Ken & Cindy McClain

Ken and Cindy McClain are the husband-and-wife team widely credited with the revitalization of the Independence Square. Beginning with a single boarded-up building in 1998, they grew their effort into roughly fifteen restaurants and businesses — and more than twenty restored century-old buildings — around the historic square, a sustained act of civic preservation in eastern Jackson County.

Biography

Kenneth B. McClain is a nationally recognized trial lawyer and a shareholder in the Independence firm Humphrey, Farrington & McClain, known for complex toxic-tort and mass-tort litigation — including the pioneering diacetyl “popcorn lung” cases — with verdicts and settlements exceeding $1 billion since 1986.¹ A graduate of the University of Michigan Law School (1982), he also serves as a trustee of the State Historical Society of Missouri.²

In 1998, Ken and Cindy McClain “bought the biggest boarded up building on the Square and decided that restaurants are destination businesses and that’s what the Square needed,” and opened Ophelia’s that year; Cindy, who had no intention of working in the restaurant, “suddenly became the managing partner.”³ The Ophelia’s building has its own layered history: its front was built about 1907 as the Hillsbrothers Hardware store and its rear as part of a 1948 Katz Drugstore renovation — a store with 175 employees and 13 departments that operated until around 1974, after which the building sat empty.⁴ The restaurant’s name comes from Reviving Ophelia, a book Cindy was reading as they searched for a name — “reviving the Square.”⁴

What began as a single rescue grew into a portfolio the McClains describe as nine food concepts — Ophelia’s Restaurant & Inn, Main Street Coffee House, Court House Exchange, Café Verona, Diamond Bowl and Billiards, Square Pizza and others — that anchored the square’s revival.³⁵

Cindy McClain, an artist (with a degree in graphic arts), serves as president of the McClain Restaurant Group, overseeing the family’s Independence Square businesses, and sits on numerous civic boards and commissions, including the Independence Tourism Board, the City of Independence Planning Commission, and the Independence Square Association.³

Legacy

The McClains’ decades-long investment turned a struggling historic square into a dining and cultural destination, a model of locally driven downtown preservation in the Kansas City metro.

See also

• mcclain-enterprises — their Independence Square business portfolio
• independence-mo
• courthouse-exchange

Sources

Footnotes

1. “Kenneth B. McClain,” Humphrey, Farrington & McClain, P.C — trial attorney and shareholder; complex toxic-tort and mass-tort litigation including the diacetyl “popcorn lung” cases; J.D., University of Michigan (1982). ↩

2. “Kenneth B. McClain,” The State Historical Society of Missouri — trustees ↩

3. “Palatable Pursuits: Trailblazer Cindy McClain,” The Independent (Kansas City), 2023 — Independence Square “became blighted over time with vacant buildings well into the late 1990s”; “The couple bought their first boarded-up building on the square in 1998 and quickly found themselves in the restaurant business”; Cindy: “We bought the biggest boarded up building on the Square and decided that restaurants are destination businesses… In 1998, we opened Ophelia’s. I had no intention of working in the restaurant, but as the owner of the business, I suddenly became the managing partner”; “We have nine food concepts: Ophelia’s Restaurant & Inn, Main Street Coffee House, Court House Exchange, Cafe Verona, Diamond Bowl and Billiards, Square Pizza…” ↩ ↩² ↩³

4. “The Story of Ophelia’s,” Ophelia’s Restaurant & Inn — the building’s front built circa 1907 as the Hillsbrothers Hardware store; the back half built as part of the 1948 Katz Drugstore renovation (175 employees, 13 departments, snack bar, soda fountain and pet store); Katz operated until around 1974; “The building remained empty until it was purchased by Ken and Cindy McClain in 1999”; the name drawn from the book Reviving Ophelia — “reviving the Square.” ↩ ↩²

5. “Independence Square,” The Pitch ↩