Union Ink, Inc. purchased The Greater Kansas City Labor Beacon from Kevin O’Neill in January of 2022. Tristin Amezcua-Hogan, Kevin and Gaye O’Neill’s trained successor and Associate Editor at the time of sale, was named Editor-in-Chief of the publication. The staff of The Labor Beacon are members of Laborers Local 264. Union Ink, Inc., with IBEW Local 124 Business Manager Bo Moreno as President of the Board, continued the work that the O’Neills had so diligently carried out.

Union Ink, Inc.’s Board is currently composed of IBEW Local 124’s Bo Moreno, UA Local 533’s Kevin Hendrickson, CWA Local 6360’s Tom Gebken, Laborers Local 264’s Marcus Johnson-EL, IUPAT District Council 3’s Joey Flickner, Greater Kansas City Building Trades’ Ralph Oropeza, and SMART Local 2’s Daniel Loftis.

Former Board members include: Greg Chastain of SMART Local 2, Emil Ramirez of the United Steelworkers, Reggie Thomas of Laborers Local 264, Alise Martiny of OPCMIA Local 518, Frank Carpenter of IUPAT District Council 3, and Dave Coleman of Ironworkers Local 10.

The Labor Beacon may be the voice of labor, but Kevin O’Neill was the paper’s heartbeat and guardian for over three decades. From 1992 to 2022, Kevin not only published The Labor Beacon, but grew into a respected statesman known to carry the cause of labor on his sleeve. O’Neill became the single most consistent pillar of the labor movement in Kansas City, present through dozens of labor leaders, never waivering in his dedication and always acting as a well of institutional knowledge for new leaders.

In 1992, Kevin O’Neill purchased The Labor Beacon, which had fallen down to just one subscribing union after passing through a number of hands post-Meyer Goldman, and systemically revived the publication, union by union. O’Neill credits Jim Benson, then the Business Manager of the Floorlayers, and Jim Hadell, then the Business Manager of the Roofers, for helping him gain trust and support. By the mid-1990s, O’Neill had brought the paper up to over 15,000 subscribers–a number it has continued to grow from.

Kevin O’Neill was born in 1956 to a large, and heavily-involved, Irish Catholic family in the Brookside neighborhood of Kansas City, MO. The O’Neill family, namely Kevin and his brothers, are an instantly recognizable pillar of Kansas City’s culturally-rich Irish community and continue to play a large organizing role in Irish festivities in the city. Kevin went to Benedectine College, playing defensive end for the Benedectine football team, from 1974-1978, where he earned his Bachelor’s Degree in Business. Before purchasing The Labor Beacon for $25,000, O’Neill had a career in communications and radio sales, as well as briefly running a small business in the telecommunications industry.

O’Neill brought in his father, Pat O’Neill, who had semi-retired, to write for the paper.  Pat O’Neill was a respected publicist in the area with deep ties in the political and labor world. “A lot of people knew dad and respected him,” Kevin stated.  “I really had no idea what I was doing, but I think a lot of the labor leaders at the time thought my dad owned the paper and I didn’t discourage them from thinking that.  He gave me great credibility at a time when I really needed it.”

In 2019, Kevin O’Neill ran for and became the 1st District At-Large City Councilman for Kansas City, MO. In 2023, O’Neill won reelection in a landslide. In his role as City Councilman, Kevin championed the cause of labor, making sure that the voice of labor is in the room no matter what. In 2023, Kevin O’Neill was made an honorary lifetime member of Roofers Local 20. During his time with The Labor Beacon, he was a card-carrying member of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades.

Kevin O’Neill is listed as “Editor Emeritus” in each issue and his wife, Gaye O’Neill, who ran the paper for the years after Kevin won his city council seat, is noted as “Honored” in each addition of The Labor Beacon.

Mr. Meyer L. Goldman, (Z”L) a dedicated unionist and foundational civic leader in Kansas City, founded Beacon Printing & Publishing Company in 1953 and established and published the Kansas City Labor Beacon. Goldman served at the forefront of the fight against Right-to-Work-for-Less in Missouri in 1978 and was a celebrated member of the labor movement. Goldman was born on March 16, 1919 in Portland, OR and died October 4th, 1998. In 1938 he received his bachelor’s degree from Washington University in St. Louis, Mo. He later pursued a graduate degree at both the University of Colorado in Boulder, Co. and Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. He received his master’s degree in psychology from Northwestern University in Evanston, II. in 1941. Mr. Goldman was a decorate colonel in the United States Army. His 30 year military career included six-years of wartime duty during World War II. His military memberships included Kansas City Chapter #1 of the Reserve Officers Association of the United States and the Retired Officers Association.

For five years he worked as the Kansas City Bureau Chief for Fairchild Publications, the publishers of Women’s Wear Daily, while the local garment industry was still going strong. In 1953, the year the Labor Beacon was founded, the Central Labor Council wanted a newspaper established to present labor news in from the perspective of unions and the working-class. Goldman’s association with labor at Women’s Wear Daily had been through unions that dealt with clothing and textiles. For the next (almost) four decades, Goldman published The Labor Beacon as a weekly paper. Reporting the news was and is his forte, but initially he had his career doubts.

“I was looking for a business and the Central Labor Council was looking for someone it could trust,” Goldman said to the Jewish Chronicle of Kansas City in 1986. ”We signed a memorandum of understanding and I started publishing.”

“I really was going to be a psychologist,” recalled Goldman. “But I found writing infectious and incurable, so here I am.”

“We cover news of importance to union people, which is not available from any other source,” said Goldman, who was a fourth-generation Jewish Kansas Citian and graduate of Westport High School. “Ninety percent or more of union activities do not involve any actual conflict, yet the only time union members are ever talked to in the major media is when there is a conflict.”

For 10 years during the 1960s and early 1970s, Goldman and the Beacon sponsored a radio program called “The Voice of Labor.” Today, “The Voice of Labor Since 1953” is the tagline of the paper, published on the masthead. Carried on the local NBC, affiliate, WDAF, the “The Voice of Labor” aired when people were driving home from work in the evening and covered about 60 different unions at the height of its popularity. During this time, Goldman joined the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). He remained a loyal union member the rest of his life. Meyer’s Labor Beacon was an essential weapon for the labor movement in 1978 when Republicans attempted to turn Missouri into a Right-to-Work-for-Less state. Organized labor beat that challenge, with The Labor Beacon communicating essential ideas to working-class union members and their households.

From 1985 on, Goldman had also served as a pioneer in the local medical industry, working as a consultant on health care delivery, health care systems, and the legislative analyst for Prime Health, of which was a founder, which was later incorporated by Humana Inc. He was also a founding member of Truman Medical Center Corporation; past president of the Community Blood Bank of Greater Kansas City; chairman of the Missouri Governor’s Conference on Urban Problems; board member and treasurer of Swope Park Comprehensive Health Center and a board-member of the former St. Mary’s Hospital.

In March of 1986, Goldman was honored by the AFL-CIO with a dinner in his honor at the Hilton Plaza Inn. Congressman Alan Wheat, (D) labor leaders, and members of Kansas City-civic society spoke glowingly of Goldman at the event.

Mr. Goldman was involved in the community through the Workers Circle, Kansas HMO Association; Prime Health Charitable Foundation; American Federation of Television lUld Radio Artists, Kansas. City Chapter; International Labor Communications Association; Temple B’nai Jehudah; Missouri Bioethics Council; Friends of the Zoo; Greater Kansas City Labor-Management Council and National Journalism Society (Sigma Delta Chi). He was also involved in the Kansas City General Hospital and Medical Center; Kansas City Consensus; Kansas Travelers Aid Society and was a 1986 honoree of the Celebration of Leadership, honoring 50 prime civic leaders. Mr. Goldman was involved in the Missouri Opportunity 2000 Commission, Missouri Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission; Hadassah Associates; American Civil Liberties Union; Zeta Beta Tau fraternity; Governor’s Conference on Education; Kansas City School of Practical Unionism and the Kansas City Press Club.

Meyer Goldman is listed as “Founder” in each issue of The Labor Beacon with the Jewish honorific “Zichrono l’bracha” abbreviated to Z”L after his name, meaning “may his memory be a blessing.” Goldman holds a special place in the history of the labor movement in our region.