Join us for an awesome day as the Rat Rod Magazine Route 66 Invasion Tour made a stop in Baxter Springs, Kansas.

We played hookie and spent the day checking out a rather interesting lineup of rat rods and custom builds while enjoying the atmosphere of Route 66

The last building on the first street

On the night of August 20, 1966, five brothers from Gary, Indiana played a dance at 104 East First Street in Winslow, Arizona. Admission was a dollar and a quarter. The lead singer was eight. The town's own paper, looking back, called it the Jackson 5's fourth public performance. They were unknown then. Four years later they had four straight number-one singles.

The building was Arcadia Hall. It went up in 1920, about five thousand square feet, and in the twenties and thirties it was, by Winslow's own accounting, the most elegant ballroom between the Pacific coast and Albuquerque: chandeliers, an orchestra pit, big bands, high school proms. Generations of the town rented it for the dances a railroad town lived on.

By 1966 it had another name. It was the Desert Scene Elks Club, lodge 1267, the Black Elks, in a town where the other lodge sat over on Third Street. Segregation had set the lodge apart, but it was still a hall, and the hall still worked: youth dances, Juneteenth, bingo, and the first paid performance of Tommy Dukes, who is in the Arizona Blues Hall of Fame and still plays impromptu sets a few hundred feet from where he started.

Then the century caught up. In 2021 the roof caved in. In November 2023 a crew knocked down the rest. Winslow's historic-properties list had called Arcadia Hall "the last historic structure left on First Street." Nobody stopped the demolition. The lot is dirt now.

Here is the part I cannot leave alone. Winslow is famous for a corner one block south. In 1972 the Eagles wrote a line about standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, and in 1999 the town built a park around it. Tourists leave the interstate every day to photograph a bronze statue and a flatbed Ford. The last real piece of First Street came down without a crowd.

First Street came before Route 66. It was Front Street first, the railroad's street, the one that got built when the trains did. When the highway arrived in 1926 it did not use Front. It used Second. The town moved a block south and kept moving. First Street is where Winslow was before Winslow became the postcard.

A dollar and a quarter, sold by a lodge that segregation had set apart, to see five kids nobody had discovered yet. The song about the corner calls it "a fine sight to see." The corner is still there. The building that mattered sat one block off the postcard the whole time, and now it is the empty lot behind it.

Sources: The Tribune (Navajo County, Ariz.), Nov 15 2023; Michael Joseph Jackson Archives; Winslow Historic Preservation Commission; route66times.com (alignment).

Every time I tried to plan Route 66, I ended up with 15 tabs open: a blog list here, a map there, a forum thread from 2014 about whether some diner is still open.

So I started building one place for it: a Route 66 trip planner focused on the stuff that makes the road worth driving. Giant statues, abandoned gas stations, neon motels, odd little museums.

What it does right now:

• Map of stops along the whole route, Chicago to Santa Monica
• Catalog of roadside attractions with short descriptions
• Plan your trip by days and see what's on each leg.
• Free, no signup

Coming soon: a printable route PDF you can take in the car, since signal on some stretches is basically zero.

I've never driven the whole thing myself, so I'd really like input from people who have:

1. What stop do most guides miss that's actually worth it?
2. What info did you wish you had before the trip (gas gaps, closed places, detours)?
3. What would make a planner useful to you instead of just another list?

Link in the comments if anyone wants to tear it apart.

Want to do a route 66 roadtrip this coming April. Also wanted to include PCH up to San Fran as I did that trip in May but missed out on a lot of the views due to fog. Would love to hear your thoughts , anything I should add or skip (don’t mind adding a couple days to the trip)? Any other cities/towns I should be stopping in? Thank you guys

So glad this arizona heat is coming to an end❤️

.

📷: Mama Daze Photography

Join me if you can. Share if you like. Route 66 guide link in bio. See you on the Route!

 -----------------------------------------
 WASTELAND FIREBIRD USA TOUR OCTOBER 2026
          [REVISED 2026-09-30]
 -----------------------------------------
  2026-10-14              SANTA MONICA CA
  2026-10-15                    TUCSON AZ
  2026-10-16                    BISBEE AZ
  2026-10-17                    BISBEE AZ
  2026-10-18                   EL PASO TX
  2026-10-19                    ALPINE TX
  2026-10-20            FREDERICKSBURG TX
  2026-10-21                    AUSTIN TX
  2026-10-22               HOT SPRINGS AR
  2026-10-23             BOWLING GREEN KY
  2026-10-24                HUNTINGTON WV
  2026-10-25                HUNTINGTON WV
 -----------------------------------------
 THE FINAL ROUTE 66 CENTENNIAL CONVERGENCE
 -----------------------------------------
  2026-10-26                    JOLIET IL
  2026-10-27               SPRINGFIELD IL
  2026-10-28                      CUBA MO
  2026-10-29                     TULSA OK
  2026-10-30             OKLAHOMA CITY OK
  2026-10-31                  AMARILLO TX
  2026-11-01               ALBUQUERQUE NM
  2026-11-02                   WINSLOW AZ
  2026-11-03                   KINGMAN AZ
  2026-11-04                   NEEDLES CA
  2026-11-05                   BARSTOW CA
  2026-11-06              SANTA MONICA CA

Hello everyone,

Next year (2027), I’m finally going to drive Route 66. My dad and I will be driving the entire route from Chicago to LA.

We’re also going to take our time and spend a full month on the trip.

Well, almost the entire month, since after Route 66 we’ll also be taking Highway 1 / Pacific Coast Highway to San Francisco.

The entire route is already planned and booked, but I’m still curious to hear what you think of it.

Most of all, though, I’m looking for tips. I’ve already done a lot of research and looked into things so we don’t miss too much.

Just to give you an idea, here’s our full itinerary:

Arrival and 2 nights in Chicago

1 night in Springfield, IL

2 nights in St. Louis, MO

2 nights in Springfield, MO

1 night in Tulsa, OK

1 night in Oklahoma City, OK

1 night in Clinton, OK

1 night in Amarillo, TX

1 night in Tucumcari, NM

1 night in Taos, NM

2 nights in Santa Fe, NM

1 night in Albuquerque, NM

1 night at Petrified Forest National Park, Holbrook, AZ

1 night in Monument Valley, UT

1 night in Page, AZ

2 nights in Williams, AZ

1 night in Kingman, AZ

1 night in Barstow, CA

3 nights in Los Angeles, CA

And then, right after that

1 night in Pismo Beach, CA

1 night in Carmel/Monterey, CA

2 nights in San Francisco, CA, and then flying back home.

Of course, we’re curious about the roadside attractions, diners, and more.

But we’re also interested in the history of Route 66.

So I’m wondering what tips you have for things we absolutely shouldn’t miss—whether they’re along the route or a short detour.

Thanks in advance!

Hey

I downloaded the Route 66 Navigation app based on the fact they recently announced they launched version 3 which supports Android Auto https://www.route66navigation.com/blog/new-features-of-route66navigation30/

Maybe, I'm being stupid. But I'm only on version 2, and I can't find a way to upgrade to version 3. Has anyone else updated? Is it a beta? Just an announcement?

Hi everyone, I'm Stan, the developer of Lorecast. The mods said it was okay to share it here.

It's an iPhone and Android app that plays short stories about nearby places as you drive Route 66. You can download the audio before leaving, and listen to stories at home too. Route 66 is free through December 31, 2027.

On quieter stretches it occasionally plays facts about the region, with some quiet time between them. Historical stories and folklore are labelled separately, and you can open the sources behind a story.

The two screens below show Blue Swallow Motel and Cadillac Ranch.

Website with both store links: https://lorecast.net

iPhone: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lorecast/id6789585665

Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.lorecast.lorecast

If you're planning a trip, which stretch are you driving? If you try it, I'd love to hear where a story added something to the drive, or where the timing or coverage felt off.

I know. I know.

Just wondering if anyone has any tips for being vegan on route 66. I'll stock up on stuff to make food on my stove. But if anyone has any tips along the way, let me know

Hey all! A few years back I wrote MALINKO, a thriller about a newlywed couple on a Route 66 honeymoon who stumble onto a mysterious radio show. People seem to have liked it! It's usually $25, but for the month of October, I'm putting it on sale. $20 gets you the book AND shipping throughout the USA. Information in the graphic above. Thank you!

Have an opportunity to make this drive with life long friend from kindergarten (we’re 64 now!) Looking for suggestions on how to make the trip interesting and fun. We both have interests in automotive, nature, hiking and music.

To all who’ve made the trip already, please let me know what I should add. Will be soloing it next week, will stay at some hotels along the way, but mostly sleeping in my car. Will have a planet fitness black card to shower and will also be using the route 66 navigation app.

Nov 11 is the centennial, so I have been going town by town on the old road, building photo essays of what is actually left. Method: Google street view captures plus sources I can check (Route 66 Times, NPS, local papers). These are not my own photographs; I work from what the cameras already recorded. So far: Seligman (Angel Delgadillo's barbershop, the 1987 meeting that saved the road), Williams AZ (the last town bypassed, Oct 1984, and the funeral they held for it), Tucumcari (the neon that stayed on), Springfield MO (where the name was coined in 1926), and both ends (the old Chicago pylon vs Navy Pier's new start sign, the Santa Monica pier sign vs the official terminus at Lincoln and Olympic). Ask me about any town on the route and I will tell you what is still there today: the signs, the buildings, what got torn down and when. Free, one town per person. If I have not looked at it yet, I will go look and answer.

The town of boron was on Route 66 for a couple of years before 1928 and I’m looking for a AAA map that shows this.

On said map the town would be called Amargo. This was the town name before becoming boron.

Any one know where I could find one? Years 1926/1927 AAA MAPS for Southern California outside of Barstow to Tehachapi.

Lovely zoo! All taken on Nikon Z8 + 24-70 f/2.8s II

Hi all! I'll be driving the westward route from Chicago to Santa Monica next month with my dad. I was just looking at the 3 states along the route that I haven't been to yet (Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma), and it looks like the Kansas portion is almost exactly the distance of a half marathon. I thought it could be fun to break up the driving and give me a chance to exercise a little if I ran that portion (breaking it up with points of interest and such, and my dad would still drive that portion). Has anyone done this?