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Kansas City Fans Celebrate Chiefs Super Bowl Victory

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

While much of the country may have been thinking about impeachment or the Iowa caucus debacle, today in Kansas City, they were having a parade.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHEERING)

KELLY: Tens of thousands of people decked out in red turned out to celebrate the Chiefs' first Super Bowl win in half a century. As Frank Morris of member station KCUR reports, they braved the cold to share a warm moment.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHEERING)

FRANK MORRIS, BYLINE: The parade kicked off just before noon. But like a lot of people, Marvin Shahid got here much earlier.

MARVIN SHAHID: I sure did. I left the house at 4:30. I've been on the parade route since about, I guess, 5:30.

MORRIS: And it's cold, in the 20s. People are lined up along a two-mile route stretching past art deco skyscrapers to the city's hundred-year-old train station. Almost everyone's wearing red, including Shahid, who's been a Chiefs fan since the team moved to Kansas City 60 years ago. He's hung on through a 50-year Super Bowl drought and wasn't about to miss this.

SHAHID: You know, hey, this is my team, man, you know? I can't help it, you know? I'm a Chiefs fan, a diehard.

MORRIS: And you had to be for this parade, according to Wess Barnette.

WESS BARNETTE: Little bit of snow - not bad.

MORRIS: Like lots of people, Stacy Peak brought her family.

STACY PEAK: This is my son. He's 8 - Deandre MacIntosh (ph). He's a diehard Chiefs fan.

DEANDRE MACINTOSH: Go Chiefs.

(CHEERING)

MORRIS: Chiefs players walked the parade route drinking and hamming it up. Clark Hunt, the team owner, rode by, showing off the Vince Lombardi trophy from the top of a double-decker bus. There was lots of red and gold confetti, but it wasn't really all about football. Some folks, like Madison Woods, came to support the city.

MADISON WOODS: I'm seeing a blend of people that I would never see bundled up in this cold weather together; just braving the cold together, showing our supports, meeting new people, seeing old friends - all just come together, and nothing bad has happened right now.

MORRIS: Well, there was a brief car chase on the parade route before it began, and there was definitely some rowdy behavior.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

MORRIS: But as Matthias Bostcick says, it was great to just be able to forget about politics for a few hours.

MATTHIAS BOSTCICK: It's something where we can kind of ignore some of that stuff for a couple of days and enjoy something together and then maybe get back to the business of putting our country back together.

MORRIS: As for Kansas City, lots of people here are optimistic they won't have to wait another 50 years to celebrate a Super Bowl victory.

For NPR News, I'm Frank Morris in Kansas City.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "KANSAS CITY")

THE BEATLES: (Singing) Ah, Kansas City, coming to get my baby back home. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Frank Morris has supervised the reporters in KCUR's newsroom since 1999. In addition to his managerial duties, Morris files regularly with National Public Radio. He’s covered everything from tornadoes to tax law for the network, in stories spanning eight states. His work has won dozens of awards, including four national Public Radio News Directors awards (PRNDIs) and several regional Edward R. Murrow awards. In 2012 he was honored to be named "Journalist of the Year" by the Heart of America Press Club.