Changes in routing
Four major sections of US 66 underwent major realignments during the 1930s.
In 1930, between Springfield, Illinois and East St. Louis, Illinois, US 66 was shifted further east to what is now roughly I-55. The original alignment followed the current Illinois Route 4.
From downtown St. Louis to Gray Summit, Missouri, US 66 originally went down Market Street and Manchester Road (now, largely, Missouri State Highway 100). In 1932, this route was changed, the original alignment never being viewed as anything more than temporary. The planned route was down Watson Road (now Missouri State Highway 366), but Watson Road had not yet been completed.
Route 66 between Oatman and Kingman.From west of El Reno, Oklahoma to Bridgeport, Oklahoma, US 66 turned north to Calumet, Oklahoma and then west to Geary, Oklahoma then southwest across the South Canadian River over a suspension toll bridge into Bridgeport, Oklahoma. In 1933, a straighter cut-off route was completed from west of El Reno, Oklahoma directly to a point one mile south of Bridgeport, Oklahoma crossing over a 38-span steel pony truss bridge over the South Canadian River and bypassing both Calumet and Geary by several miles.
From west of Santa Rosa, New Mexico to north of Los Lunas, New Mexico, the road originally turned north from current I-40 along much of what is now US 84 to near Las Vegas, followed (roughly) I-25 through Santa Fe and Albuquerque to Los Lunas and then turned northwest along the present State Highway 6 alignment to a point near Laguna. In 1937, a straight-line route was completed from west of Santa Rosa through Moriarty and east-west through Albuquerque and west to Laguna. This newer routing saved travelers as much as four hours of travel through New Mexico.
Also, US 66 was rerouted around several larger cities via bypass or beltline routes to permit travelers to avoid city traffic congestion. Some of those cities included Springfield, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri, Springfield, Missouri; Joplin, Missouri; and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Decline
Abandoned, fire-damaged Whiting Brothers gas station, New Mexico. Conservation efforts are under way to preserve original buildings such as this all along the route.The beginning of the end for Route 66 came in 1956 with the signing of the Interstate Highway Act by President Dwight Eisenhower. As a general fighting in the European theater during World War II, Eisenhower was impressed by Germany's high-speed roadways, or "Autobahnen". Eisenhower envisioned a similar system of roads for the US in which one could conceivably drive at high speed from one end of the country to the other without stopping, as well as making it easier to mobilize troops in the event of a national emergency.
During its nearly 60-year existence, Route 66 was under constant change. As highway engineering became more sophisticated, engineers constantly sought more direct routes between cities and towns. Increased traffic led to a number of major and minor realignments of US 66 through the years, particularly in the years immediately following World War II when Illinois began widening US 66 to four lanes through virtually the entire state from Chicago to the Mississippi River just east of St. Louis, Missouri, and included bypasses around virtually all of the towns. By the early-to-mid 1950s, Missouri also upgraded its sections of US 66 to four lanes complete with bypasses. Most of the newer four-lane 66 paving in both states was upgraded into the interstate highway system in later years.
One of the remnants of Route 66 is the highway now known as Veterans Parkway, east and south of Normal, Illinois, and Bloomington, Illinois. The two sweeping curves on the southeast and southwest of the cities originally were intended to easily handle traffic at speeds up to 100 miles per hour, as part of an effort to make Illinois 66 an Autobahn equivalent for military transport.
An abandoned early Route 66 alignment in southern Illinois in 2006. (Photo courtesy of Shawn Mariani of otchster.com)In 1953, the first major bypassing of US 66 occurred in Oklahoma with the opening of the Turner Turnpike between Tulsa and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The new 88-mile toll road paralleled US 66 for its entire length and bypassed each of the towns along 66. The Turner Turnpike was joined in 1957 by the new Will Rogers Turnpike, which connected Tulsa with the Oklahoma-Missouri border west of Joplin, Missouri, again paralleling US 66 and bypassing the towns in northeastern Oklahoma in addition to the entire state of Kansas. Both Oklahoma turnpikes were soon designated as Interstate 44, along with the US 66 bypass at Tulsa that connected the city with both turnpikes.
In some cases, such as many areas in Illinois, the new Interstate not only paralleled the old Route 66, it actually incorporated much of it. A typical approach was to build one new set of lanes, then move one direction of traffic to it, then rebuild those old lanes as the new lanes for the other direction of traffic, and finally abandon the other old set of lanes or convert them into a frontage road.
The same scenario was used in western Oklahoma when US 66 was initially upgraded to a four-lane highway such as from Sayre through Erick to the Texas border at Texola in 1957 and 1958 where the old paving was retained for westbound traffic and a new parallel lane built for eastbound traffic (Much of this section was entirely bypassed I-40 in 1975), and on two other sections; from Canute to Elk City in 1959 and Hydro to Weatherford in 1960 - both of which were upgraded with the construction of a new westbound lane in 1966 to bring the highway up to full interstate standards and demoting the old US 66 paving to frontage road status. In the intial process of constructing I-40 across western Oklahoma, the state also included projects to upgrade the through routes in El Reno, Weatherford, Clinton, Canute, Elk City, Sayre, Erick and Texola to four-lane highways not only to provide seamless transitions from the rural sections of I-40 from both ends of town but also to provide easy access to those cities in later years after the I-40 bypasses were completed.
Roadbed of Route 66 in Newkirk, New Mexico in 2003. (Photo courtesy of Joseph Houk)In New Mexico as in most other states, rural sections of I-40 were to be constructed first with bypasses around cities to come later. However, some business and civic leaders in cities along US 66 were completely opposed to bypassing fearing loss of business and tax revenues. In 1963, the New Mexico Legislature enacted legislation that banned the construction of interstate bypasses around cities by local request. This legislation was short-lived, however, due to pressures from Washington and threat of loss of federal highway funds so it was rescinded by 1965. In 1964, Tucumcari and San Jon became the first cities in New Mexico to work out an agreement with state and federal officials in determining the locations of their I-40 bypasses as close to their business areas as possible in order to permit easy access for highway travelers to their localities. Other cities soon fell in line including Santa Rosa, Moriarty, Grants and Gallup although it wasn't until well into the 1970s that most of those cities would be bypassed by I-40.
By the late 1960s, most of the rural sections of US 66 had been replaced by I-40 across New Mexico with the most notable exception being the 40-mile strip from the Texas border at Glenrio west through San Jon to Tucumcari, which was becoming increasing treacherous due to heavier and heavier traffic on the narrow two-lane highway. During 1968 and 1969, this section of US 66 was often referred to by locals and travelers as "Slaughter Lane" due to numerous injury and fatal accidents on this stretch. Local and area business and civic leaders and news media called upon state and federal highway officials to get I-40 built through the area, however, disputes over proposed highway routing in the vicinty of San Jon held up construction plans for several years as federal officials propopsed that I-40 run some five to six miles north of that city while local and state officials insisted on following a proposed route that touched the northern city limits of San Jon. In November of 1969, a truce was reached when federal highway officials agreed to build the I-40 route just outside of the city, therefore providing local businesses dependent on highway traffic easy access to and from the expressway via the north-south highway that crossed old US 66 in San Jon. Interstate 40 was completed from Glenrio to the east side of San Jon in 1976 and extended west to Tucumcari in 1981, including the bypasses around both cities.
Originally, highway officials planned for the last section of US 66 to be bypassed by interstates in Texas, but as was the case in many places, lawsuits held up construction of the new interstates. The US Highway 66 Association had become a voice for the people who feared the loss of their businesses. Since the interstates only provided access via ramps at intersections, travelers could not pull directly off a highway into a business. At first, plans were laid out to allow (mainly national chains) to be placed in interstate medians. Such lawsuits effectively prevented this on all but toll roads. Some towns in Missouri threatened to sue the state if the US 66 designation was removed from the road, though lawsuits never materialized. Several businesses were well known to be on US 66, and fear of losing the number resulted in the state of Missouri officially requesting the designation "Interstate 66" for the St. Louis to Oklahoma City section of the route, but it was denied. In 1984, Arizona also saw its final stretch of highway decommissioned with the completion of Interstate 40 through Williams. Finally, with decertification of the highway by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials the following year, U.S. Route 66 officially ceased to exist.
With the decommissioning of US 66, no single interstate route was designated to replace it. Interstate 55 covered the section from Chicago to St. Louis; Interstate 44 carried the traffic on to Oklahoma City; Interstate 40 took the largest chunk, replacing 66 to Barstow, California; Interstate 15 took over for the route to San Bernardino; and Interstate 10 carried Route 66's traffic across the Los Angeles metro area to Santa Monica.
After decertification
Towns such as Kingman, Arizona promote their association with Route 66.When the highway was decommissioned, sections of the road were disposed of in various ways. Within many cities, the route became a "business loop" for the interstate. Some sections became state roads, local roads, private drives, or were abandoned completely. Although it is no longer possible to drive Route 66 uninterrupted all the way from Chicago to Los Angeles, more than eighty percent of the original route and alternate alignments are still drivable with careful planning. Some stretches are quite well-preserved, including one between Springfield, Missouri and Tulsa.
Some states have kept the 66 designation for parts of the highway, albeit as state roads. Missouri highways 366, 266, and 66 are all original sections of the highway. Oklahoma State Highway 66 remains as the alternate "free" route near its turnpikes. A long segment in Arizona signed as Arizona State Route 66 links Seligman to Kingman. A surface street stretch between San Bernardino and La Verne (known as Foothill Boulevard) to the east of Los Angeles retains its number as State Route 66. Several county roads and city streets have also retained the "66" name.
Revival
Restored service station in Mt. Olive, IL. (Photo: Patty Kuhn; ©2003 Illinois Route 66 Heritage Project, courtesy of byways.org)In 1990, Route 66 associations were founded separately in both Arizona and Missouri. Other groups in the other Route 66 states soon followed. The same year, the state of Missouri declared Route 66 in that state a "State Historic Route". The first "Historic Route 66" marker was erected on Kearney Street at Glenstone Avenue in Springfield, Missouri (now replaced, the original sign has been placed at Route 66 State Park near Eureka). Other historic markers now line—at times sporadically—the entire 2,400 mile (3,860 km) length of road. A section of the road in Arizona was placed on the National Register of Historic Places; the Arroyo Seco Parkway in the Los Angeles Area and Route 66 in New Mexico have been made into National Scenic Byways; and in 2005, the State of Missouri made the road a state scenic byway from Illinois to Kansas. In the cities of Rancho Cucamonga, Rialto, and San Bernardino in California, there are US 66 signs erected along Foothill Boulevard and on Huntington Drive in the city of Arcadia.
Route 66 and American pop culture
Route 66 gave its name to a company and also was immortalized in literature, popular music, and television. Although several businesses became associated with Route 66 because of their being on or near the highway, Phillips 66 actually took part of their name directly from the highway.
Because the road through Oklahoma was relatively flat and straight, two chemical engineers decided to test a new gasoline from a Tulsa oil company in the late 1920s. The company car they were driving ran exceptionally well on the new blend, prompting the engineer in the passenger seat to exclaim that the car was "going like sixty". His companion looked at the speedometer and said that they were going more like 66 miles/hour (106 km/h). The combination of the highway number and the speed of the car led to the naming of Phillips 66 gasoline, a brand still marketed today.
Buckingham Fountain in Chicago, the official starting point for Route 66In 1939, California writer John Steinbeck published The Grapes of Wrath, his novel about the westward migration of Oklahoma's Dust Bowl farmers to California's San Joaquin Valley. The book described the problems many of them faced, including prejudice and poverty, as they traveled to a hopefully better life. In this book, he spent a chapter describing the path west, which funnels to Oklahoma City and continues down Route 66. He referred to Route 66 as the "Mother Road", a nickname the highway still retains. The book won a Pulitzer Prize and made the road even more famous.
In 1946, jazz composer and pianist Bobby Troup wrote his best-known song, "(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66", after driving the highway himself to get to California. He presented it to Nat King Cole who in turn made it one of the biggest hit singles of his career. The title was suggested by Troup's first wife, Cynthia, who accompanied him on the trip. The song later became a hit for Chuck Berry, and has been recorded by many subsequent artists, including The Rolling Stones, Depeche Mode and John Mayer.
The highway also gave its name to a popular television show, Route 66, seen from 1960 through 1964 on CBS. The show featured Martin Milner and George Maharis as Tod and Buz, two young men in a Corvette looking for adventure along America's highways. Maharis was later replaced by Glenn Corbett, who played a returning Viet Nam vet named Linc. Strangely, though the entire program was filmed on location, it was rarely shot along Route 66. Since then, the Corvette has become the car most associated with Route 66. The theme song from the TV series, long a staple of General Motors advertising for the Corvette, was written and played by Nelson Riddle and his band.
