Route 66 Preservation Efforts Accelerate For Centennial

(MENAFN- USA Art News) Preservation efforts are intensifying for US Route 66 as the historic highway approaches its centennial year. Officially launched on November 11, 1926, as part of the nation's first federal highway system, the route became a cultural landmark, fostering a unique vernacular identity along its almost 2,500 miles through eight states, from Chicago, Illinois, to Santa Monica, California. This culture encompassed everything from neon signs and themed motels to roadside attractions featuring concrete and fiberglass sculptures.

Decommissioned in 1985, Route 66 saw its Art Deco service stations and mid-century diners bypassed by new highways. Now, 100 years after its debut, initiatives nationwide aim to preserve the surviving remnants of what was once known as the“Main Street of America.”

“We want to let people outside of Route 66 know that it's more than what you think it is,” said Rhys Martin, manager of the Preserve Route 66 Initiative at the National Trust for Historic Preservation.“Most people think of '57 Chevys and cheeseburgers and Marilyn Monroe, and there's a lot of that, but there's so much more. It ties together so many diverse cultures, from Native American to African American. In my home state of Oklahoma, it goes through the Asian District [in Oklahoma City], which sprung up around Vietnamese refugees during the war. In West Hollywood, Route 66 has a huge LGBTQ presence.”

Grants from the Preserve Route 66 Initiative reflect this broad historical scope, often overlooked amid nostalgia for Americana. Projects include structural repairs, such as at the Fanning 66 Outpost in Cuba, Missouri, home to a 42-foot-high rocking chair, which was the world's largest until 2015. Storytelling initiatives, like mapping Native American experiences along the corridor, are also underway, addressing the road's passage through tribal and ancestral lands with limited representation of Indigenous voices. Preservation also extends to rare sections of original pavement; local advocacy helped protect the Ribbon Road in Ottawa County, Oklahoma, which features the last segment of a 9-foot-wide design made for Model Ts, from resurfacing this year.

Martin highlighted the historical significance of the road itself.“You might think a pavement's not art, but when you get out and look at it, especially compared to what it is today, it is very different,” Martin said.“I have come to really appreciate it from a craftsmanship perspective, but also a longevity perspective. These are the same roads that the Model Ts went west on during the Dust Bowl to seek a better life, and the fact that I get to drive these same roads tells a story.”

Advocacy is progressing to grant Route 66 National Historic Trail designation, with a bipartisan bill introduced last year. Martin noted that Route 66 currently resembles its pre- 1926 state, a loose network of roads, and this legislation would help unify its fragmented sections.“It gets people to sit at the same table, like the state Route 66 associations, the National Park Service and the Department of Transportation, so that we can find ways to work together for corridor-wide initiatives and to help elevate preservation needs,” he explained.“The corridor continues to evolve, and buildings are threatened all the time with demolition or augmentation beyond recognition, and being designated as a National Historic Trail is not a roadblock. But it is something to say, this is important and we need to take care when the fabric of the road might be forever altered.”

Local groups, municipalities, and individuals are actively stewarding Route 66 relics. Martin, also president of the Oklahoma Route 66 Association, is involved in restoring a U-Haul painted by the late artist Bob Waldmire, known for illustrating maps and postcards of the road's landmarks. In 2020, the city of Catoosa, Oklahoma, acquired the beloved roadside Blue Whale from the family of Hugh S. Davis, who sculpted the 80-foot-long concrete attraction in 1972 as a gift for his wife. Last May, a new Blue Whale Visitor Center opened, complete with retro illuminated signage.

Similarly, the city of Albuquerque opened a Route 66 Visitor Center last April, featuring a collection of restored roadside signs in its park. This includes the first major project from the Friends of the Orphan Signs (FOS), an organization that has revitalized abandoned signs since 2010, particularly in Albuquerque's underserved neighborhoods.

Lindsey Fromm, executive director of FOS, stated that many of these signs belonged to places demolished during the city's removal of derelict buildings.“There were areas of Route 66 with dozens of towering empty signs,” Fromm said. While most Route 66 sign restorations aim for historical accuracy, FOS reimagines them as public art. The 2012 project Revivir at the new visitor center involved students designing visuals inspired by local nature, bordered with purple neon.

“While artists lead these sign projects, they will collaborate with communities, archives, the surrounding environment, or will collect histories and stories to create the work that is displayed, so that it speaks to the immediate moment and surrounding community who live, work and travel by the sign,” Fromm said. These projects extend beyond tourism, highlighting Route 66's ongoing role in daily life. Grassroots and national efforts recognize its continued importance as a connection from the Midwest to the Pacific, linking urban and rural communities, and uniting visitors and residents on their journeys.

Source: The Art Newspaper

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