This is where we are in 2023, on the eve of the Centennial of Route 66. If journalists today wander onto Route 66 in the course of telling a story they need to add an obligatory descriptor - an historic road that once ran between Chicago and Los Angeles. Younger readers could be excused for wondering if Conestoga wagons once used the road.
Route 66 was - and always will be - the most famous United States road that ever was. The Mother Road. America's Main Street. Travel on Route 66 was a way of life for many, a beacon in the imagination for many more. Televison, movies, popular music - Route 66 existed in the heart of American car culture of the mid-20th century.
But if you received your driver's license after 1985, Route 66 was already gone - at least officially. The road was decommissioned in 1985 and removed from highway maps. Much of the original highway was appropriated by the interstate system that had been gobbling up stretches of Route 66 right-of-way since the 1950s.
But much of the roadway still existed. It was soon swept up by a wave of nostalgia in the 1990s when Route 66 could rekindle memories of how it was to take a road trip when gas stations were service stations, when road food meant Mom-and-Pop joints, when business signs meant neon. Associations formed, motels re-awakened and souvenir shops stocked.
A generation has passed since those days. Many of the Route 66 attractions spruced up for the revival travelers are tired again. It is not likely that another Mother Road renaissance will come to their rescue.
They are still there for the most part, however. The last great American road trip is still possible.
Some can still tour America's Main Street and remember how YOU once were. But it will not be long before the only drivers on Route 66 will only be driving to experience how AMERICA once was. The way we visit Revolutionary War battlefields - as history. In the future you may even see re-enactors on Route 66, dressed in uniforms pumping gas and checking under the hood. Yes, people used to do that at gas stations.
Why is this "Last Great American Road Trip" a unique opportunity? Who is going to return to drive the interstates they grew up on? Historic I-95, historic I-80, historic 1-10. Nope, it isn't going to work that way.
For that matter what is the future of the road trip? The golden age of Route 66 dovetailed perfectly with the heyday of America's fascination with cars and youth that defined much of the 20th century. Remember how the milestone event of your teenage years was getting your driver's license? Cars are not at the center of young lives that way anymore. And haven't been for a while. Driving for pleasure seems as alien as rushing to answer your rotary phone because you didn't know who was on the other end.
So this is the time. Route 66. Road trip. The magic is running out.
This book is not a turn-by-turn direction guide. If you are not full in on GPS by now you should be; an address will suffice. It is not a comprehensive look at everything that exists on the one-time Mother Road. Driving Route 66 is a mood, not a checklist. This is more of a treasure hunt for Route 66 All-Stars selected because they tell the best stories about America's most fabled road - Heritage Businesses, Restored Architecture, Guardians of the Road, Museums, Historic Infrastructure, Roadside Art, Roadside Attractions, and the occasional Escape to Nature.
Despite its out-sized place in the American experience, America's Main Street enjoyed only a relatively brief time in the baking sun. But when it disappeared almost immediately Americans recognized that something had been lost.
What is it that people were so afraid to lose? What stories do the buildings tell? So as the window on Route 66 nostalgia begins to close what is still out there? Let's have a look.