Pulling Off the Boards at the Rock Island Plow Building
The Rock Island Plow Building can be seen to the right of the now vanished MKT Train Depot in this vintage mid-20th century photo (courtesy of the Oklahoma Railway Museum)
Weather permitting, it is likely many of you will be excited to see some activity at the long vacant Rock Island Plow Building at Oklahoma and Reno Avenues in Bricktown.
Don’t celebrate yet.
Let’s get into some background first; the building, built in 1909, has been vacant since the early 1980s when it was targeted for redevelopment by original Bricktown developer Neal Horton. During research for my book OKC Second Time Around, I learned that Horton was bewildered when he first walked into the building and found all the desks, paperwork, equipment and furnishings still in place even though the final operation in the building had ceased years earlier. It was, as his architect Don Beck noted, as if the employees left on a Friday and simply never returned.
The building was eventually boarded up, and has remained empty ever since. Avis and Phil Scaramuci bought the building a few years ago, spent quite a bit of money to prevent the building from collapsing, but have done nothing in the years since.
As time passed, the rest of Bricktown has continued to move forward and Avis Scaramuci has been singled out for criticism by the online community and others.
Richard McKown, who worked with the Scaramuci’s son Wade, a respected London architect, on the Level Urban Apartments in Deep Deuce, confirms he is now doing some exploratory work on what it will take to bring the Rock Island Plow Building back to life.
The boards will be removed from the building Tuesday and Wednesday, weather permitting. Then, on Thursday, a historic surveyor will inspect the building’s window openings. And on Friday, the boards will go back up over the windows.
There is no deal yet. But this also is cause to have hope.
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Comments
Thanks Ryan! It is Thursday and I went down this morning and got some photos. They were not quite finished removing the boards but very close. That would be a great building to revitalize.
Hey, Steve I work in bricktown partime. Driving to work I saw that building I was hoping another good something was going into the building saw all the windows. The building looks great. I hope they do get something into that space. Bricktown is such a unique area of this city. I spend many lunches exploring downtown OKC taking photos Its one heck of a downtown. The mix of culture and architecture you can never say your bored. I have had huge compliments from friends on photos I have taken the past few years.
Steve, could you update this piece when the boards are down? Assuming that you will be watching for that. I would like to make a trip downtown to take some photos. Thanks!