Harry Truman House museum and Truman Presidential Library are also to be seen and are unique in America. And there is casino gambling and first-class regional theater. Sad to say, it’s no longer home. But we do love our new spot on the earth north of Seattle. Oh, and the people in KC are some of the friendliest, kindest on earth. Oh, don’t forget the Country Club Plaza, the first “shopping center” in America, begun in the 30’s. But don’t get me started.
October 9th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
PICTURES, Charles, PICTURES!
I have never before wanted photos of what you’re describing as much as now!!
I *must* see those vintage stewardess uniforms! (”I KNOW!”) The gold lurex thread on the upholstery! The contents of the Arabia!
Post them *now*!!!!!
October 9th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Sounds like fun, Charles. I went through Kansas City on my way to Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico. Like one of the people said, I wish you would post the pictures of your travels. As always, love your web page!
October 11th, 2008 at 6:26 am
As a partner of KCMODERN who hosted and partnered with Charles for this event, he has a fan club now in KC. To see Charles exit from the cockpit of the Connie in full Captain’s uniform was truly a sight to behold. Thanks Charles, let’s do it again.
October 12th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
thanks!
October 13th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
WOW! That trip must have been the most! And perhaps, Charles, an image of you as an Airline pilot could be one of your signature portraits…? I envy those who’ve seen your show, but never more than now!
October 14th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Thank you for sharing all the great details of your exciting KC trip.
I love Airline History, and Aircraft design and it sounds like the Airline History Museum has both. They have a beautiful website, hopefully they will post pictures from their event. They are doing an amazing job, I hope their beautifully restored Constellation will be flying to an airshow near me.
I enjoyed reading the post from Jack McClurg, I hope more will post memories from their great years with TWA. I agree with Miss Formica Dinette, I would love to see more pictures. The posts on “youtube” are getting better, I found one I hope Miss FD and others will enjoy?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWVLLC23g2U&feature=related
There are many more, this one features the history of aircraft designs in the TWA fleet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCIHA3z2Khc&feature=related
Thanks again Charles