Old motel cabins on Route 66 in Joplin, Missouri, soon will be razed or removed, according to a story by a business columnist Wally Kennedy in the Joplin Globe newspaper.
The item was tucked into a story about Rob’s Audio Solutions, which was forced to move from 2604 N. Range Line Road (aka Route 66) to a new location on Joplin’s Main Street:
He learned last fall that Casey’s General Store was eyeing the property, which is located at the northwest corner of Zora Street and Range Line.
In March, some tenants in the small Route 66 travel court cabins next to his business were given 30 days’ notice to move out. When that happened, the deal closed. Each of those cabins had been occupied. The original corridor for Route 66 turned west at that corner as it meandered through Royal Heights to Langston Hughes-Broadway and then downtown Joplin.
Dates are a bit sketchy, but it is correct that the corner of Zora and Range Line was where a segment of the Ozark Trail existed and, later on, a post-1955 alignment of Route 66. That part of Range Line remained Route 66 until about 1972.
You can see the old cabins in this Google Street View image here:
I’ve been unable to ascertain what Route 66 motel was there. Looking over Joe Sonderman’s 66 Postcards site, the surviving cabins look like the ones in this Cottage Inn postcard image. Or it could be remnants of the Star Tourist Camp.
If you have any data that would indicate what motel was at that corner, let us know in the comments section.
UPDATE 5/28/2014: Ron Hart at the Route 66 Chamber of Commerce has ascertained through several sources that the former motel property was the Lincrest Court and Cafe, which also had a Conoco station. Hart also found the Joplin Globe archives listed the motel as new in 1946.
Here’s an early 1950s image of a postcard of the motel from 66Postcards.com:
Note the postcard’s Webb City address. Apparently the motel was only about a mile from Joplin city limits.
Skip Curtis’ “The Missouri U.S. 66 Tour Book” also had this listing about the motel complex:
“Clean, Cool and Comfortable. Eat, Sleep and Gas Up. Mr. and Mrs. T.I. Halley, Prop.”