Girls on Wheels visit Oklahoma City where the road less traveled led to unforgettable memories.
Vicki Baker
Have you ever had the feeling the whole world knew something you didn’t? That’s exactly how Girls on Wheels (Susan Hebert, Vicki Baker, Karen Dipietro, Cassie Richardson, and Nancy Burns) felt after recently visiting Oklahoma City. If your knowledge of OKC is limited, don’t feel bad. We were in the same situation, which is why we never visited the city before. In fact, when we mentioned our plans, everyone asked, “Why Oklahoma City?”
Within hours of our inaugural visit, we were smitten with this delightful place. We didn’t know what to expect but certainly didn’t expect what we found: a vibrant downtown with a thriving arts scene, stunning architecture, a variety of museums, colorful history, and great food and nightlife.
OKC came into being one morning in 1889 as part of the land rush. With the oil boom in the 1920s, the city was flush with money and success. In the latter half of the 20th century, as fortunes declined, people moved from the city, leaving downtown largely vacant. Since the 1990s, more than $3 billion has been pumped into public/private partnerships for revitalization.
Today, it’s a big city with a small-town vibe. Our first stop, the Bricktown District where just about all the structures are built of brick, is home to restaurants, breweries, and shops. While here, we couldn’t miss the Bricktown Water Taxi, a man-made canal running through the neighborhood inspired by the famous Riverwalk in San Antonio. The 45-minute tour gave us a unique perspective of the district and an overview of the city’s history.
Our visit to the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum, dedicated to the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, was a haunting and sobering experience. The self-guided tour walked us through April 19, 1995, an uneventful day of “business as usual” suddenly thrown into chaos in one horrific instant. The surrounding memorial plaza paid homage to the 168 victims of the attack. It also honored those who survived and the 12,000 rescue workers who came from all over the world to help. The outdoor memorial was a symbolic place of quiet reflection that became more meaningful after experiencing the story inside the museum.
The Oklahoma City Museum of Art is recognized for its world-class exhibits, including one renowned artist we traveled for: Dale Chihuly. The exhibit contained one of the world’s largest Chihuly collections and featured five decades of glass and paintings and told the story of the iconic glass artist’s groundbreaking career.
The image of OKC as all stockyards and oil wells is an enduring one. It’s not a city that frequently makes cultural headlines, nor is it known as a hotbed of entertainment. It’s easy to believe it’s a sleepy, uninteresting point on a map. Our short time in the Sooner State left a vastly different impression on Girls on Wheels. Oklahoma City truly lives up to its title as the Modern Frontier and is definitely on our bucket list for a return visit.