Tulsa has an area in downtown called the Blue Dome District — an area of up-and-coming restaurants, taverns, businesses and residential lofts.
The district’s namesake is a blue-domed Gulf Oil station, built in 1924 on what became an early alignment of Route 66 through Tulsa. According to this article in Urban Tulsa, it was the first station in Oklahoma to have hot water, pressurized air and a car wash, and the first in the Sooner State to be open 24 hours a day. It no longer operated as a gas station after Route 66 was realigned in the 1940s.
Michael Sager owns the Blue Dome, along with several other buildings in the district. He’s applied for historical that would allow him to develop the site yet keep its period appearance.
He’s already had some inquiries from businesses interested in moving into the building, he said, including a national chain coffeehouse and a bakery. He’s also considering moving his offices from the May Rooms Gallery, 328 E. 1st St., back into the Blue Dome, where they’ve been before.
Sager also is restoring a vintage Phillips 66 gas station in downtown, converting it into a car-rental business.