LA Marathon includes parts of Route 66 November 9, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Attractions, Events, Sports.add a comment
The annual LA Marathon in March will include parts of Route 66 in its 26.2-mile course — including the western end of Route 66 in Santa Monica, it was announced today.
From the news release:
Along the way, runners will pass signature sites, including El Pueblo de Los Angeles (the city’s birthplace), Los Angeles City Hall, the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Kodak Theater (home of the Oscars), the Sunset Strip, historic Route 66, Rodeo Drive and the Santa Monica Pier.
The course, which trends downhill and loses roughly 400 feet start to finish, is expected to be among the fastest courses in LA Marathon history.
Here’s the map of the course. It includes several miles of the Route 66 alignments of Santa Monica Boulevard and Sunset Boulevard. The race also ends at the intersection of Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean Avenue — the western end of the Mother Road and just a few hundred feet from the Santa Monica Pier.
The race begins at Dodger Stadium, which is right off the historic Arroyo Seco Parkway, another historical alignment of Route 66. Officials are calling it the Stadium to the Sea Course.
The L.A. Marathon starts at 7:20 a.m. on Sunday, March 21.
Registration is being capped at 25,000 entrants. Because of the expected popularity of the course and the fact registrations already are far ahead last year’s pace, it’s advisable to sign up ASAP.
I’m no runner, but the course — and its attractions — sound fabulous. It wouldn’t surprise me if organizers stick with this course for years to come.
Book review: “Dollars to Donuts” November 9, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Books, Food, History, Movies, People, Restaurants.add a comment
Dawn Welch’s story of as a young Oklahoma woman who became the successful owner of the historic Rock Cafe, served as the inspiration for Sally in the hit Disney/Pixar animated film “Cars,” and then resurrected the restaurant after a devastating fire last year, would serve as compelling material for a book.
But her first book, “Dollars to Donuts: Comfort Food & Kitchen Wisdom from Route 66′s Landmark Rock Cafe” (Rodale Press, 288 pages, paperback, $19.99), became a lot more than a biography. Co-written with Raquel Pelzel, “Dollars to Donuts” serves as a cookbook that’s terrifically practical — especially for those who want to stretch their food budget.
Welch’s book aims to help readers cook at home inexpensively by packing the book with 150 recipes and, most importantly, a truckload of advice.
For instance, she recommends investing in a stand-alone freezer to help preserve large quantities of food and tells what features (Energy Star rating, an exterior power light) are the most important.
In another example, Welch says that adding a teaspoon of fresh lemon juice to a cup of regular milk will act as a buttermilk substitute if the real stuff isn’t around. In another, she provides instructions on how to make your own breadcrumbs.
Almost every page of “Dollars to Donuts” contains advice such as this that will help a reader recover the cost of the book many times over.
One of the “Dollars to Donuts” chapters concentrates on what are called Big Bag Relays, in which one main course will yield several days’ worth of other dishes. For instance, two rosemary and thyme roasted chickens can be converted into meals of chicken and dumplings, almond chicken salad with honey-mustard dressing, cheesy baked chicken enchiladas, and chicken udon soup — nearly all for under $4 per meal.
The book’s number of recipes far exceeds the Rock Cafe’s large menu. However, those who wish who re-create some of the restaurant’s creations at home will find instructions for spaetzle, beignets, bread pudding with hot buttered rum sauce, and its signature chicken-fried steak with bacon gravy.
Many of the recipes contain short asides about Welch’s experiences in running the restaurant. But Route 66 fans probably will find most rewarding the book’s preface and introduction, which delve into Welch’s and the Rock Cafe’s history. This excerpt provides an inkling of why Welch became a highly regarded restaurateur:
Gifting the kids with the gift of cooking gives me peace of mind that they’ll know how to fend for themselves once they leave the nest. I’m passing all the recipes in Dollars to Donuts not just to you, but to them, too. Many of these recipes were handed down to me by my mom, grandma, and even by customers, and I regard them as a legacy of sorts. This is the food we all hold close to our hearts, the comforting slow-roasted meat dishes, the hearty stews, the satisfying sandwiches — it’s the stuff we grew up on, whether cooked by our moms and grandmas, aunts, neighbors, friends or neighborhood bistro. This is why people love the Rock. They can count on it, lean on it, and know there will always be something on the menu that brings them home. Food is for sharing, after all. It’s a common thread that connects us no matter where we’re from or what our food budget is.
“Dollars to Donuts” could have become a straight-ahead, consumer-oriented cookbook that would have been as entertaining as a Consumer Reports product-comparison grid. But it’s the book’s heart that elevates it into something more.
Highly recommended.
(For a good introduction to the book and its format, go to Welch’s “Dollars to Donuts” blog here.)
Notes from the road November 7, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Animals, Art, Events, Food, Publications, Restaurants, Route 66 Associations.add a comment
Megan Carter e-mailed a few days ago to report that she’s suspending her quest to ride a part of Route 66 on horseback until spring, simply because winter will inevitably set in.
However, it’s too bad she didn’t continue her riding for another week or two; the weather in the Midwest has been incredibly nice in late October and early November.
Carter’s Web site is here.
— Broome’s Fried Pies, which had a location in Oklahoma City, recently reopened on Route 66 in Arcadia, Okla., just east of POPS, according to its Twitter account. It carries fruit, cream and meat fried pies. It is open for breakfast and lunch from Monday through Saturday.
— A victory party for those who participated in the Bike MS fundraiser on Route 66 from Tulsa to Oklahoma City will be held Nov. 15 at the Route 66 Interpretive Center in Chandler from 4 to 7 p.m. The bicycling event in September raised $470,000 for multiple sclerosis research, reported the Oklahoman. And registrations are already being accepted for next year’s ride.
— The Community News of Pontiac, Ill., noted that one of the city’s murals made the cover of the latest issue of the Federation News, a publication of the National Historic Route 66 Federation. The image accompanied an article about the Walldogs’ annual mural-painting festival in Pontiac.
It’s a beautiful day November 7, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Music.add a comment
Don’t let it get away.
Put some soul in the world.
“The Road Song” November 6, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Music, Photographs.add a comment
Here’s a haunting song by Mel Shaker, who is photographed by Edward Mance among the ruins of abandoned properties along Route 66.
An index of more of Mance’s photos of Shaker along Route 66 can be seen here. The photos reportedly will be part of a book titled “Route 66 Abandoned.”
Classic Arizona diners November 6, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Restaurants.1 comment so far
The Arizona Republic published a listing of the state’s favorite comfort-food diners.
Of the six listed, three are on Route 66 — the Galaxy Diner in Flagstaff, Mr. D’z in Kingman and Goldie’s Route 66 Diner in Williams.
A visit with Bob November 6, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in People, Publications.add a comment
Longtime roadie and Chicago Sun-Times columnist Dave Hoesktra this week visited with Bob Waldmire as the terminally ill Route 66 artist hunkered down in a converted school bus near his hometown of Springfield, Ill.
Waldmire talks about his favorite Route 66 things (one is in Oklahoma) and about cremation arrangements after he dies (half his ashes will be next to his parents’ ashes; the other half will be scattered along Route 66, including off the Santa Monica Pier and into the Pacific Ocean).
Then there’s this amazing passage about Waldmire by author Michael Wallis:
“In my mind I see the whole highway,” Wallis said from his home in Tulsa. Ok. “I see it stretching from Chicago to Santa Monica, from Lake Michigan to the Pacific. I know its this linear village and I know Bob was on there. So all was right with the world. And that’s not going to change because Bob will still be out there. Its that legacy, the artwork and that incredible presence.
“I remember one day I drove into Glen Rio (on the New Mexico-Texas border) with a bunch of bikers. I went off by myself and absorbed the ‘Death By Interstate’ and there’s an old alignment with grass on the side. In the wind I could hear this laughter.”
It was Bob Waldmire.
He was on his back in his shorts and sandals. Bob was laughing and singing.
“And he was holding up this big tortoise with two hands.” Wallis recalled. “They were talking. I didn’t intrude because I didn’t want to interrupt this conversation. Or whatever. This rendezvous.”
On a related note, you probably ought to pick up a copy of the upcoming issue of the Route 66 Pulse newspaper, which will contain remembrances and tributes to Waldmire when it is published later this month. I’ve already read one tribute, and on that alone, it promises to be a very special issue. I hope I can put some thoughts about Waldmire together myself.
The lost “Route 66″ episode November 6, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Television.3 comments
WGRZ-TV in Buffalo, N.Y., has the fascinating story about a 1963 episode of the “Route 66″ television series that was shot in nearby Niagara Falls, edited and ready to go. But CBS never aired it.
Here’s what happened …
In October 1963, the cast and crew of the CBS drama Route 66 came to Niagara Falls to film three episodes, including one which was shot entirely on location called: “I’m Here To Kill A King”.
The story line centered around a plot to assassinate a fictitious Arabian Potentate by gunning him down while he visited the world famous waterfall.
Hours before the episode was originally set to air on the night of November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was himself assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
Due to continuing news coverage, networks pre-empted their prime time lineup and the Route 66 episode was bumped to the following Friday, November 29th.
But faced with an all too real episode of life imitating art, it was decided that airing even a fictional account of a national leader felled by an assassin (wielding a high powered rifle while standing on a grassy knoll no less) wouldn’t be prudent before a still-wounded American public.
Eventually, the episode was consigned to a storage vault, presumably to never be seen.
The New York State Parks Department, much to its surprise, was able to acquire a print of the episode from Columbia Pictures in 1988 and show it at the new Niagara Falls Visitors Center. It was screened several times in one weekend, to large — and stunned — crowds.
Colangelo also remembered that while it may have been 25 years after the fact, many left the theater chilled by the haunting irony of what they’d waited so long to see.
“The silence was deafening. People watched and were just shocked by some of the irony in this thing. If you follow this thing through you’ll find 5 or 6 weird ironies that could be translated to the JFK assassination, ” he said.
They include parts of the dialogue from the show, particularly when the King’s bodyguard, conspiring against his leader, advises the hired assassin:
” …he wears body armor, at my insistence …but a high velocity bullet” — only to be cut off in mid sentence by the assassin who assures him he’s got that covered, because: “I’m shooting him through the head.”
“When I heard that the first time I got tingles up my spine,” Colangelo said.
There were other coincidences. The main character remarks to the assassin that “my father’s name was Lee” — drawing parallels to JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald. The motorcade scene, where the king waves to crowds from a limousine, bore a resemblance to the Kennedy motorcade in Dallas. When the king first arrives in Niagara Falls, he is told of a threat on his life; a State Department official suggests to the king that perhaps the flight should be diverted to Dallas.
The link provides access to a video that includes footage of that unaired “Route 66″ episode.
The episode was part of Season 4 — the final season for “Route 66.” Roxbury/Infinity hasn’t yet released episodes from that season to DVD, but will in the coming months. I’m skeptical, however, that particular episode will ever make its way to home video. Columbia Pictures gave a print of the film to Niagara Falls officials and told them it could be never reproduced for sale, nor should a fee ever be charged for airing it to the public.
More about Santa Monica’s role on Route 66 November 5, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Attractions, Highways, History, Movies, Towns.add a comment
Dan Rice, proprietor of the 66 to Cali apparel shack at the Santa Monica Pier, sent a fascinating e-mail today that gives some historical background behind the upcoming dedication of a new “End of the Trail” Route 66 sign at the pier next week.
The gist of it is that Route 66′s original western terminus was at Seventh and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles. But, beginning about 1935, that started to change …
At that time, even though the end was downtown, a sign was placed several miles to the west on the bluffs in Santa Monica over the Pacific Ocean (at Santa Monica Blvd. and Ocean Ave. ). The sign was a prop sign placed there for a movie. It simply said, “ Santa Monica 66: End of the Trail.” When the movie was over, the sign was left behind and still standing.
Rice says that he’s been unable to verify in what movie the “End of the Trail” sign appeared. He says old-timers have said it was a John Wayne movie, but Rice remains doubtful of that because of the time frame. Rice is probably right; Wayne’s breakthrough movie didn’t happen until 1939 with “Stagecoach.”
Rice said a lot of people in Los Angeles complained about the Santa Monica sign, to no avail. Santa Monica was growing in wealth, population and influence, and sure enough, Route 66 was extended westward to Lincoln and Olympic boulevards there. Rice said the city lobbied to have Route 66 end at the sign near the Pacific Ocean, but federal rules mandated that the highway end at another highway, this one being Highway 1.
Still, Rice said, the “Santa Monica 66: End of the Trail” sign continued to stand at Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean Avenue, near the pier and the Pacific Ocean.
Rice says the Lincoln and Olympic intersection eventually was deemed too busy and a safety hazard, so the western terminus of Route 66 was again moved further west to Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean Avenue — right where the “End of the Trail” sign stood.
“Life had imitated art,” Rice wrote. But it didn’t end there …
Downtown business people were not happy. They felt that the fix had been in from the beginning. They believed this had been the calculated plan to steal the end away from them all along. Their opposition was expectable.
The Lincoln and Olympic supporters balked too. Putting the end at Santa Monica and Ocean violated the Federal rule of Highway endings and beginnings in one place. The state’s legalistic bureaucrats continued to claim Lincoln and Olympic as the “Official end of Route 66.” Those in favor of moving it to Santa Monica and Ocean argued that another highway simply couldn’t begin there because there was an ocean in front of them and nowhere to put it, but the “official” pundits continued to call the Santa Monica and Ocean ending, “unofficial.”
Official or not, the actual people who were happily traveling the Route didn’t care. They began to travel to Santa Monica Blvd. and Ocean Ave., ending their journey at the more dramatic, and certainly more romantic overlook of the Pacific. To further cement this end, in 1952, when the highway was dedicated to Will Rogers, the city held the dedication ceremony at this new “third” ending of 66…the intersection of Santa Monica and Ocean, and newly “unofficial” end of Route 66. They felt that this dedication would legitimize the end at the new location. The Will Rogers Highway plaque dedicated that day still lies in the grass there today. But on the day of the dedication, the famous movie sign that started it all was now just a few feet away.
Although people did choose to end their Route 66 road trips at the ocean, they instead gravitated more to the Santa Monica Pier just two blocks to the south. So the “unofficial” end of Route 66 changed again — to the romantic and picturesque pier.
In the meantime, the “End of the Trail” sign disappeared. It may have simply fallen apart from age, or it was rumored that William Randolph Hearst took it to his Annenberg Beach House.
One thing that WAS known for sure. You couldn’t call it a complete trip on 66 without going to the pier. That much still holds true today. A series of postcards was created with the “End of the Trail” sign re-created and superimposed over a photo showing where it’d been at one time. Still, the actual sign itself never resurfaced. [...]
Today, people still come to the pier (official or not) to mark the end of their Route 66 journeys. No, it was never officially recognized by the legalists who are bound by their rules, but it’s definitely the place where I welcome thousands of visitors from around the world everyday who view it that way. [...]
Therefore, I’m proud to announce that on November 11, the 83rd birthday of our beloved Route 66, that rebuilt old sign will be restored to its upright position, this time protected by camera monitoring and located here on the Santa Monica Pier…the place that ironically became the “End of the Trail” because of the sign’s original existence.
Albuquerque motel in sad shape November 5, 2009
Posted by Ron Warnick in Motels.1 comment so far
This report from KOB-TV in Albuquerque tells the sad tale of the Sundowner Motor Hotel, years ago once one of the best motels on Route 66 in the city.
The prognosis seems fairly grim. The owner has 60 days to bring it back up to code.