By Steve Gill
When I arrived at the office on my first day at the magazine, I discovered didn’t have a desk yet. The production staff was in the thick of banging out the December issues, and furniture allocation had been a lower priority — so I spent the first week working from a chair pulled up to a credenza. That first day was Oct. 25, 2004.
The office was near NW 63rd and Western in a building (it’s gone now) between Mexican restaurant Mamasita’s, where we’d sometimes gather on the patio for drinks (it’s also gone now), and a gas station we’d occasionally visit for afternoon snacks (it’s gone now too). In subsequent years the magazine’s HQ would move to an industrial area on NW 50th, then a space on Sheridan in what was just starting to find its feet as Film Row, then to Broadway just north of Automobile Alley, before finding its current home near the Plaza District.
And when I started, “the magazine” was actually several: Nichols Hills News, Edmond Monthly, Norman Living, Quail Creek News (which shortly became Northwest Style) and Downtown Monthly. It wasn’t until 2010 that we combined the portfolio of community-focused titles into a single central Oklahoma magazine called Slice, which was rebranded in 2015 as 405 Magazine. On that first day I didn’t have any premonition that I’d still be on the payroll 20 years later, or that the magazine — in any form — would still be in existence. Print media comes with some harsh realities.
But I also didn’t know then that 2004 would turn out to be a fantastic time to start paying closer attention to the metro’s civic and cultural growth and development. I was living in Norman at the time and largely unfamiliar with OKC proper (on an errand for my new boss, I got badly lost twice trying to get to Edmond, which you wouldn’t think would be hard), but I remember MAPS just beginning to transform downtown. There was a ballpark and a canal in Bricktown as opposed to Spaghetti Warehouse and practically nothing else; and the recently renamed Oklahoma River suddenly had actual water in it. Of course, the Skirvin hadn’t yet reopened, there was no Devon Tower and the new Ford Center hadn’t yet hosted the NBA’s Hornets, much less become home base for a franchise relocated from Seattle. (I was partial to the proposed name “OKC Barons,” personally.) The city has grown incredibly in these two decades — and in more ways than just the 200,000+ population increase.
I eat out with some frequency, and was fortunate enough to contribute restaurant reviews to 405 for several years, so while OKC has also gained entertainment venues (soon to include OKANA) and ambitious events like the Norman Music Festival and stores of every description, I tend to think of development in terms of restaurants. And I know growth isn’t always linear — we’ve lost some great spots over the years from Cafe do Brasil and Misal of India to Back Door BBQ — but generally speaking, without losing its taste for the classics (Cattleman’s, Sid’s onion burgers in El Reno, Florence’s home cooking), OKC has found room at the table for a wider cultural world. I’ve had frog legs at McClintock, fresh oysters at The Drake, grilled octopus at The Jones Assembly and a French feast at Edmond’s Fait Maison that remains among the best meals I’ve encountered in Oklahoma. I don’t believe the OKC of 2004 could have supported Nonesuch or Grey Sweater, and that we have both now is to the chefs’ credit but also ours as a community.
It’s been a true pleasure watching the 405 grow these past 20 years. I’m grateful to have had this vantage point, and excited to see where we go from here.
