HAVE A QUESTION ABOUT ANTIQUES OR COLLECTIBLES?

Send me an E-mail
(Please, no questions
 about value.)

Instructions for sending photographs of your pieces with your question.
 

Which department store originated the concept of selling artistic home furnishings?

Macy's
Harrod's
Liberty & Co.
                     To see the answer

Arts & Crafts:
From William Morris to Frank Lloyd Wright

by Arnold Schwartzman

The author focuses on a British craftsmen, such as William Morris and Charles Rennie Mackintosh, who turned their backs on the mass production of the Industrial Revolution to form a ‘Round Table’ in order to establish a means of returning to hand-crafted products.

                                  More Books

 WATCH VIDEOS

How Was It Made? Block Printing William Morris Wallpaper

This video recreates the painstaking reproduction of a William Morris wallpaper design from 1875, a process that can take up to 4 weeks, using 30 different blocks and 15 separate colors.

Click on the title to view.

And look for other videos in selected articles.

Have Bob speak
 on antiques to your group or organization.

More Information

Can't find what
 you're looking for?

Go to our Sitemap

Find out what's coming in the
2024 Spring Edition

of the
THE ANTIQUES ALMANAC

"Art Deco World"

COMING IN
May

Share pages of this ezine with your friends using the buttons provided with each article.


Download our
Decorative Periods and Styles Chart
 

Read our newest glossary:

Antique Furniture Terminology
 from A to Z

courtesy of AntiquesWorldUK

Videos have
come to


The Antiques
Almanac

Expand your antiques experience.

Look for videos in various articles.

Just click on the
arrow to play.

FEATURED
ANTIQUE




Argyle Chair
Charles Rennie Macintosh

 Get Your Kicks on Route 66
by Bob Brooke

 

Ever since the invention of the first automobile, America’s culture, economy, and even its architecture has been defined by the road. Many people associate roads with memories—a trip to grandma’s along a winding road during a gentle snow, the new landscapes rolling by the backseat window on the first big family vacation, a favorite drive where the automobile and the road become one. One of these iconic highways, dubbed the “Mother Road,” was U.S. Route 66.

John Steinbeck immortalized Route 66 in the Grapes of Wrath with his vivid descriptions of the dirty and desperate faces of the “Okies” fleeing the oppression of environmental degradation and financial injustice during the dust bowl. And later he took his readers on a romantic driving journey across the nation in Travels With Charley. William Least Heat-Moon gave his readers Blue Highways and MGM gave audiences a Technicolor yellow-brick road.

U.S. Route 66 , also known as the Will Rogers Highway or the Main Street of America, was one of the original highways within the U.S. highway system. The U.S. Congress established it on November 11, 1926, with road signs erected the following year. The highway originally ran from Chicago, Illinois, through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona before ending in Santa Monica, California, near Los Angeles, spanning 2,448 miles.

Route 66 served as a primary route for hundreds of immigrants from the Dust Bowl in the 1930s. The road supported the economies of the communities through which it passed. People doing business along it became prosperous. As the route grew in popularity, business along it became prosperous.

Over its lifetime, Route 66 underwent many improvements and realignments. The Government officially removed it from the nation’s highway system in 1985. After it had been replaced by segments of the Interstate Highway System, portions of the road passing through Illinois, Missouri, New Mexico, and Arizona became a National Scenic Byway with the name "Historic Route 66."

In 1857, the War Department ordered Lt. Edward Fitzgerald Beale, a Naval officer in the service of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers, to build a government-funded wagon road along the 35th Parallel. It also ordered him to test the feasibility of the use of camels as pack animals in the southwestern desert. Eventually, this road became part of Route 66.

Before the states adopted a nationwide network of numbered highways, private organizations named and marked auto trails. The route that would become US 66 consisted of three of these early highways. The Lone Star Route passed through St. Louis on its way from Chicago to Cameron, Louisiana. The transcontinental National Old Trails Road continued from St. Louis to Los Vegas, New Mexico. And the National Old Trails Road which began just south of there and continued to Los Angeles.



The original inspiration for a roadway between Chicago and Los Angeles came from entrepreneurs Cyrus Avery of Tulsa, Oklahoma, and John Woodruff of Springfield, Missouri.

How Route 66 Came to Be
Route 66 received its numerical designation on April 30, 1926 in Springfield, Missouri. Championed by Avery when the first talks about a national highway system began, Route 66 became one of the original U.S. highways in 1927.He was adamant that the highway have a round number and had proposed the number 60 to identify it. After many arguments, Avery and highway engineer John Page settled on the number "66," which had yet to be assigned.



Traffic grew on the highway because of the geography through which it passed. Since much of the highway was essentially flat, it became a popular truck route. The Dust Bowl of the 1930s saw many farming families, mainly from Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas, heading west for agricultural jobs in California.

During the Depression, the route helped create many mom-and-pop businesses, such as service stations, restaurants, and motor courts, all easily accessible to passing motorists.

Much of the early highway, like all the others, was gravel or graded dirt. Route 66 became the first highway to be completely paved in 1938. But it did have some dangerous curves, earning part of it the nickname of "Bloody 66." Gradually, the Government realigned many of these bad segments to remove dangerous curves. However, one section through the Black Mountains outside Oatman, Arizona, had hairpin turns and was the steepest along the entire route, so much so that some early travelers, too frightened at the prospect of driving such a potentially dangerous road, hired locals to navigate the winding grade. The section remained part of Route 66 until 1953 and is still open to traffic today as the Oatman Highway.

Buildings Along the Way
Notable structures along Route 66 include the Art Deco–styled U-Drop Inn, constructed in 1936 in Shamrock, in Wheeler County east of Amarillo, Texas, and now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. There’s also a restored Magnolia fuel station located in Shamrock as well as Vega, in Oldham County, west of Amarillo.



During World War II, more migration west occurred because of war-related industries in California. US 66, already popular and fully paved, became one of the main routes and also served for moving military equipment.



In the 1950s, Route 66 became the main highway for vacationers heading to Los Angeles. The road passed through the Painted Desert and near the Grand Canyon. Meteor Crater in Arizona was another popular stop. This sharp increase in tourism in turn gave rise to a variety of roadside attractions, including teepee-shaped motels, frozen custard stands, Indian curio shops, and reptile farms. Meramec Caverns near St. Louis, began advertising on barns, billing itself as the "Jesse James hideout." The Big Texan advertised a free 72-ounce steak dinner to anyone who could consume the entire meal in an hour.



Route 66 marked the birth of the fast-food industry. Red's Giant Hamburg in Springfield, Missouri, was the site of the first drive-through restaurant, as well as the first McDonald's in San Bernardino, California. The route became a near-perfect microcosm of the culture of America, now linked by the automobile.

The Beginning of the End
The beginning of the decline for US 66 came in 1956 with the signing of the Interstate Highway Act by President Dwight D. Eisenhower who was influenced by his experiences in 1919 as a young Army officer crossing the country in a truck convoy and an appreciation of Germany’s autobahn network as a necessary component of a national defense system.

During its nearly 60-year existence, Route 66 underwent 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 Route 66 through the years, particularly in the years immediately following World War II.



Although it’s no longer possible to drive US 66 uninterrupted from Chicago to Los Angeles, much of the original route and alternate alignments are still drivable with careful planning.

Over its lifetime, Route 66 underwent many improvements and realignments. The Government officially removed it from the nation’s highway system in 1985. After it had been replaced by segments of the Interstate Highway System, portions of the road passing through Illinois, Missouri, New Mexico, and Arizona became a National Scenic Byway with the name "Historic Route 66."

Preserving the Past
All along Historic Route 66, preservation efforts are under way to preserve original buildings. The route was also responsible for the founding of many chain stores back in the 1920s that sprouted up next to it to increase business and sales. But when the US 66 signs disappeared, businesses along it were forced to close because motorists couldn’t find them.

American pop-culture artists publicized Route 66 and the experience of driving it, through song and television. Bobby Troup wrote "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66", and the highway lent its name to a TV series in the 1960s that still plays today on Retro TV.

< More Special Features
                                                   Next Article >

FOLLOW MY WEEKLY BLOG
Antiques Q&A


JOIN MY COLLECTION
Antiques and More on
Facebook

LIKE MY FACEBOOK PAGE
The Antiques Almanac on Facebook

No antiques or collectibles
are sold on this site.

How to Recognize and Refinish Antiques for Pleasure and Profit

Book: How to Recognizing and Refinishing Antiques for Pleasure and Profit
Have you ever bought an antique or collectible that was less than perfect and needed some TLC? Bob's new book offers tips and step-by- step instructions for simple maintenance and restoration of common antiques.

Read an Excerpt

Auction News
Get up to the minute news of antiques auctions around the country and the world.

Also see
The Auction Directory

Antiques News
Read breaking news stories from the world of antiques and collectibles.

Art Exhibitions
Search for art exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world.

Home | About This Site | Antiques | Collectibles | Antique Tips | Book Shop | Antique Trivia | Antique Spotlight | Antiques News  Special Features | Caring for Your Collections | Collecting | Readers Ask | Antiques Glossaries | Resources | Contact
Copyright ©2007-2023 by Bob Brooke Communications
Site design and development by BBC Web Services