The elf and the whale December 4, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Attractions, Events, Preservation.3 comments
On Saturday afternoon, we stopped by the Blue Whale near Catoosa, Okla., to see Santa Claus make an appearance at that famous historic site on Route 66.
After a Christmas lightning ceremony last week, Catoosa volunteers are still taking advantage of the Yuletide season to bring a little holiday cheer and raise money for the Blue Whale for future maintenance.
For a donation of $5, a photographer can take a picture of you with Santa on a comfy bench, with the Blue Whale in the background. The photo is e-mailed to your account. In the brief time we were there Saturday, we saw parents with children taking advantage of that opportunity with that little red elf.
Volunteers also opened the Blue Whale’s souvenir stand. In addition to coffee or hot chocolate to ward off the cold wind, they sold a number of items that would be of interest to Route 66ers or Blue Whale fans.
First, they’re selling recently published postcards …
… along with vintage postcards from the early 1970s, when the Davis family still ran the Blue Whale as a popular swimming hole.
The stand also sells POPS’ Catoosa Cream Soda (by the bottle or six-pack) and Blue Whale drinking water.
Also offered were specially made Christmas ornaments.
And, while we were there, volunteers sold freshly made Blue Whale soft sugar cookies with blue icing on the top and a blue candy piece for the eye. Delicious.
Santa and the volunteers will be at the Blue Whale from 1 to 4 p.m. tomorrow, Dec. 11, and Dec. 12. Remember, everything you buy there goes for upkeep on the lovable blue behemoth.
(For more photos from the event, see Red Fork Hippie’s blog post.)
Prominent Lebanon business founder dies December 3, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Businesses, People, Signs.add a comment
Rea Wallace Reid, co-founder of the Shepherd Hills Factory Outlet Stores in Lebanon, Mo., that sprouted billboards along Route 66, died Monday at age 77, according to the News-Leader in Springfield, Mo.
Shepherd Hills was hard to ignore. Billboards advertising Shepherd Hills’ Case pocket knives, Chicago Cutlery, and pottery remain dotted along the Interstate 44 and Route 66 corridor. And the gigantic store in Lebanon was hard to miss, too. It still draws tourists to this day.
According to his obituary at Holman-Howe Funeral Home in Lebanon:
Rea never did anything “half” way. He was a deep thinker who established high standards for himself and all those around him, putting his heart and soul into each and every endeavor he undertook. [...]
Having co-founded Shepherd Hills Gift Shop in 1972, with Ida, and incorporating with their two sons, Rod and Randy, the family-owned and operated business had gained a firm footing and was just beginning to grow as Rea and Ida returned to Lebanon in 1980. Adding a second location in Osage Beach, Missouri, was just the first of several expansions that would eventually encompass seven states. Rea had an incredible gift for master-minding an operation with efficiency, effectiveness, organization, and resolve to do the right thing. He loved the challenge, but even more, he appreciated having the opportunity to share the adventure and the work load with those he loved most, Ida and “the boys”. All in all, as Shepherd Hills grew, he designed and facilitated the build out of over sixteen different retail locations, and then, what is perhaps the crown jewel of his design acumen, he designed and oversaw the building of the Lebanon location of the Shepherd Hills Factory Outlets, completed in 2000.
Reid also held extensive stints in civil service at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., and, later on, raising Angus cattle.
The funeral and burial was Friday, in Lebanon Cemetery. He is survived by his wife Ida, two sons, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.
(Hat tip: Tonya Pike)
1930 journal of Route 66 trip will be donated to museum December 3, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in History, Preservation, Road trips.4 comments
Claudia Heller, a correspondent of Route 66 stories for several Southern California newspapers, including the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, tells about a journal from a 1930 road trip on a fledgling Route 66 from Los Angeles to Chicago.
Mary Desbrow wrote in the journal as she, her husband, and two children made the trip when U.S. Highway 66 was less than four years old. Mary’s daughter-in-law found the journal about 20 years ago, after Mary died.
From the Tribune’s story:
The journal starts in Los Angeles in March: “Had 74 dollars. Bought gas in Alhambra for $1.05 and two tires for $4.” Traveling through the California desert, Mary wrote: “This is all desert – few houses. Got puncture in tire. Tube was no good so we bought one for 75 cents. Awfully windy. Passed Ludlow about 3 p.m. … Got to Siberia, a nice place.”
They ventured through Bagdad and on to Needles, where they encountered a storm. “It’s a nice little town, right on the Colorado River,” she wrote. The family stayed in camps, often sleeping outside. Typically when
it rained, they slept in cabins. She wrote: “For $1.25, one room, bed, mattress, wood stove, table and two chairs.”
They were thrilled to see “prehistoric Indian caves,” were stopped by the authorities “to see if we had fruit,” and mailed postcards home from Hackberry, Ariz. They passed through Williams, picking up two young men in Peach Springs who needed a ride.
“Passed through Flagstaff, Winslow, Holbrook and Navajo and stayed in Albuquerque,” she wrote, noting that “we had little pavement in Gallup, the 13 miles on the west side was rough.”
The journal revealed a trek full of automobile repairs, primitive roads, bad weather and Spartan facilities — hardships that modern travelers would find intolerable.
Marilyn Desbrow reportedly will donate a copy of the journal to the National Park Service Route 66 Preservation Program repository at the Autry National Center in Los Angeles. I sure hope the NPS digitizes the journal so researchers can read it online.
Route 66 attractions guide now available for GPS December 2, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Attractions, Maps.27 comments
A touring company based in Oregon has just released a download for several Garmin global-positioning systems that will guide travelers to literally hundreds of attractions along the entire length of Route 66.
River Pilot (yes, that’s his name) of River Pilot Tours in Oakland, Ore., has developed a $9.99 download, “Route 66 Attractions,” for Garmin Nuvi, Zumo or StreetPilot GPS units. With a high-speed connection, it can be downloaded in less than 10 minutes.
“Route 66 Attractions” became available to the public this week.
(Disclosure: I helped Pilot track down or verify a couple of obscure Route 66 sites in Oklahoma. He consulted with many other Route 66 experts, maps, and reference books during his research.)
Here’s an animation of what “Route 66 Attractions” looks like in action:
Here are some of the features of “Route 66 Attractions”:
- More than 850 attractions on Route 66 listed.
- Descriptions, photos, websites, addresses, and phone numbers for hundreds of these locations.
- Attractions include those on obscure Route 66 alignments, including Cuervo Cut-Off and La Bajada Hill in New Mexico, Sidewalk Highway in Oklahoma, Jericho Gap in Texas, and the original Santa Fe alignment.
- Information is up-to-date, as data was gathered in late 2010. It will be updated quarterly.
Pilot said in an e-mail he began legwork for the project in March, and traveled Route 66 for 24 days in August. Another three months was spent on production.
“One of the goals of the product was to ensure accuracy as it’s ultimately being delivered on a digital platform. I choose to create the product based on historical fact and accuracy first and then add the charm of the road and all of the people on it after that.”
Next up on Pilot’s plate is to develop a companion GPS program that provides turn-by-turn directions.
“I have compiled the Route 66 main tour route that we all know, as well as some of the major old alignments, into a digital map. From there, I plan to offer Turn By Turn Directions of Route 66 that actually works. GPS accuracy on the content I have is currently +/- 10 feet . That’s sufficient to allow folks to pop that information into their GPS and get real and accurate Turn By Turn directions of the road. They can even select the old alignments if they are feeling adventurous. Finally, with the latest technology, that content can be delivered into all of the major languages from throughout the world. This can only get better as GPS accuracy is going to improve dramatically by 2014 with the deployment of new satellites and navigation equipment.”
Pilot also said he might consider other historic highways for future GPS projects.
UPDATE: For a few days, the price has been $19.99 for a download. This is a mistake, and tech folks are working to correct it.
Excerpts of an e-mail I received from Pilot:
Long story short is it’s a misprint. I just got off the phone with the distributor and that price was intended for another product. It should be changed back to the $9.99 within 24 – 48 hours. They are adding titles and updates daily and it appears that one of their IT folks updated my file instead of another.
Thank you very much for the feedback and sorry for the confusion. I appreciate your support and time.
(Graphics courtesy of River Pilot)
The man behind “Route 66: A Road Trip through the Bible” December 2, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Religion, Road trips.2 comments
The Houston Chronicle tracked down Pastor Bruce Wersen, the man behind all the “Route 66: A Road Trip through the Bible” videos that have been posted on YouTube (and on Route 66 News) in the past year or so.
Wersen, 48, leads the His Place Community Church in Burlington, Wash. Using each of the Bible’s 66 books as a narrative springboard, Werson plays straight man as he converses with biblical hitchhikers in an old convertible.
A few excerpts from the interview:
Q: What prompted this project?
A: My training was in film, not seminary, so I approach things a bit differently as a pastor. Other churches have had sermon series called “Route 66″ (for the Bible’s 66 books), but we thought, why not take that idea to the next level and actually go down the real Route 66 and pick up characters as hitchhikers? [...]
Q: You’re on a tight budget, and your church is hundreds of miles north of Route 66. How did you film the opening sequence and background shots?
A: One of the office gals went on Craigslist and found a ’62 Falcon for $600, so we bought it, chopped the roof off and made a poor man’s convertible. A fella in the church volunteered to put the car on a trailer and drive it down to Arizona. We stayed in a $35 motel that was just horrible, and then we got up early and spent the next day filming the backgrounds. Every time we’d see a scenic shot, we’d jump out and get the car off the trailer. By 6 o’clock that night, we were heading home.
Clarification: I’m fairly certain nearly all of the background footage in the series was shot in California’s Mojave Desert, not Arizona.
Wersen choose this video, based on the Book of Haggai, as his favorite:
An Aussie in America December 1, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Road trips, Television.add a comment
Affable television host and race-car driver Grant Denyer has been traveling Route 66 in an old Cadillac in the past few days and doing live feeds back home to Australia for the “Sunrise Channel 7″ show.
Today, the show start putting his Route 66 segments on YouTube. The channel is here, but here are the segments most relevant to the Mother Road:
I’m certain more videos will be posted in the coming days. He intends to go all the way to the Santa Monica Pier, and he’s barely in Oklahoma.
Denyer’s Route 66 Roadtrip for Sunrise Facebook page is here, and he’s also been posting on his Twitter account.
UPDATE: KTUL-TV posted a story about Denyer and his camera crew’s stop at Ollie’s Station in Tulsa.
“We all sound the same we all look the same we all are the same, America we go to all these little micro-nations everywhere and we just love arriving in different places, you get warm hospitality everywhere you go,” says Grant Denyer. [...]
Inside of Ollie’s the bloaks [sic] were all business.
“They ordered chicken fried steak which was funny because when they ordered it they thought they were getting chicken well it’s beef,” says Forester.
“We are weighing ourselves everyday to see how much weight we put on and the person that puts on the most weight gets free beer all night at the end of the trip,” says Denyer.
UPDATE2: The Daily Miner in Kingman, Ariz., reports that Denyer and his crew will be in Kingman this weekend. Here’s a little tidbit I didn’t know:
“The crew is basically doing a two-fold project,” Durkin said. “They’re taking about eight days to do the whole route, and their goal is to film segments to air every morning on this morning show, but they’re also gathering video footage to put together a one-hour special.”
Route 66 volunteer nominated for top citizen December 1, 2010
Posted by Ron Warnick in Books, Events, People.add a comment
The Lincoln Courier newspaper in Lincoln, Ill., is set to announce its Citizen of the Year tomorrow night, and one of the 11 nominees is a longtime Route 66 advocate.
That nominee is Lucille Pech of Atlanta, Ill. The Courier writes:
Lucille Pech, a longtime Logan County advocate and member of the Abraham Lincoln Tourism Bureau of Logan County and curator of the Atlanta Museum, is an avid history collector and is passionate about supporting the Mother Road that runs through her hometown. She has earned the unofficial title of “Route 66 Grandma.”
Here’s the Courier’s Citizen of the Month article earlier in the year that enabled her to be a nominee.
Pech has been a Route 66 champion for so long, she was mentioned in the acknowledgements of the first edition of Michael Wallis’ best-selling book, “Route 66: The Mother Road,” in 1992.
Pech also was honored as the grand marshal of Atlanta’s Fall Festival Parade in 2007.
She’s lived in Atlanta since shortly marrying her husband, Joseph, in 1936.
UPDATE: The Citizen of the Year was John Sutton, who is helping restore The Mill along Route 66 in Lincoln.