The man behind the resurrection of the clock was initially speechless, but recovered to say he was glad it was finally up in the city and wanted to thank all the people who helped make his dream possible.

"It has been a long time coming, nearly two-and-a-half years but now that it's up I'm happy," he said. "I am so grateful to the people that came and supported it and those that helped and took on the job of putting it up there." Mr Keoghan said he would have liked to see the clock installed sooner but a year of health issues left him unable to continue moving the project forward.

When he arrived back in Mount Isa on Tuesday after four weeks away in Brisbane, Mr Keoghan said he had a few residents approach him in the airport to tell him what they thought of the clock.

"The first bloke came and spoke to me yesterday (Tuesday), he came into the terminal and said how very good it was and the chimes were great too," he said.

Mr Keoghan approached the Mount Isa City Council, Rotary, Xstrata Mount Isa Mines and MITEZ over the years to make his dream a reality, but eventually decided it would be the community's job to work together to raise money for a clock.

"I checked out the old people and asked if they wanted a clock and they said yes, and the rotary people did too," he said. "We got a petition going and 1238 people signed it and it went from there."

He said he wanted to give credit to the former editor of The North West Star Tahnee Sanders for getting the petiton started.

The man who was humbled by the chime of the clock at noon said he was looking forward to seeing people dance around the clock at the city's heart tomorrow night.

n Mount Isa's 90th birthday celebrations, Pages 7 & 8