US30

The whole idea of the great Route 66....has always been an interest to me. Like I've said before on the boards...I really want to travel from Pa....out west, via Rt. 66. Take a summer...and just explore all of the little tucked away attractions that still remain. I would love to do this before what is left...is forever gone.

I can see how the people that grew up during the heyday of it all..would totally be nostalgic for the ways/traditions of their past. I mean, I am only 30 and I yearn to relive those occasions that sit in a special place in my heart (a lot of them dealing with vacations/traveling traditions, etc)...I can only imagine what people of that era must feel like, especially when they see how much of it has changed over the years.


Oh...btw, this topic would have been great in the Off-Beat Oddities section..maybe we can have it moved there. :)

I think in some respects childhood is the most precious time in people's lives, because it's the first things you know, and you're waking up to the world. That's how I feel about the Bay Area and almost anything I experienced in my first 8 years, which almost seems like a magical time that I have to wonder if I dreamed it sometimes. Even the '90s honestly feels pretty close to that now, though. Although I wasn't a kid in the literal sense anymore (by the second half of the decade), the relative closeness to the '80s and the fact that nothing major had changed, still made it a time that was familar enough territory for me to still feel like it was home.

So yeah I can see why they would feel the same about what they grew up with as I do about Nintendo games, music videos, VCRs or anything else I experienced personally. I associate that stuff with family experiences, and I'm sure the Boomers would too. Oddly, although I'm from California, I don't think I've been to a part of the still standing Route 66, or at least not that I know of. I'll have to see where it runs though, because it feels "close enough" to being part of my heritage too.

I agree with EchoNomad too, and that's a good point I hadn't considered. Boomers were sort of the last gasp of people who had a childhood that predated interstates and still travelled on the older style two or four-lane open highways as kids. Real freeways didn't seem to get common until the early 1970s. That's when most of the ones out here were built or made into interstates.

When I was 12, being 7 was "the good old days", so I can't say I don't understand where they're coming from. ;D They're still in the uppermost positions of power to influence the media too.

http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h154/Brigitte_B/seventies/66.png
This image has always reminded me of our family road trips we took in the 70's. I have never been on Route 66 but I'm sure it was much like other highways of that era.
I loved how every car had a bumper sticker and along the highways we would search for a motel with a pool.
Good memories!

Having a huge back seat, made much smaller by my older siblings, and being small enough to sleep in the back window. Looking for a Holiday inn was the high point if we were lucky, a Thunderbird Inn, if we weren't so lucky. I never traveled on 66 either, but we drove all over I95.

The nostalgia for Route 66 stems from the lack of imagination in cross coutry touring.  Route 66 is a model of the antithesis of the sameness in interstate travel where all the roads look the same and offer the same things. If you have taken a road trip, and done it on the interstate, then you haven't taken a road trip at all, you have just gone from one place to another.

If you have taken a road trip, and done it on the interstate, then you haven't taken a road trip at all, you have just gone from one place to another.

:\'( thanks for bursting my bubble...

:\'( thanks for bursting my bubble...


oops, but the truth must be known.  The thing about a road trip is seeing the odd and unusual that turns up.  That doesn't happen on the interstate.  Take the side roads, avoid chain stores and restaurants, then you have the makings of a real road trip.  Way back when, you would get the names of people along the way that would let you "crash"(sleep over) along the way.  You would stay with someone, and they would give you the name of someone in the next city, and so on, and so on....

The nostalgia for Route 66 stems from the lack of imagination in cross coutry touring.  Route 66 is a model of the antithesis of the sameness in interstate travel where all the roads look the same and offer the same things. If you have taken a road trip, and done it on the interstate, then you haven't taken a road trip at all, you have just gone from one place to another.

Agreed.  Someday when I have the means I'd love to travel the whould country on the old U.S. routes.  Even on my trips around the New England/New York I prefer U.S. and state routes if I have the time. 

Unfortunately, thanks to the malling of America, local culture has given away to cookie-cutter uniformity....however, the process is far from complete.  It's still more than worthwhile.

Maybe it's because of the song lyric.  get your kicks on route 66  :-\\

Who sung that and are they American?  ???

Maybe it's because of the song lyric.  get your kicks on route 66  :-\\

Who sung that and are they American?  ???



The song was composed in 1946 by American songwriter Bobby Troup, and was originally recorded in the same year by Nat King Cole. It has also been sung by many artists including Chuck Berry and The Rolling Stones.

I found a fairly informative site on the history of Route 66 and there are many to be found, but this one was easy to follow and seemed to cover the beginning of the historic route to present, all on one page which is great for my short attention span.  8)
    http://www.national66.com/66hstry.html

Maybe it's because of the song lyric.  get your kicks on route 66  :-\\

Who sung that and are they American?  ???


There was a television show called Rt 66.  Wikipedia has a good write up on Route 66

www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rt_66#Route_66_and_popular_culture

The song was composed in 1946 by American songwriter Bobby Troup, and was originally recorded in the same year by Nat King Cole. It has also been sung by many artists including Chuck Berry and The Rolling Stones.


Maybe it's the Stones version I know then.  I was asking because I hear (and say) the route to rhyme with boot but the sat nav I have always pronounces it to rhyme with out.  And that just got me wondering.

Maybe it's the Stones version I know then.  I was asking because I hear (and say) the route to rhyme with boot but the sat nav I have always pronounces it to rhyme with out.  And that just got me wondering.


I've heard it pronounced both ways before.

Maybe it's the Stones version I know then.  I was asking because I hear (and say) the route to rhyme with boot but the sat nav I have always pronounces it to rhyme with out.  And that just got me wondering.


Nat King Cole, in his recording of "Get Your Kicks On Route 66," pronounces it "root" which is the way I pronounce it, too. I like that the song names some of the towns along 66.

I remember the TV series. I saw the late Stirling Siliphant, the screenwriter, give a talk in 1980 and he showed clips from an episode of "Route 66" that he wrote. I think he might have been the head writer of that series, which was about two young men in a convertible on a permanent road trip and the crises of the people they got involved with along the road.

I remember the TV series. I saw the late Stirling Siliphant, the screenwriter, give a talk in 1980 and he showed clips from an episode of "Route 66" that he wrote. I think he might have been the head writer of that series, which was about two young men in a convertible on a permanent road trip and the crises of the people they got involved with along the road.



George Maharis and Martin Milner, it was great.

Living in a RT 66 state I'm constantly hearing about the great "mother road". However also living closer to the real mother road - US30 aka the Lincoln Highway, I'm not too impressed. It was neither the first nor did it stretch from coast to coast.

EchoNomad,

I also live near the Lincoln Highway  :) (Route 30). Im in the Western PA area. You should check out www.lhhc.org for the Lincoln Highway Heritage Corridor. Unfortunately, some of the land marks along the sections I live have been destroyed :( . The main one being the Ship Hotel along with two other sites were torched.  >:(   

The Coffee Pot ( a building shaped like a coffee pot) in Bedford has been restored and moved from its original location. It now sits about 200 yards from where it was to its new home at the entrance of the Bedford County Fairgrounds.

Nozmo

Living in a RT 66 state I'm constantly hearing about the great "mother road". However also living closer to the real mother road - US30 aka the Lincoln Highway, I'm not too impressed. It was neither the first nor did it stretch from coast to coast.

EchoNomad,

I also live near the Lincoln Highway  :) (Route 30). Im in the Western PA area. You should check out www.lhhc.org for the Lincoln Highway Heritage Corridor. Unfortunately, some of the land marks along the sections I live have been destroyed :( . The main one being the Ship Hotel along with two other sites were torched.   >:(   

The Coffee Pot ( a building shaped like a coffee pot) in Bedford has been restored and moved from its original location. It now sits about 200 yards from where it was to its new home at the entrance of the Bedford County Fairgrounds.

Nozmo



OMG...I live in that area too!!! I am very familiar with the LHHC....infact, I would love to be apart of the organization someday. I am an avid collector of items from the once standing roadside attraction, SS Grandview Ship Hotel.....infact, everytime I drive by there...I give it a little moment of silence..out of respect and all.  Where are you at in western pa? I live near Greensburg. Small world, huh?

Quirk,

Very cool!! I used to live in Latrobe. I grew up near Twin Lakes Park. I moved away from Latrobe a few years ago, but go back about twice a week to visit family.

NozmoKing

Quirk,

Very cool!! I used to live in Latrobe. I grew up near Twin Lakes Park. I moved away from Latrobe a few years ago, but go back about twice a week to visit family.

NozmoKing



wow....I am not very far from there at all. I go to Twin Lakes all the time!! That is awesome! :)

Quirk,

Very cool!! I used to live in Latrobe. I grew up near Twin Lakes Park. I moved away from Latrobe a few years ago, but go back about twice a week to visit family.

NozmoKing



I'm pretty close to you as well. I live near Chambersburg. I pass through Bedford a lot, to go back to where I used to live (Greensburg/Mount Pleasant area), but I've never seen the coffee pot. T'would be cool, though.

MidKnight...

You have to get off of route 30 and go through downtown Bedford. The CoffeePot now sits at the entrance of the Bedford Fairgrounds/Speedway. Also, about two miles from there is the Art Decco Gulf station.  Buisness route 30 is what you need to travel. If heading East you cant miss the Gulf station as you will be looking almost directly at it as you head into town. It will be on your right. If traveling from the East you may miss it because you will be watching the flow of traffic which bears to the right and the station would then be to your left.

NozmoKing

There was a television show called Rt 66.  Wikipedia has a good write up on Route 66

Yeah, and they had a really neat theme song.

Saw the flick 'Cars' the other night on the tube and it was fairly cool to watch. Pixar did a good job on picking out real pieces of road and animating them. Very deja vu looking at cartoon versions of a road I have travelled, but it will give those too young an idea of what a bipassed town looked like way back then.

The X country trips today all stop at the same chains of burger stands and gas. You get off, you fill up, empty the bladder, stuff the styrofoam burger down the gullet and off you go. The roads are straight, all are built for 75mph corners that won't slosh your coffee in the cup holders, you have your ipod plugged into the stereo, it's all the same damn place! For freaking days!!!

Two lane? What the hell is two lane these days? Secondary roads, right? Rte 66 was two lane most of the way past St Louis!

oops, but the truth must be known.  The thing about a road trip is seeing the odd and unusual that turns up. 

You want to see the "odd and unusual", just go to WalMart at 3AM...

You want to see the "odd and unusual", just go to WalMart at 3AM...



LOL  ;D  I, personally, have never set foot in Wal-Mart, but in my wilder days I had a roommate and we would meet up at the end of night of partying and hit a Dunkin' Donuts.  It always had to be one we had never been in before, and a couple of times we went over 100 miles  just driving, having a cup, then turning around and coming back.  That is when all the Dunkins stayed open all night.  Sometimes we saw the show, sometimes we were the show  ;D ;D

You want to see the "odd and unusual", just go to WalMart at 3AM...



Ugh...I used to wait tables on the graveyard (3rd) shift....you want to see some oddballs....go to a "open 24 hours" restaurant around the middle of the night. :D ;D


But anyway...getting back to the real "odd & unusual" things of Route 66....I would SO love to experience and explore those kinds of quirky roadside attractions someday soon! :)

Ugh...I used to wait tables on the graveyard (3rd) shift....you want to see some oddballs....go to a "open 24 hours" restaurant around the middle of the night. :D ;D

Tell me about it, I've been to many all night diners in the early hours...

Tell me about it, I've been to many all night diners in the early hours...



the freaks come out at night, eh? ;D

:P

I don't know if it was a baby boomer thing or not. Both of my parents were born in the baby boom years and I don't think either of them ever went on Route 66.

Ive traveled route 66 many times. Although a much lesser version than the well noted one of song and film. It ran from the middle of Greensburg to to Apollo. Maybe about thirty miles long.

NozmoKing