One Times Square remained a major focal point of the area due to its annual New Year's Eve "ball drop" festivities and the introduction of a large lighted news ticker near street-level in 1928.

The financial firm Lehman Brothers acquired the building in 1995, adding billboards to take advantage of its prime location within Times Square.

[45] The building's roof attracted visitors such as French author Pierre Loti, who called the Times Tower "one of the boldest" of New York City's skyscrapers,[46] and Jamalul Kiram II, the Sultan of Sulu.

[59] The zipper originally consisted of 14,800 light bulbs, with the display controlled by a chain conveyor system inside the building; individual letter elements (a form of movable type) were loaded into frames to spell out news headlines.

As the frames moved along the conveyor, the letters themselves triggered electrical contacts which lit the external bulbs (the zipper was later upgraded to use modern LED technology).

[59] On the evening of August 14, 1945, the building's zipper announced Japan's surrender in World War II to a packed crowd in Times Square.

[67][68] Ahead of the 1952 United States presidential election, the Times temporarily installed a 85-foot-tall (26 m) electronic sign on the 4th through 11th stories of the northern facade, displaying each candidate's electoral vote count.

[79] Due to recent changes to New York City zoning laws, it was more economically efficient to renovate the Times Tower than to demolish it, as a new building on the site could not be as tall.

[83] Allied Chemical stripped the building to its steel frame,[84] replacing the intricate granite and terracotta facade with marble panels as part of a $10 million renovation.

[84] Allied Chemical reactivated the news zipper on the building's facade in March 1965[76] as part of a joint venture with Life magazine.

[90][91] Shortly after the renovation was completed, Allied Chemical's nylon division had outgrown the space, and the building's elevator service was also reportedly unreliable.

Allied Chemical had relocated other workers to Morris Township, New Jersey, during early 1972, and it planned to move its nylon division into smaller space at the nearby 1411 Broadway.

[102][103][104] He then hired the architectural firm of Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects to redesign the tower with a glass facade and sloping roof.

[112] In a plan presented to the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) in June 1981, architectural firm Cooper Eckstut proposed doubling the height of One Times Square's northern section.

[102][103][104] As part of the 42nd Street Redevelopment Project, in 1983, architects Philip Johnson and John Burgee had planned to raze One Times Square and construct four new towers[b] immediately surrounding the site.

[88] Israel started converting 12,000 square feet (1,100 m2) on the lower stories into the Crossroads Fashion Center, a retail complex designed by Fernando Williams Associates.

[125] City and state officials debated whether to acquire One Times Square through condemnation for several years, but they canceled these plans in 1988 after failing to reach an agreement.

[139] Madame Tussauds, a subsidiary of Pearson PLC, had sought to lease space for a museum in One Times Square but could not reach an agreement with the new owner.

[167] Due to the building's small size, it only housed a single office tenant during the 2000s and 2010s: the production company in charge of the Times Square Ball drop.

[177] The ground level would also be renovated to provide an expanded entrance to the New York City Subway's Times Square–42nd Street station, directly underneath the building.

Work on the subway entrance was originally supposed to be completed in 2018,[176] but the MTA did not start construction on the 42nd Street Shuttle reconstruction project until August 2019.

[181][182] Jamestown announced in January 2019 that it planned to renovate the building and lease the upper floors, which at the time were completely blocked by billboards.

[205] On the eastern part of the site (where the underlying rock sloped upward), workers built a retaining wall with embedded I-beams, providing additional wind bracing.

[206] Seven piers in the basement, each measuring 43 feet (13 m) high, carry the entire structural load of the upper levels;[221] they are encased in Portland cement.

Between the individual elevator shafts is a system of knee bracing; it consists of diagonal steel bars shaped like a rotated "K", which extend downward from the centers of the horizontal girders.

[149] Filings related to the building's 1997 sale revealed that the billboards on the tower had been generating a net revenue of $7 million yearly,[139] representing a 300% profit.

[243] Sherwood Equities president Brian Turner estimated in 2005 that over 200 million people saw the Times Square Ball drop at the building every year.

Due to cutbacks resulting from GM's bankruptcy and re-organization, the Chevrolet Clock was removed in 2009[249] and eventually replaced by a Kia Motors advertisement billboard.

[149][258] In 1998, Discover Card replaced ITT Corporation as the operator and sponsor of the topmost screen on One Times Square as part of a ten-year deal.

[261] Upgrades to the upper portion of One Times Square commenced in 2008, including the installation of new Toshiba high-definition LED displays (known as ToshibaVision), and the redesign of its roof to accommodate a larger New Year's Eve ball, which became a year-round fixture of the building beginning in 2009.