Saving the Meadow Gold Sign

Saving the Meadow Gold Sign. . Erected in 1934, the Meadow Gold sign stood above its rooftop perch at 11th Street (Historic Route 66) and South Lewis Avenue for nearly seven decades and served as a reminder of days gone by - days of the milkman and deliveries of dairy products to the porches and front doors of America., In August of 2004, the Tulsa Foundation for Architecture (TFA) applied for and received a grant from the Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program administered through the National Park Service to restore the Meadow Gold sign at its original location. When the one-story brick building on which the sign stood those 70 years was purchased, the landmark sign was seemingly doomed to join its supporting structure in the landfill., Not wanting to see another icon along Route 66 destroyed, TFA convinced the new owner of the building to allow the organization time to dismantle the sign so it could undergo restoration and be erected at a different location. With assistance from the Oklahoma Route 66 Association, private donations and funds from Vision 2025, TFA was able to have the sign parts and framework labeled dismantled and stored. The citizens of the City of Tulsa and Tulsa County, through Vision 2025, contributed the balance of the funds needed to complete the restoration of the sign and to build a new supporting structure., Each face of the Meadow Gold sign measures 30-feet wide by 30-feet high. Originally filled with argon gas, the lettering on the sign is now illuminated using neon gas. The new brick structure which currently supports the sign was designed to emulate the plains commercial architecture prevalent along this section of Tulsa's Route 66 corridor and is located approximately a mile west of the sign's original location.