Route 66 runs past the Gold Dome, the geodesic bank built in 1958 at NW 23rd Street and North Classen Boulevard. Built in 1958 at the intersection of NW 23rd Street and North Classen Boulevard, this was commissioned when Citizens State Bank began construction that year. It was the fifth geodesic dome in the world and the first to be used as a bank, described as “one of the nation’s most revolutionary bank designs.” The dome follows the geodesic principles of futurist and architect Buckminster Fuller, realized here by local architects Bailey, Bozalis, Dickinson, and Roloff of Oklahoma City.
Look up and note the structure: 625 panels make the skin, each ranging from 7.5 to 11.5 feet in length and weighing 60–70 pounds, together spanning a diameter of 145 feet (44 m). Inside, the shell covers about 27,000 square feet. The Gold Dome was about a $1 million investment when built. Later attention to the area shows the city pursuing new zoning along NW 23rd Street in 1998, and the dome was declared eligible for the National Register of Historic Places in 2002. Notice all six hundred twenty-five panels forming this hundred-forty-five-foot dome, the world's fifth of its kind and the first built as a bank.