An Oklahoma arts and entertainment magazine is back. Oklahoma Gazette ceased publishing last year, but now it’s on newsstands around Oklahoma City.
KOSU’s Robby Korth spoke with the publication’s new owner, Drew Williamson, and publisher, Kimberly Walker, about why they decided to start publishing Oklahoma Gazette again.
Robby Korth, KOSU News Director: So I want to go back to June 2023. On June 14 of, 2023, the Oklahoma Gazette posted on social media print is dead and announced they were no longer printing. Well, why are you bringing print back to life?
Drew Williamson, OG owner: That was them. This is us. I think print is important. And to me, the Gazette is somewhat historic in Oklahoma City. I kind of grew up in this town reading the Gazette, and felt like it didn't need to fail, and so Kimberly and I are here to make it successful again,
Kimberly Walker, OG Publisher: Absolutely, print is needed, I think so more than ever, with the amount of misinformation online that is available out there for the community and for education that having something that's been researched and edited and out there With journalistic integrity, it's really important to bring that back, to have in our hands and be able to have a concrete resource.
RK: So what's this new Gazette going to be like? Is it going to be what we've already experienced? What's going to be different this time around?
DW: I think it's going to be a lot more like the Gazette was several years ago than what it had evolved to prior to going out of print last year, still centered around arts, culture, entertainment. That's our pulse. That's what we're about. That's the community we want to serve. But we have always had, historically, an edge, little bit of a political edge, and I think we continue to do that in our own way. And so we, like I said, in the comeback issue, if there's something that needs to be said, we want to say it.
RK: What is the public service that you're trying to get through to people here through the Oklahoma Gazette?
DW: So I grew up in a small town that I grew up in rural Oklahoma on a farm, didn't have a lot of exposure to the arts when I was a kid. Moved here to go to college. I went to Oklahoma City University and got this amazing exposure to the arts. That's our primary mission, to support, promote the arts in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma County. So anything we can do to help better the community, whether that's in the arts, or things that are going on around town, we're here for that and bringing out those social issues. And it's very important to educate the community in the political sphere as well as with the arts and entertainment. In times of adversity, people always turn to the arts, so it's important to have that as our structure as well, but importantly is that is the education in the political sphere and letting the community know what's going on so that they can make those choices on their own.
RK: Drew, for you, had you invested in journalism before like this in any way?
DW: Oh, no, not at all. I have no experience, no history. That's how Kim talked me into it, right? She found somebody that didn't know what they were doing, not really I. I became interested in the Gazette about the time it went out of print, and met with some people, talked with several people. No one was excited about bringing it back, but I never found someone that I felt confident could manage the Gazette and run it and do the hard work. And when Kim approached me, it was really great, because of our visions aligned like I had. So many people say, just keep it digital. Don't bring it you can't support print. It's not sustainable. And she and I both feel like it has to be in print to be the Oklahoma Gazette. And so when she came into the picture, this became doable, and had a meeting of the minds with the previous owner on transferring ownership, and got that done, and went, went to work.
RK: So Drew, what was your what was sort of your background? Can you take us through your background and, like, your experience with the old Oklahoma Gazette, and how that informed, like, what you're doing now?
DW: I don't know if it shaped what I'm doing now, but it was always I felt like something that tapped into the pulse of Oklahoma City, and I think we can do that again. I'm not trying to shape anyone's views in any certain way, other than to give them a well-rounded view of things and let them decide for themselves. Sometimes we might be a little bit more one-sided than others, like we were in this issue on the OCPA Supreme Court Justice Initiative, we published an op ed that was opposed to it. But you know, I think if we're talking about an issue that might be controversial, we should present everyone's point of view, and our readers can make up their own mind. And that's what I want the Gazette to be. Everybody wants unbiased media. And we'll see if they're willing to support it.
RK: Yeah, it sounds like you're in this for the long haul.
DW: I have to do. I have to have something to do. When I'm 77 I'll be bugging Kim, telling her what I think, and that sort of thing. But Kim's running the show. I'm just I'm just her cheerleader for the most part. Although I do have a point of view, I have a pretty long history with the Gazette myself. I was the Creative Director at the Gazette and left in 2019 when the previous ownership took over, after Bill Bleakley. And I'm glad to come back with the rescue ship and bring it back on board and restore that legacy that the last five years, throughout the COVID and change of management, just didn't really bring what the community expects with the Gazette.
RK: Why did you think it was important to pilot that rescue ship, and how did it come into your life?
KW: So I have been following it for the last five years and just hoping and praying to see it come back the way that we all expect it when we go to pick it up an issue. And as I kept seeing the masthead get smaller and smaller and smaller, and then them finally stop printing. And this last summer, or this summer, whenever the website finally went offline, it spurred me into action. And so I had received Drew's phone number and the previous owner's phone number, and made the phone calls, got back the website, and we went running full steam ahead.
RK: So you really pushed this?
KW: It was very important to see if the city needs it. It's been a missing piece in the market, and I know that whenever I go out to lunch and I don't have the Gazette to pick up, it's like I'm missing a piece of Oklahoma City with me. It's always stood for me to be involved within the community and gave me that opportunity to be part of it as well.
RK: Why monthly instead of weekly?
DW: I think weekly is very ambitious. And you know, when the Gazette was weekly, they had 40-plus people on staff. It was a very big endeavor. When you go weekly, you're almost reporting news, and we're not going to be reporting hot news stories, you know, who, what, when, where, how, that sort of thing. We're going to speak up on things that are ongoing issues that we want to talk about. But weekly is just a lot, and maybe someday we'll feel like we're called to go to press more often. But we think monthly works really well. We think the Gazette could be more robust even on a monthly basis. But right now, we feel really good about monthly.
RK: How many people do you have on staff this time?
KW: Myself, and we have a lot of we have a large team of contributors that have come in. We have an editor, we have several writers and consultants working with us. We have our distribution manager out there on the streets getting all of our papers out in the racks. So it's a small knit group right now, and we'll be building on that as the time and needs progress,
RK: Yeah, as the hope is for it to grow.?
DW: People we're talking to now about coming aboard and where they would fit, and we'll see where that goes, but it's never going to be back to well, never say never. But we have to run this in a way that is sustainable, and that means keeping the cost structure down. The founder, I think, did an amazing job. The Gazette was founded in 1979 45 years ago, and he built it up to something amazing. The last owner just went in a strategic direction that was different. And I really think that he was working with a few people that might not have had a great vision for the Gazette either. And so we just want to get back to trying to put out the best content in Oklahoma City and supporting the arts and talking about it being thoughtful. And, you know, that takes a lot of work, but I think we can become what the Gazette once was, which is, you know, kind of the go-to for what's going on in town and when we print something that's not about, you know, an art exhibit or something of that nature, people will listen to you.
