If you count the interstates that parallel the original Route 66 roadway, I’ve traveled the entire length of Route 66. But I cheated…
Route 66 runs along the town I grew up in (Granite City, IL) and while it was just another road to my generation, nobody ever called it anything other than Route 66 or Old 66 despite all the street signs proclaiming it as a named street or local thoroughfare . My first and second jobs (welder and forklift driver) were both on Old 66. My current office - where I am sitting at work at this very moment - is along one of the previous Route 66 paths through St. Louis. So, I still drive on a portion of it almost every day and see the old Route 66 bridge across the Mississippi that has one heck of a dogleg turn about 2/3 the way across the river (look at satellite images of the Chain of Rocks Bridge).
Many places along the route and the route’s position itself changed over the years, both in the road’s heyday and in its retirement. There are several Route 66 pathways through St. Louis alone so in its 100-year history it has both shaped and been shaped by the changing times. I would imagine the meandering path holds true across the country.
When I was a kid (in the 80’s) pretty much everything along the old route from St. Louis to Chicago was in some state of disrepair or abandonment. There’s been quite a resurgence of the kitschy stuff in recent years and now there’s a lot of signs helping people navigate the old path.
November marks the 100th anniversary of The Mother Road (will we see a bet you’ll didn’t know about this coming up?). I’m not sure I have seen as many antique cars in my lifetime as I have seen just this year. Great numbers of enthusiasts have been retracing the paths of the road and of the mentioned show.
My grandpa and his brother left this area in the depression and tried to find better luck than what befell the Joads on their Route 66 travels. They drove out to California in a 1916 Chandler on 66 and ended up finding work building a Borax factory somewhere in the California desert. Eventually grandpa came back home to Illinois, but his brother stayed. They traded letters and a few phone calls but never saw each other again over the next 60 or so years. It’s a shame grandpa didn’t write a book about his adventure out and back.
My daughter goes to college outside Los Angeles. While I loosely knew that the western terminus was out in the same area, I was delighted to find that her college is merely a block or two over from Route 66. It’s kind of neat that while she’s over 1800 miles away, she’s really just down the road. Full circle.
Steve