A man from Luther, Oklahoma, who built a labyrinth made of thousands of abandoned bricks from old Route 66 wants to eventually turn the site into a tourist attraction, including as a wedding venue.
Brent Byrd, who owns a barber shop in nearby Arcadia, Oklahoma, learned about a year ago about the orphaned bricks from roadwork on Kelley Avenue (aka Route 66) in north Oklahoma City. He estimated he hauled away about 10,000 of the bricks and sold a few for $20 apiece at his shop.
Most of the bricks, however, ended up on his property near Luther, and he built a labyrinth that’s large and complex enough that he said it takes him and his son about seven minutes to walk it.
News9 in Oklahoma a few days ago produced this wide-ranging video about Route 66 in Oklahoma. The Brent Byrd material about his labyrinth begins about the 1:50 mark.
News9.com – Oklahoma City, OK – News, Weather, Video and Sports |
Contacted by phone Monday, Byrd said he was applying for a grant to help speed along the development of the labyrinth property. He couldn’t remember which grant it was because a friend was taking care of its paperwork for him. He said, however, it wasn’t an application to the soon-to-sunset Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program.
In addition to the wedding venue, Byrd also wants to add a gift shop to the labyrinth. With luck, Byrd said he’s hopeful the complex would be ready by next year.
The labyrinth sits on private property and isn’t open to the public for now. It sits about a mile northwest of the historic Threatt Filling Station east of Luther. Sharp-eyed readers probably can figure out where it is via satellite images on Google Maps.
(Aerial screen-capture image from a video of the labyrinth made of Route 66 bricks near Luther, Oklahoma, courtesy of Brent Byrd)