Amid an announcement this week that the Bloomington-Normal Convention and Visitors Bureau and the McLean County Museum of History is joining in a partnership was this little item, courtesy of WJBC radio:
The Bureau and Museum are working together on a new Abraham Lincoln and Route 66 Visitors Center. “Cruisin’ with Lincoln on Route 66” will be located on the first floor of the museum and CVB Director Crystal Howard said more information will be coming in the next few weeks.
The museum’s online calendar doesn’t have anything listed about a Route 66 exhibit at the visitors center through August, so it appears nothing yet is imminent.
However, Lincoln did frequently travel the path that became Route 66 during his early days as a lawyer, so the tie-in between those 19th- and 20th-century icons isn’t as incongruous as it might first appear.
The museum, at 200 N. Main St. in Bloomington (map here), is about a block west of old Route 66, marked as northbound U.S. Business 51 through town.
(Image of the old McLean County Courthouse in Bloomington by Todd Ryburn via Flickr)
I love this site. I learn something new almost every post.
Lincoln on (what became) 66, Sundown towns, the bit on Gallup the other day… it just goes on.
Please keep up the good work.
Wow…maybe they’ll improve the poor south-to-north Rte. 66 markings as part of their effort. This is one twisty town to follow the Route through if you are going “the wrong way”.