In the past few days, dozens of five-minute video clips from episodes of the original “route 66” television drama have shown up on YouTube.
It’s a shame the entire episode can’t be viewed on YouTube in one click, but copyright laws and a general policy of keeping YouTube video clips brief prevent that.
Still, even with short excerpts, they provide a “route 66” novice a decent idea what a well-written and socially progressive series it was.
Here’s an excerpt from one of the best-known episodes, “Good Night, Sweet Blues,” in 1961. It stars Ethel Waters as a dying blues singer:
The person responsible for posting these clips is ZacharyTheThird. I asked him what his motivation was for doing this:
I’m doing this because I loved the show, and it’s not available to my knowledge. I was fortunate enough to get the entire series on ebay, but even then it was because the individual had recorded each episode from Nick-At-Nite (1985 or so).
ZacharyTheThird, at last count, has nearly 40 clips from the “route 66” series posted, and I’m sure more are coming. You can pick and chose from the segments here.
I think the overall excellence of “route 66,” the strong interest in the Mother Road, and the fact two books about the series are being released about the same time, tell me that a proper, official DVD release of the television series is long overdue. I’ve been told that there are other DVDs out there of the series available, but their quality is erratic.