Publisher's Synopsis
If those walls could talk...this is what they would say. A story about Route 66.
Despite its out-sized place in the American imagination, America's Main Street enjoyed only a relatively brief time in the sun. The entire road was not paved until 1938. President Dwight Eisenhower authorized the interstate highway system in 1956 and the modern limited-access roads began replacing the outdated two-laned Route 66. In 1985 the entire road was removed from maps.
Almost immediately Americans recognized that something had been lost. Preservation groups sprouted and President Bill Clinton signed into law a bill providing $10 million in restoration funds. The National Park Service made grants available. Even so, it wasn't long before Route 66 found its way onto "Most Endangered Sites" lists.
What is it that people were so afraid to lose? Route 66 was not the first long distance highway, not by a long shot. The first interstate highways were built and promoted by private road associations led by businessmen with auto interests. The Lincoln Highway was dedicated in 1913 with 3,389 miles running through 13 states from New York to California. On its heels came the Dixie Highway, the Spanish Mission Trail, the Liberty Highway, the National Old Trails Road, and others. The names disappeared in the 1920s, replaced by the numbers we have known ever since. What magic was left of early motoring was sprinkled on Route 66.
John Steinbeck dubbed Route 66 "The Mother Road" - a moniker it would never lose - in The Grapes of Wrath, the story of the Joad family blown off their Oklahoma farm by "Dust Bowl" drought conditions and forced to head to California. A year later The Grapes of Wrath became a beloved motion picture, winning two Academy Awards.
Following World War II Route 66 entered its golden years. The Great Depression and World War II were in America's rear view mirror, times were prosperous, and the road trip was invented. The battered Joad farm truck was replaced by the convertible and the station wagon and Route 66 now meant fun and adventure. When nostalgia buffs go looking for Route 66 today this is the America they are looking to find.
The highway even got its own fun theme song, courtesy of Bobby Troup. In 1946 Troup was 27 years old and driving across country to try his luck in Hollywood. He spent a lot of the trip on US 40 and was intending to work that road into a tune but his wife Cynthia offered the tagline "Get Your Kicks on Route 66" as they ventured further west and altered the course of American culture forever. Nat King Cole recorded the original version in 1946 and it went to #11 on the Billboard charts. Chuck Berry took "Route 66" to rock and roll and the Rolling Stones covered it on their debut album. In 1982, with the actual road in its depth throes, the Manhattan Transfer took home a Grammy Award for their jazzy rendition of Troup's 36-year old tune.
Route 66 was entrenched in the ethos of American youth in 1960 when Tod Stiles (Martin Milner) and Buz Murdock (George Maharis) rode their Corvette into the country's living rooms each week on the CBS television series Route 66. For five seasons, as the interstate highway system was methodically eliminating the obsolete two-lane highway, Tod and Buz made the case why it should not ever go away. Route 66 was independence, freedom, and possibility.
But away it inevitably did go, although some 85 percent of the road can still be found. In 2002 Congress initiated the Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program making grants available to restore existing buildings along America's Main Street. The program expires in 2022 and it is far from certain that additional Route 66 monies will be forthcoming from the federal tap.
So as the window on Route 66 nostalgia begins to close what is still out there? What stories do the buildings in 8 states tell? Let's have a look.
