Book review: “Route 66 St. Louis”

In the preface to her new book, Norma Maret Bolin says the purpose of her previous work, “The Route 66 St. Louis Cookbook,” was to raise funds for a more expansive historical recounting of Route 66 in the Gateway City.

If you’ll excuse the pun, Bolin really got cooking with her enormous new volume, “Route 66 St. Louis: From the Bridges to the Diamonds” (St. Louis Transitions, softcover, $29.99).

Simply put, “Route 66 St. Louis” stands tall as one of the best history books I’ve read. This 470-page beast oozes with detail about hundreds of former and existing landmarks and businesses that dot St. Louis’ half-dozen alignments of Route 66. It’s jammed with images from old photographs, vintage advertisements and even match covers. The book also contains chapters about select people, including Route 66 aficionado Jane Dippel and “Route 66” composer Bobby Troup.

Route 66 fans and historians will find this book invaluable for years to come because of all the facts and anecdotes Bolin has collected. “Route 66 St. Louis,” along with Kip Welborn’s recent “Things to Look Out for on Route 66 in St. Louis,” has turned 2010 into a banner year for St. Louis roadies.

Bolin credited her background in the hospitality industry and as a lawyer for her impeccable research for this book. She conducted dozens of interviews, pored over books, magazines and newspaper articles, and even consulted old telephone directories.

As a result, even the most seasoned roadies will appreciate Bolin’s work when they inevitably find new information, such as:

• Guardrails on the now-closed MacArthur Bridge, aka Free Bridge, were found to be notoriously fragile, resulting in motorists plunging more than 150 feet into the Mississippi River during accidents.
• Carl’s Drive-In restaurant serves original-formula IBC root beer, made from sugar and not corn syrup.
• The Eat-Rite Diner started as an oil and coal business, then a gas station, before coming the White Kitchen restaurant in the 1930s, then the Regal Sandwich Restaurant, then the Gateway Sandwich Shop before becoming the Eat-Rite.
• Ted Drewes Frozen Custard used honey as a substitute when World War II rationing caused sugar shortages. Drewes kept honey as a crucial ingredient when he discovered the custard tasted better with it.
• The castle-like intake towers near the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge on the Mississippi River once were occupied as living quarters for city water employees up until the 1930s. Also, contrary to popular belief, Tower No. 1 never served as a lighthouse.

Bolin also doesn’t back away in telling  the dark side of a Route 66 landmark. She devotes several paragraphs to a double-murder on the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge in 1991 — years before the bridge was converted to a pedestrian and bicycle path. At least one of the suspects was put to death for the crime and another awaits execution, although many of the details from the killings remain murky. Bolin wrote:

The cases have been widely criticized as being filled with police brutality, prosecutorial misconduct, racial bias, and unanswered questions about what actually happened that night and who did what, with some testimony simply not adding up and the defendants arguably tried for the actions of the group as a whole. These issues led to question about the appropriateness of the death penalty in the cases while there was also a huge public outcry for justice for the Kerry sisters.

Bolin wrote chapters on the dioxin-waste saga of the now-deceased town of Times Beach, Mo., plus an extensive interview with former Times Beach mayor Marilyn Leistner. The tales of a road contractor’s neglect that led to the town’s toxic contamination and subsequent dithering by health officials will infuriate. Bolin also busts the chops of the Missouri Department of Transportation for failing to maintain the now-condemned Route 66 bridge at the former Times Beach site.  The Times Beach portion of “Route 66 St. Louis” is worth the price of the book alone.

Also praiseworthy are chapters about St. Louis’ early history, including its steamboat era, the American Indian origins of St. Louis’ “Mound City” nickname, and details on the infamous Dred Scott court case, which further inflamed the nation against slavery and inexorably toward the Civil War.

Ted Drewes Jr., who wrote the forward, neatly summarizes this amazing book:

Norma Bolin gives you the opportunity to look beyond our storefronts to the people behind the various businesses. I invite you to take an intimate look at the many families in St. Louis that have been a part of the Route 66 story. Some came and went quickly, often the victims of traffic patterns gone awry. Sometimes the family businesses lost out because of health concerns or a failure to keep their niche, and the flame went out. Here, Norma will take you into the living rooms of some of us who stuck around and also the many that live on only in memories.

“Route 66 St. Louis” comes highly recommended; roadies will find it indispensable.

(“Route 66 St. Louis” can be found at these St. Louis-area shops, or you can order it online by PayPal, Google Checkout, or a mail-order form.)